how would you explain your Kosovo tour in a few words there's not a few words to explain it to be honest with you it made me feel how can human beings do this to human beings North Helman Province the patrol went in and they went into the kill box they got opened up on by the Taliban I was there all day on the hill just happened to look up where I shot the Dicker and there was two guys lying down they turned out to be Taliban leaders I fired my third shot and I counted in my head 1 two three you mentioned PTSD how difficult has that been for you absolutely crippling I got a voice in my head I take meds for it and it just says I'm vile and there's been no support or help from the Army at all no at all you're gone you're gone some days I wish I lost a leg or cuz maybe I have something to show for my bow scars instead of having mental health or PTSD [Music] Craig welcome to the show mate always George thanks for having me yeah very much looking forward to this one it's been a while bouncing back and forward hasn't it to get us here yeah be bu busy man absolutely and we'll go into that later as well where did you grow up and how did you get the world's longest sniper kill Jesus there two questions there you know um I was born in chham y in gler and um I was sort of um there's no job prospects in um in chant at all as where old people just go and disappear and retire and stuff so um at an early age I had I was sort of like mentor to join these forces cuz my mom was in the RF my dad was in the my granddad was in the RF so I joined the army you know but I had horses um when I was younger my my childhood was good you know and F blessed to have horses and um I wanted to become a farer and there's no in chant there was no farers taking on apprenticeships what's a farer uh to put some the shoes on the horses like a blacksmith sort of thing you know um so I joined the house of Cavalry um to become um a farer and uh but when you go in the Forge in in in the Army you're time barred for a certain amount of time because they spent all that money on you you just can't do the course and go [ __ ] it get out now you your time B you have to do a certain am bit of time so um yeah I started doing that and um I was a bit dyslexic when I joined the army so when they set homework up when I joined the household Cavalry and went into my apprentiship they um set you homework to do at night and I was doing more illustration work than actual writing so they did like that my shoe making was all right but my homework was very poor so I didn't get a an opportunity to go down to Mel mry that's where the frier school is to become a farer but trouble is I didn't have a plan B right didn't have a plan B at all I thought [ __ ] I always had a plan a and every time I talk to people now I you know young old or everything I always say have a plan B you have a plan C as a sniper always have a plan C D E and F because we're in this [ __ ] you need to get out you know and um so I was in the house of Cavalry couldn't get in the Forge my dream was shattered so I went awall and joined the French Foreign Legion the French Foreign Legion yeah did you yeah yeah I wasn't there long um because I was quite honest with them I said to him I was awolf from the British Army and they wouldn't accept me because years and years and years ago they would have accepted me because that's where murderers used to go and stuff like that um but they would they wouldn't accept me so um they they kicked me out I was there for about four weeks and um sent back to England and then went back to kns bridge got charged for being able and did 14 days in Nick and uh then I started prize fighting did you yeah I was doing all sorts I was going down a dark path that I didn't want to go down you how old how old were you you started price fighting roughly um I must have been 18 yeah um going on yeah and I start I did it for a couple of years you know my face was batter but then they realized that why is this guy coming back I never got in trouble with the ple oh I did sometimes you know but um I never got trouble for doing the price fighting it was the fact I was going on Queen's lifeguard Dan and Buckingham Palace White Hall with black eyes broken no split lips and stuff like that and it wasn't acceptable for the household Cavalry you know so my regiment split into two so you got the reconnaissance armored side which is based in Windsor and you got the ceremonial side which is based in London in knsb you know and as a child I was a lonely child yeah I was always on my own I didn't have many I got one friend I'm still in contact with now and he's the only friend I've ever had um I've had colleagues and Associates you know and um so I was lonely anyway as a child so becoming um where was I going with it come on what's going with it now the prize fighting oh the prize fighting so to to do to be in London getting a full wage packet [ __ ] me I was a weekend millionaire and to have a childhood like I did I was [ __ ] all over the shop I was getting pissed girls [ __ ] drink every fighting and everything like that and I just went down a hole I couldn't get out of eventually I got out of it you know I remember my last fight that I had it was in a field in Gloucester had bells of straw and I fought this big fat guy with a white vest on with stains on you know typical enow looking person and he headbutted me and I laid on this bail looking at the sky and I thought I'm done I'm [ __ ] done here so I got to my car which is abouted old Rover not tax not insured nothing and I went back to nightsbridge and they said what you going to Windsor uh to the armored side and I went yeah okay I need to get out of London you know so I went to the armored side and I just [ __ ] excelled excelled because I love being outdoors I love being a soldier you know and I don't think the ceremonial side was fulfilling that cuz I didn't have a plan B and I realized after a while that I wanted to become a sniper you know amazing what what sort of trouble you get in with the police um abh gbh just fighting getting drunk and end up fighting I realized after a while that um Lads were just taking me senior Lads of the regiment were taking me on the piss just to get me drunk just to make me fight okay do you know what I mean and I sort of clicked onto it a bit and I thought this is [ __ ] this is this is not what the arm is about you know and I need to really concentrate and I wish i' buckled down more at a younger age in the Army and I'd have probably gone for um SF um you know because I went for it um at an older age and I've got I've got an injury and I never really went back to achieve that role and that's one of my biggest regrets probably he's not not getting not going for the Special Forces yeah yeah not really concentrating I remember my Colonel at the time um um Colonel air he's xsf and he was the colonel of the regiment and I was teaching down the sniper school for two years and I remember him turning around to the chief instructor there and he said that man should have gone somewhere else and he said to me that's what your Colonel does turn around and said to me cuz I was doing I was out and about and he could watch me through the binoculars yeah he said that man should have gone somewhere else wow you know and I always stuck with me that did and I wish I carried on but 95% divorce right what special force you can see why all my friends are special force they've all a little bit different yeah they've you know my wife stuck next to me for the tours that I've done and everything you know and she said I'll stick next year if you if you choose to go SF way but she' never see me you know and I'm very close to my wife yeah so uh would you have chosen win special force would you have chosen SAS or SBS SAS 100% you're in the Army yeah yeah SPS is m is it so I would have gone that way what was it like for you then at that age then you were prize fighting did you enjoy the prize fighting I did to start off with and then I just got addicted to the money yeah you know you're you're fighting um three fights a night you can make 350 crit a fight you know and then the idea is to lose one because if you don't lose one you you got done over outside right okay for your money yeah because they Nick of your money they think you a cookie [ __ ] you know they end up doing you so always always always drop one and I learned that hard way you know um but yeah I just I got I got into that role and I wanted to get out of it really more of the money so what did you see what did you see in that environment that you didn't like um just how dodgy it all was and I thought what the [ __ ] am I doing what am I doing I'm in the British army for [ __ ] sake the British Army and what am I doing down in a dingy old [ __ ] gym with a ring you know it was like a propa pucker gym upstairs and they had to a door Corridor and you go down the corridor and it used to be a big huge room with do you know the cloer chairs everyone sits on you had them on with a ring in the middle and had a hole in the in the in the wall with a door and that's where you go and put your bet a hand would come out take your money and then a ticket will come out you know and I had two stairs on either side uh so one guy would come down one side the other come down the other side you get in the ring and you have a fight and that's it so yeah and what are the rules um freefor all it's no biting no biting no head butting you can use your forearms or your elbows and stuff like that um if you get them down but there's a ref there as well there's you know if you can tap out you can go I've done enough now mate you know when your face is all destroyed and all that you think I've done enough now get me out of here yeah what was your movements then in the Army when you joined what were your movements over those over those years in your sort of late teens coming into your 20s um what do you mean my movements your movements actually going into the army how long you in there for when when did you start realizing I actually want to become a sniper um when I first did my first ARA tour um what year was that um roughly what did we go into Iraq was it 2004 I three four yeah we went into Iraq or three if I remember rightly how old have you have been then um 20 25 25 okay yeah and um we we we had to fight to get into this city called alamara and we fought to get into into the city it was heavily defended by um Saddam Hussein's Red Army and um the Americans went off to Baghdad we went on to um alamara and then we went on to bazra and that was our route we had to take and the Americans went obviously straight to Baghdad and then um we fought our way into alamara and there was a huge football stadium there and we took over the football stadium and used it as our main logistical um HQ so when the fight died down and uh we were doing more um more peacekeeping Road patrols um I had a chance to go in the and she had more chance more downtime so I remember I thought [ __ ] I'm just going to walk around the stadium so I was walking around the stadium and on the top of the stadium wall were snipers placed and uh there Royal Irish snipers so I went up there and um I I was looking at the view and I just started talking to this sniper he didn't take his eye off the glass yeah once he was maintain his focus and everything and when I saw him around the stadium they get treated like adults because they got a different role than a normal foot soldier you know because they they trusted with a Precision weapon system with a with a scope on him and I started talking to him and um I thought this is what I want this is what I want but because I was with the house of Cavalry because we're reconnaissance there was no role for snipers in a reconnaissance role right and so every time a all finish your sergeant major used to come around to you and say what do you want what what courses do you want to do because you need to do career courses cuz you're out there for 9 six months and they say and and I say I want to be a sniper he goes you can't there's no role for it fair enough got back to England want to be a sniper and I just kept badgering and badgering and finally um it's a bloke called his role is called dra it is it's some reconnaissance armored Core and he's in charge of the whole armored court and um he finally decided to let snipers into a reconnaissance role and yeah and I went [ __ ] I want to do it but you got to think in my regiment there were no snipers so I didn't have a precourse I didn't have any beat up or any we call it a beat up so you beat you have a precourse PR going on I had no equipment I didn't know what to take so I went down the sniper school and I tipped up there I was the only house or cavalry one there and um they were all full of poers and guards and they had all their ghillie suits out the OBS boards the sticks rifles spotting Scopes extra Scopes wind meters I was like binoculars I [ __ ] all i' absolutely [ __ ] all you know I was like a ginger step kid honestly so I uh I was I was um I was trying to I said I got I got [ __ ] all what you know I mean luckily a Cold Stream guard goes I got a spare rifle I'll give you a spare rifle yeah and every weekend I had off I went back to the regiment and um I was in the Taylor shop and he gave me the key and I was in the taor shop my wife never saw me she used come down and sit in the taor shop with me just to see me and I was making ghilly suits I was making trousers to make myself more comfortable in the field putting pads on everything yeah U making OBS boards making mistakes giling everything up you know and um yeah I think 35 my course and four passed yeah really yeah how long was that course then it's 9 and 1 half weeks okay of intense training it's [ __ ] full on is it give me an example of intense training for a sniper course so basically you put your kit on your back you have to you have to carry your kit everywhere so there's nothing left in your Billet past your uniform but you have to carry everything with you in the backpack so you got your everything you know you car about100 p on your back every day which is what kg to 4050 kg yeah yeah okay just just tabbing around yeah you know and um your Fitness needs to be spot on and you have to wear your Gil suit everywhere you go give an example what a ghillie suit is so a ghillie suit is camouflag and concealment so you've got this plant behind me you would use the foliage to stick on we call it a shroud yeah and it's like a cape with a hood on and it's got special Loops in it where you stick your foliage okay yeah so there's special ways of putting your foliage though CU a plant's got different Tech yeah and people were sticking them upside down so the roots were sticking up stuff little things you need to remember you know and that's what a GH suit is and then you get some Hessian like a sandbag we call it burlap and you cut it and fray it up and stick it on you look like a wook you know but there there was a saying that veg is The Edge so vegetation is better than synthetic material because you can hide better you know that's what ghillie suits is and what were you doing for N9 and a half weeks on this course for the first four weeks you do range package yeah so you do um near Mid and far shooting and then you have badge tests you cannot progress on to do a be a sniper unless you pass the shooting phase once you pass the shooting phase if you fail the sniper phase you go back to the regiment as a sharpshooter okay all right so but if you fail the shooting phase you cannot progress on through the sniper phase right and the sniper phase is sneaky beaky being a sneaky bastard you know but you have to pass the barge tests and you have to you have to pass the near one the mid one and the far one and the far one's up to 12200 met um shooting and you get UND distance shooting where you don't know where the target's going to pop up and you have to do the calculations and stuff so you're 1,200 MERS away yeah with a sniper yeah y y and what's popping up just little targets little like a figure four Target I remember on my one um we we um we went to um Castle Martin in in Wales yeah and um it was a 36 hour exercise and in that 36 hours the target would have popped up so he could have popped up in half an hour or we could have waited 20 hours or wait food and you have to be on the scope ready to go and on your air sets it would go one two three four five Target down and you're like what the [ __ ] what what I didn't see it but on mine I saw it and I think it was like an fluent K on a white background and then you the Walker will come up to you and he won't give you a position away to stand and he would go what was it doesn't even look at you and you go fling K on a white background and then he report back to the op he says yeah it's flesh and K on a white background he goes yep and then they would move away and a Target would pop up like um figure 12 Target would pop up and you got hit that Target I missed on my first round so I adjusted and hit it on my second yeah and there was only four of us that managed to to hit it bloody hell yeah it was quite a SC [ __ ] Rush as well yeah bet yeah when we set off everyone went right I thought [ __ ] that I'll go left and I found a massive GS Bush and where the sheep have gone underneath it they've holled out it was like a little town under there I was that [ __ ] brilliant I was walking to my f fp's final F I walked to it and I found a wall inside everything I thought bu I could stay every AG the rain was coming down but it wasn't CU of thicks and everything but everyone went right for some reason everyone got pinged going that way quality yeah and I was I je the fu so only four passed yeah after n and a half weeks what was that feeding like knowing that you're actually an official sniper it's quite of a [ __ ] good feeling because you got to think right I've come from a regiment with no I didn't have any practice these par these guards have had a four weeks 6 weeks8 weeks beat up course prior coming down so they're all prepared you know and then I've come down I'm a Jack Jones with my little kick bag going hi how cavy how you doing you know and they've was there any was there anything before you got there that you knew that you were a good shot or was it literally like I just want to be a sniper I don't know if I'm a good shot or not um I used to shoot when I was little air guns and air rifles and stuff like that I used to do trifelon so it was running shooting cross country horses yeah and then swimming yeah and I used to do that when I was younger so I was pretty fit as a kid you know and I used to enjoy the shooting so my shooting was okay you know but never never fired a sniper rifle before never looked for the scope of a sniper rifle didn't understand the clickers the mill dots the mill RADS you know Wind Drift and stuff like that biometric pressure and you know there's so much you got to take into if if you're shooting 1,200 meters away how long is it when you pull that trigger for 6 seconds is it 6 seconds 6 seconds flight yeah my world record Shot was 6 seconds yeah and I was like counting Counting in my head I saw it wow yeah it took uh nine shots to oh we talk about it in but it took me nine shots to get there in the morning and then four shots to kill the two guys yeah wow what was your movements when you become a sniper what was what was your movements after that um you end up just going on tour and and because you were a sniper um you you get used and abused on the tour because you're an asset I remember uh you don't do it anymore they've stopped doing it we SC on exercise in Canada and we call it Med hat um on on the plane and um it used to be like6 million pound this exercise planes involved wagons everything soldiers and everything like that and two snipers held a whole ble group up and that's over 3,000 odd people and vehicles and everything these two snipers cuz it's called tzx yeah so he wears these vests and when you shoot your rifle a beam will come out and your your vest will beep and the only way you can stop the beeping is to lay down to simulate your dead yeah all right and these two snipers just kept popping everyone off and they stopped the whole battle group because they couldn't move anywhere they was in this Valley and they couldn't move anywhere because the snipers and eventually the the instructors the DS went up to him with a gun god gun them we call it Go and they stood up and okay yeah because that's how powerful a sniper is and you think of the second world war and everything you know everyone wants to everyone wants a sniper on hand because they're an asset but when's War's finished they don't want to know you right okay you that's what it's like you get using abused on yeah I'm sure I'm sure what a cool name to have though as a sniper yeah yeah um eventually with more my PTSD and stuff like that it's a curse more than a because it was a trade yeah but it became more of a curse than anything okay you know from the things that you see and do and some of the missions you have to do and some of the shots you have to do you know um Yeah you sort of you don't enj somebody said you enjoy it no I don't enjoy it killing people you know you don't enjoy it it's a job and I didn't look at them as people I looked at them as targets more than anything else you know do you remember your first kill yeah I do yeah yeah it was in Iraq and he's in a a desert called the mesan desert and we're in a MOG a mobile operational group and this MOG will move around the desert and the mesan desert is massive you know it's vast it's it's hundreds of hundreds of hundreds of hundreds of miles away and we could be away from anybody and a little kid would always tip up going what what you think where the [ __ ] this kid come from We're hundreds of miles from anywhere and he' just walk off into the desert again you know bizarre these kids do but um this this mobile group kept getting mortared so every time we stopped we got mortared all the time and they were after uh the fuel cans they were after our water to blow them up to to make us um inefficient as a as a as a mobile unit so I eventually got the green light to take the guy out who was [ __ ] us or scouting us we used to call them but then from higher above they said you got to call him Scouts now cuz it's demoralizing to him [ __ ] off [ __ ] a [ __ ] Dicker yeah sorry I can't call you call you a scout you know but yeah we had to call him um Scouts but it was a bloke on a motor bike and he kept following us and every time he followed us stopped we got mortared so I got the green light to take him out so the MOG moved off and as it moved off he came into view so I was laying and had um an Israeli camnet on me and an Israeli camnet is reversible so if you turn it one way it keeps the heat in turn the other way keeps the heat out yeah so I cut a square off this massive canet and I just use it as a as a cover and all the sand on me you couldn't see me at all and he moved along and I [ __ ] yeah I shot him I shot him right here um but you got to think um you know when you see somebody in the desert on the film they always look tall yeah it's the heat Shimmer so it's it's an optical illusion so I always shot lower than than the main and people said why don't you do a head shot because always I always entered for the center of mass you get more destruction there obviously head shot you're going to you're going to do the job but it's a smaller yeah un Le you got a head like a [ __ ] football like a watermelon yeah walking around and um what was that what was that feeling like when you shot him I thought I was in trouble you did did you yeah yeah massively and I went up to him to confirm and he was still alive and he was gasping through air and he had a radio next to him which was still talking um and we call it icon icon chatter and um he was still talking and I checked his body he had maps on him with every location that we stopped in the desert um his motorbike was wedged into the um the sand the throttle was stuck in revving its tits off and then AK47 strapped to the side of it you know and um he eventually passed away and and um could I have saved him probably not horrific you know little exit W exit WS big he just bled out you know and then I I I remember kneeling against him shutting his eyes and then um I've got the other Lads to bring up a body bag we we bagged him and tagged him and sent him back and um I remember sitting on my cop bed going I'm in [ __ ] [ __ ] here you know I've just I've just killed someone I've just killed someone oh [ __ ] hell I've just killed someone that's okay and but I I was waiting for a tap on the shoulder to go make you have a quick word of you yeah yeah you just killed someone you Justified to do I [ __ ] sake but nothing happened like that it was like whatever mate good [ __ ] good Mission yeah you know good call good call good shot and I was like ah [ __ ] hell and then you become in your own you become that word sniper you know and the stuff that you do put in the trigger as I said I don't I didn't look at him as people off that I looked him as Target cuz if you constantly look at them as people you never you never get over what you see what you've done yeah yeah wow you said you got given the green light yeah what do you mean by that so um you have to ask permission from higher um you just can't go around killing people yeah you know and um because we were get Mort all the time it was a Justified kill so you know and from high it came down and it came down to my level and he said yeah you got the green light to [ __ ] take him out so I said oh brilliant if it was a red light I would have done it you know no they said you can't take him out what is the what is the rules like if you were like by yourself and you didn't have the green light from anyone and you were like hold on is it G I know I've got to take I've got to take him out what are the rules so if you's if he's carrying a weapon system or he seems to be a threat to you or shooting at you or anything you got the right to to put him down you know um because you've got an optical scope on your rifle you can see you can p you can personally identify him more than you would with the naked eye yeah so um if he put his rifle down and walked away you can shoot him right because you have to justify was that his gun right it was like when we in um Iraq we was in the port called um un Kazar port in Iraq and kids used to thr stones at us all the time and then another kid threw a hand grenade and it hit one of the wagons and blew up but could you shoot that kid you have to prove that was he just thrown a stone or did he throw a hand on it and that's your rout of Engagement and you get a card card 14 Alpha card um to um with your oral engagement on there and it changes all the time you know but if if you got green gun you know you can take you're on a mission you can take it out it's quite hard sometimes because sometimes I was on a mission and I'd be still for four five days looking down into a village looking down into a compound looking at people's pattern of life and then I'd see the Target and he I'd watch him for days I know what he's like I know used to make little stories that to keep my mind occupied oh there's Bob there he goes there's his misses you watching yeah he's going to kick her yeah does all the time I'll keep my mind occupied in that way and then through the net he goes right you got you know you're clear to take him out so because you're as a sniper people think you just go around shooting people yeah you don't the first role of a sniper is to gather lifetime information of the battlefield that is your first role as a sniper being a sneaky bastard getting in there and getting as much information as possible once you've got all that Intel and then you pull back and they said yeah go and take them out right and you go forward again or you stay where you are and you take that Target out right so if you're watching how give me an example how long you'll be watching a compound or someone for longest I've done it as a week just watching One watching a compound compound watching the patterner live Vehicles going in and out watching weapons exchange opion drugs stuff like that you know and you're Gathering as much information you're reaying it all back to higher um so HQ and they're reeling it back to higher higher and then they would say okay then you got a clean clean shot yeah I have might take them out so wow yeah my God what was what was that first toy Iraq Iraq Iraq yeah in what 2003 2004 how long you won that tour for um 6 and a half months was it yeah was that the most dangerous tour of all the tours you've done my last tour in Afghan was was it what year was that roughly um 2009 to 2010 so that 2003 one gave you the sort of I'm a sniper going in there for six months what was that like how would you explain that tour for you um you got a you got a what's it called de compromis yeah you put it in boxes that's what you need to do okay don't take your [ __ ] on with you did you find that easier or hard um I had PTSD from Kosovo without a doubt without a doubt from that first tour from when we went to kovo oh kovo okay yeah without a doubt and um what year was that uh 200 no um 1999 okay so before you even got to Yeah but I I hate the [ __ ] word man up suck it up yeah but that's what you had to [ __ ] do yeah do you know what I mean there was no one to talk to and I remember coming off covo going into a room like this woman sat there and we sat on a chair she look at you goes how do you feel yeah I'm all right okay off you go you go and leave and that was it that was your that was your uh method of finding out if you have PTSD or you know cuz in Koso we we're digging M's Graves up you know hold on what covo 9 you were digging Graves up yeah Mass Graves tell me about this tour so basically we went into we were the first into Kosovo the Cava and then the gkas came in and then the poers came into Pristina which is the major city of Kosovo and it was to kick all the serbians out um of um Kosovo into Serbia and our next primary role was to find a troop house and then Patrol the Serbian border to stop him coming back over and we were getting shot at every single day but we couldn't shoot back CU cuz they were shooting over their border so we couldn't shoot them in Serbia otherwise it ca [ __ ] World War III you know so we just have to wear it and get shot at you know you just have to walk your head down all the time it's [ __ ] horrendous and then once we finish fighting uh we were meant to be pulled out so we were meant to be there for three months fighting and then get pulled out the fact is they didn't have enough people to replace us so after the next three months we had to do hearts and Minds so the person down the road that was shooting at you throwing stones at you killed killed your best mate probably we're giving him a football and colored crayons for his kids making sure he's got water and you know make sure he's got clothes and all that and it was hard it was [ __ ] hard and then um we were digging Mass Graves up and I think the Irish guards were involved in that as well and um yeah so and also we the albanians went over near enough to the The Bard of Serbia to collect their dead and then they bring it back and we had to check the coffins and check the bodies in the coffin and they would been in there for months and months it will degrade we had to wear respirators and stuff like that cuz the smell was horrendous you know I think the worst thing was they had an anti-aircraft gun and they put all the albanians in this wood and uh they let rip with this anti-aircraft gun killed all the albanians and there were suitcases in the trees clothes and everything and then we had to go in and put arm to body match it with oh there a red sleeve there yeah red and put them in coffins and put them in body bags and then take them to the morg in Pristina but the morg was broke in in Pristina so they had Refrigeration ice containers yeah packed full of people dead people and they they couldn't keep up with the crematorium for burning the bodies as many bodies were bringing in yeah jeez it was a horrendous place and you were early 20s here yeah my my God so when you how long were you on that for um I was on that tour do you know I can't remember if we there were for a bit longer if we were there for past 6 months cuz a normal tour is six months but if you know one no one to replace you at that time you stay on a little bit longer which is no big deal you know but um I can't remember if it was a bit longer some saying we stayed there a little bit longer but I can't tell to my head but say six months you know I don't remember I remember I was so BL a about it you know um a little kid running down the road going Mina minina minina mines yeah and and my sergeant major was with me at the time and he had an interpreter with her with him a woman interpreter and um I ran up the road you with all my gear on because I was on duty at the time on the gate and I ran up the road and there were two heads female heads and I remember him clear as day you know and I picked him up and my made he go is there anything C there I no this just two heads and then the female interpreter fainted you know and I didn't realize I was so oh [ __ ] yeah I should have been more bit more we got immune to it I take it yeah like just another dead body yeah exactly yeah and that's what it was like yeah and I remember being in a Minefield as well and we saw a couple of torsos and um we were looking at the map going we're in a Minefield here and we red it back to height and they said no you're not in M field there's nothing on our Maps push forward keep going forward not [ __ ] going forward it's a [ __ ] Minefield yeah you know one the last went for a piss in a bush just fan another Touro and he said yeah we're in a Minefield here you know so we had to ignore them orders and just take the pocking when you got back yeah you know it's all like sitting in a comfy office yeah right yeah you can't keep going forward LED kicking back at you can't pick the ulating ground of so how how much did that affect you personally coming back from that Kosovo tour dealing with all these dead body the smell the smell um I could spot road kill and smell it yeah and it' take me back you know but I was drinking I would say drinking a lot but I was going out on the piss fighting when you got home yeah WS I was just and when you got when you got back did you know cuz PTSD wasn't probably spoken about back then no one was talking about mind health mental health all the things that we'll know about today what was your way of coping was it getting on the piss coming back yeah going on the piss fighting yeah going in the gym yeah then I started running a lot and stuff like that and then yeah and I went down to do my um I went down to do my Commandos course uh down in um where is where they do their commander of course and then um we got sent back because they were having dramas with their instructors and certain recruits they couldn't do an all arms course so it got cancelled so me and my mate we came back and that was my Outlook because I did PE company as well to become airborne and I got my wings and all that did you yeah the parachute reg yeah and I was with the guards Powers so um and I was they put me on that to calm me down because I was just [ __ ] frantic wouldn't say yeah I was just hyperactive you know I just wanted to get were you loose yeah a bit of a loose loose canon cuz you're a big man yeah it must have been quite scary for people seeing you on the piss being and that's why people took me on the piss got me drunk funny to kick off you know I knew no different I'm a single I was a quiet lad in chham isolated from anything never been in a fight in my [ __ ] life got to like I said got to London [ __ ] different Limelight women drinks [ __ ] everything so unlicensed fighting yeah yeah everything so when you come back off that what help is there from that first tour [ __ ] all nothing nothing at all nothing at all there's no decompression going to Cypress it was nothing like that or it was straight back into Civ life was a decompression Cypress I don't think that was around then no it wasn't wow no we didn't do that until we went to Iraq yeah and then he bought this thing in called trim um when the rack and Afghan kicked off and it was trauma recovery something something and basically so when you're in a tick tick St or troops in contact when you're in a tick and then you get pulled back You' sit in a room with the Padre and your sergeant major and that you talk through it and basically it's meant to reduce PTSD nah never got trimmed in my life no none of my Bloks did but you not think back in the day people have like sort yourself out mate get on with it that's what it's about right okay yeah that rugby mental well Sports mentality back in the camaraderie and the lads and the Bloks they got you through it yeah a good bunch of Bloks yeah I remember we took over in covo again we took over this Village and we took over the school and we're going to use the school for our main headquarters we had to clear it first so I remember there I got loads of stories about C and we I remember going down into the balling room and I was walking down there's a big long Corridor with doors out the side and each door had a post in the Middle with a mattress covered in blood going down there's five doors Al together and each one had the same one and at the end of the corridor was one door and it my friend Ronnie with me and um I said cover me I'll kick the door so I checked it back in my hand checked it kicked it and they were um I think about six women in there all naked alive in the dark room um just covered in blood and the serbians and um using the the things as rooms and stuff like that so I took my helmet off I took my body armor off I gave my rifle to my mate and I sat there and went cuz the last thing they want to see is a blow and uniform with a gun and I told Ronnie to go and get a female r&p to come down to see you to dstress them and you know we got space blankets and blankets to cover them up to cover their modesty up and all that so yeah it was a [ __ ] horrendous tour that sounds horrendous it was a horr that was your first tour that was my yeah my first tour was Bosnia yeah yeah that was out of all the tours you've done do you look back at kovo and go that was the worst one for nightmares for nightmares yeah don't get me wrong I have nightmares of sniper in you know I get Flash images and stuff like that but um C is bad yeah it don't it doesn't get really talked about does it no it doesn't no it's always Iraq and Afghanistan it's interesting you bought a covo up because that must have been horrendous it what you're telling me here and I'm sure there's many other stories there how long so you were rly the 6 months May been a bit longer yeah I think it was a bit longer head yeah how would you explain your OVO tour in a few words there's not in a few words to explain it to be honest with you it made me feel how can human beings do this to human beings you know and I don't think like you know really can't answer that one there's not enough words to go you're it's horrendous yeah there's no words to describe what we have to deal with out there no no words you know I remember um this is a funny one all right we had a body in the back of the Land Rover me and Ronnie again will going to the morg in Pristina and the Land Rover broke down so we got on the net see yeah we could here get here in a few hours for the Remy to come out and drag us back so we went okay we heard we look that the [ __ ] are noise ignored it sat sat in the driver's seat and they said look we can't get you to a bit later on tonight you know just get your heads down and we get to here and we thought okay then so we took the body out and just rested it in the and then it's then it lent up and then it went down again and I looked at Ronnie and I thought is it dead is that is the body dead and goes yeah it's [ __ ] dead Creek I thought no just just sat up it's all the gases leaving the body and stuff like that but it was the most so we locked ourselves in the loue over and we didn't open the doors at all just in case just in case something it's [ __ ] happened you know and the Remy tipped up and we were like asleep in this Landover and Ronnie was awake I was dossing on Tapped on the window that [ __ ] shook me up [ __ ] H he goes what's wrong we told him it was gases leaving the body yeah [ __ ] we getting zombified here you know what I mean after Kosovo straight into a wreck bit of downtime England party on the piss and then straight back into a w how long you in Raa for then uh six months we were the evasion Force first arctor we over on evasions Force yeah and um it was funny I was Blas there about bodies out there you know because um the vehicles had ran over loads of dead bodies and um we were made to stop and put them body bags to be Humane to the to the dead out there and um yeah I was just yeah BL say about it because I dealt with it so much in Kosovo you know and um you really do know affection you to let you along in life till everything slows down yeah and you got time to think and reflect in the Army you're th000 milph as a sniper you're th000 miles an hour until you slow down or get out you start reflecting on things that's when stuff starts settling and you thinking [ __ ] you know where were you when you had the longest kill I was in um north um Helman Province um it's probably south of this place called musala and um I was down south from there in a place called Talan and um it was a little village overrun by Taliban and it was our job to flush the Taliban out um to um give OverWatch because we had um we call them the omelet they were a mixure of Ana Afghan Army and a mixture of British troops and they mix together that's what we call an omelet yeah you know and then they they would go in and I remember we would the Afghan Army felt comfortable with had guns on The High Ground they felt confident enough to go in you know and that's when that's when my shot happened what year was that um 2009 yeah talk me through that moment when you made that longest kill so basically um there was a Dicker or Scout whatever you want to call him and um he was in the far distance and I could see all the Taliban in the village queuing up to attack the patrol going in and I said to the patrol leader and I said look they're queuing up here I got perfect eyes on um he goes okay then just keep an eye keep an eye because we had to go in no matter what and there was a killbox now what a killbox is is an area of land with no cover and which you can cause Max Devastation and um I thought they're going to go in the killbox and they're going to be opened up it and I spotted the killbox straight away that's a perfect arrow for me yeah and no doubt there pois think the same thing you know and um I see glint in the distance now I've got an interpreter with me and he's got a radio which is tuned into the Taliban icon chatter and um they're getting orchestrated by this guy up here I didn't know at the time I saw the glint so I got my scope look through the glass and I could see uh a guy there with a radio with an antenna and the glint was glinting off the Sun so I I shot cuz my rifle only goes 1500 M that's it so I've got the crosshairs but I'm off the crosshairs massively and I have to put the magnification down because if you have it on full mag your gral wobbles because it feels your heartbeat so you turn the magnification down to get a clear clear view and um it took me nine shots to get there in the morning and I bracket in so I one dropped aim higher drop drop drop drop drop finally got the compound wall and I see the splash on the compound wall and um he got his head down and then the icon chatter went quiet and then I Heard a Voice on the icon chat and I said The Interpreter what's he saying he said he's saying he can't direct you anymore he's getting shot at from somewhere and that from [ __ ] me and that was two that was a mile and a half away all right and um so the patrol went in and they went into the killbox they got opened up on by the Taliban yeah and they were getting casualties um [ __ ] firefight now a firefight usually lasts a couple of minutes five minutes or something like that nothing longer than that you know it's all shoot and Scoot tactics and you just spray the area where you thinking this went on for [ __ ] ages I think about half 11 it kicked off and it finished about 2:00 in the afternoon it was full on fighting you know Lads were pinned down um so I had four vehicles behind me so I thought to myself I'll tell what I'll do I'll I'll think on the ground and I thought right I'm going to send the vehicles down cuz we had 50 cows and 40 mil cannons on the on the on the gy p on the wagon Jack so i s down to act as a buffer between the kill between the patrol and the talian and lad were just opening up on them and I was taking shots as well I was um it was like a turkey shoot really because they were just clearing the open like that and then I can see a guy here and I thought and my spotter I was weird my spotter was my driver yeah and um I had to talk him through the spotting scope he got the same Graal as me and he said Craig some is over there and I looked and I thought [ __ ] and when you're training for Iraq in England you always get taught think 20 minutes ahead so they don't flank you you know and as a sniper you only meant to take um maximum of three shots minimum of one shot yeah and then get the [ __ ] out because you're not meant to be there yeah you know I was there all day on the hill so I'm getting off the walls and stuff like that I'm ducking down I'm still but people think I was l down when I did my shot I wasn't I was stood up stood up yeah I stood up I was letting to get a compound wall and um so I looked over looked for my binoculars I could see this guy and I thought is he a marker so I turned around you know shot him and he fell down and what he had done he wasn't a marker he had knocked the water pump off and he flooded the whole irrigation field in front where my Lads were on the vehicles so now the vehicles are wheel spinning there stuck in this field and then I could hear from somewhere I where the [ __ ] that coming from so everywhere I engage targets I'm checking from my scope checking checking checking checking can't see anything and I it sprays in the water all my Lads were on the ground and I thought [ __ ] I need to find the shooter somewhere and I looked up just happened to look up where I shot the Dicker yeah to get his head down and there was two guys lying down with a PK machine gun it's a Russian belt fed machine gun and there shooting down onto my Lads I thought [ __ ] this so I knew where I was shooting cuz I shot there in the morning yeah so I fired my first shot missed hit the compound wall and as it hit the compound wall one of the guys stood up I shot again as I shot again I hit him here and the only reason why I knew I hit him because we went up to P the bodies and to get the weapon offer P ID yeah person identifi the the victim to make sure you know and the idea is to get the weapon off him to stop it circulating back and turn in your hands and then um I fired my third shot and I counted in my head one two three and I moved my rifle across fired again so now I've got two bullets in the air at the same time three seconds apart Third One Missed fourth one hit him wow he fell back and then um an a patchy helicopter CU if you on a tick for a long time um they caught airon or Aon and two a patch of helicopters tipped up about [ __ ] time they tipped up CU they were well late for for the party anyway and the pilot came down and he gpsed it and he went and he [ __ ] said how for 2,475 meters I went like that didn't sink in yeah I just thought bu done my job Lads came up you know checking them all we doing battle damage and stuff like that replaying ourselves and um I said I need to check these bodies so we went back up and we checked these two bodies the gun had gone yeah you see why we hit the compound wall as well yeah and I hit one one here and one here and um they turned out to be um Taliban leaders brilliant quite high up and they were orchestrating the attack through the guard of the radio and um the patrol went past everything then everything you know they got there injured and wounded out and stuff like that and then we went back to an old abandoned um compound just outside musala we have beards everything like living off the land you know and um wait for the next mission basically and that was the job that was my world record Shot but you know and it was a I say it's a fluke always say it's a fluke that's very humble but people say youve done it twice there's two flukes yeah you know that's a [ __ ] long way away A Long Way and the target is minut cuz I'm not shooting on four mag yeah so the target is very very small you know and yeah so but it was a perfect day perfect [ __ ] day you know um it like those crisp winter mornings you know with a bit of heat from the Sun perfect day you know can ask anything better to be give me an example of what your gun would look like and how much ammunition will you have on you so me as a sniper um you got issued four magazines I had six cuz to scram some more um all full up and then you have a sidearm how many in each magazine uh 10 10 Rounds in each um was it 10 or five it's five okay it's five top of my I can't remember [ __ ] long time you didn't need them yeah I didn't need them yeah and um yeah so you have your sniper rifle then you have your sidearm you have your Glock U you have two I had three magazines on my glock what's a CL um Hand pistol and and then you have your um se80 and you I had um 12 magazines of 5.56 rounds in there and obviously six rounds six magazines with 338 rounds in So yeah so I was heavily loaded yeah yeah yeah but people people forget you know I didn't have a body I have a body armor I was in a T-shirt and I was doing my shot and my headset was off my my spot I was relaying to my Gunner who was relaying on the net you know and um yeah I stood up but we were getting shot at as well he was hitting the wall everything but you just got to meain take your composure you know are you cold and calm and calculated with the whole thing you have to be yeah you have to be it's Adrenaline Rush yeah you're in charge yeah you know you're giving orders as well you got to keep on eye on what's going on in the battlefield as well as doing your job as a sniper you know and then three weeks after I think 3 weeks after that I got shot in the helmet and knocked me out and then 3 days after that I got blown up hold on AE you got blown up yeah where um a place called Minden it's north of musala um I was um doing a a mission up there and um because there's no electric light there um when it's dark there's no ambient light so when it's dark it's [ __ ] pitch black we finished the mission at half four and it was December the 14th at half 4 memory clear's day and then and then dece um 2009 okay yeah and then I um I was in a convoy and as a sergeant you lead from the rear and because it's better to organize because you're the control yeah so you put your Junior cor sign forward to lead and Junior cor sign stopped it's been a long [ __ ] day you know and um so I got off and I ran down I was said come on mate we need to shift what's the problem and they always called me first name terms it was always Craig you know because I preferred that then Sergeant haral Sergeant because then my Lads had respect for me and if they [ __ ] up they knew they [ __ ] up yeah and then it's Sergeant you know but my Lads were all good lads all [ __ ] all their first tours majority of them you know and they're really good BL good bunch and uh the the lad said I don't want to say his name but the lad said um I've got I've got kids at home cig I've got kids and I'm married I've got a cut feed and something's going to go wrong and I went okay all right think think think our lead so I passed everyone LED instead of going for the village where those of vulnerable points VPS we call them um I said oh I'm going to scoot around the village say because past 5:00 he gets pitched black and we're going to have a nightmare overwise and then I hit a 30 Kil antank mine on my driver's side um my my driver's um legs were all [ __ ] my Gunner went deaf um my vehicle was totally destroyed I blew I got blown out landed to the side um scars everything so what is that how you lost your finger there as well it yeah that was food surgery through previous they tried to get it better and better but it didn't work so it just finally cut it off you know and then um I broke my radius gate forward wrists in both arms um Had a Brain Injury my brain swelled up they were going to do stuff to my skull and all that but my head went down luckily enough and um don't forget I've been shot on the helmet as well yeah so I got concussion from that and now I've been blown up 3 days later so it's all on the right side so I've got TBR I've got a brain AG I suffer from migraines I forget things you know and um they uh kazzy Lads did a fantastic job kazzy Ved me out and uh you know the worst pain is they drilled into my shin with a screwdriver to put ketamine into my bone marrow and that's how they reduced the pain the pain of that is the worst pain anyone can go through I think it is [ __ ] horrendous you can feel it go through your body and I remember waking up in um Bastion in the hospital and I remember turning over looking at clip's bed it was just covered in blood I thought [ __ ] he's died you know what I mean he's [ __ ] died and then I tried to stand up to get out of bed turn all these F out I'm Delirious I'm not a religious person all right I believe in fate but I remember when they took me off the chunuk I can't remember none of that apparent I was ballet naked going through the runway everything you know because I was just in so much trauma and then they x-ray your body on this big tube and because I was high as a kite I was coming around and all I could do was celic images like really weird sort of psychedelic sort of feeling and everything I could see was all blurred all I could see is white coats I thought they were angs to this day now we always say I thought they were angels and I remember grabbing my arm and grabbing one pulling them over to me and I I said to him I said can you tell my wife that I'm sorry just tell her that I'm sorry and I let go and then he injected me to counter out the ketamine I mate you can tell her yourself you're okay and everything came into view they were all doctors oh yeah but I thought they were angs they they are angels as well oh massively yeah and I then then I went off again and put me in bed and then I flew to Kandahar and then I flew back to Birmingham stayed in Birmingham for two weeks and then had casts on four six weeks they took the cast off made me do 10 press UPS sent me back out straight away sent you back out yeah yeah to a place called Panda Ridge we at that point when they took the cast off were you itching to get back out did you have an addiction to get back out you I don't want to go when I got blown up it was like an ice ice wall got shattered in me you know and this ice W just [ __ ] I couldn't hold my feelings back from kosova through Bosnia for anything I couldn't hold these feelings back and they were just getting [ __ ] out of control and I was addicted to paink I was taking raw painkill you know and I was a dissolvable once I was eating in raw just to release the pain in my brain because my head was hurting all the time but like I said I don't like that word man up but that's what I was doing because that's all I [ __ ] knew to do that's all I knew yeah I'm a bloke's bloke yeah so I [ __ ] hid it you know and they [ __ ] me back out and I went to a place called Pander Ridge looking over a village I was there for uh four weeks yeah just [ __ ] sniping and they were hunting me so what I done in the first bit of the tour before I got blown up I cost so much [ __ ] upset they bought an out of season fighter to stalk me to to had a bounty on my head I don't know how much it was but through um in and in intelligence they said yeah there's a bloke out there trying to find where you are I was like okay bring it on sniper on sniper yeah see who's the best yeah so did you ever did your name ever come out in the press or anything like that happened it did yeah yeah yeah that's why we got death threats yeah we went into hiding for three years you went into hiding for three years what back here yeah in England yeah yeah so we came off tour what tour did you come off my last Afghan tour okay which 2010 came back yeah and then you have a medals parade um so you you you're you're not confined to camp but you have to work for a week or something and they monitor you to make sure you're all right and um my lad saw the most um sort of um action we had the lads had the best stories as they say it's not nice to say but the best stories so they bought a press guy in from the local paper or from he was a freelance journalist i' say and um he's meant to get escorted around by our adant our captain at the time and um he come up to me he goes couple of horse he goes come here I want yes sir and he goes um tell this guy some stories he's going to print them up in the paper and I said well everything get censored and he goes yeah everything gets censored I goes okay so I got all my Lads together the lads I had left and I said um uh this guy's a fiz jist he wants to learn some stories and some my will talking and he came up to me and um I didn't want to go into Too Much Death in my stories so I told him about the longest kill the shot and I said year it was 2,475 m and he said do you realize you broke Rob furlong's record the Canadian who held it with a bar 50 cal and I said not really I said mate I don't really care and I said at the end of the day I saved 12 people and the patrol going in and I said that's all that mattered to me is that he goes okay no worries Kev will tell him stories well anyway we went home on the Friday Sunday came phone was going off the [ __ ] chart answering it you need to look at the papers you need look at the papers so looked at the papers my face my name my wife's name my daughter's name my dog's name where I was born where i' lived um everything regiment everything was in the papers you're joking so basically the story is meant to go to London District media off to get censored so he gets addicted yeah and then it goes to print it never did so some fat ex Colonel or something it's gone yeah that go absolutely right it just went straight to print and um and then it happened um just before that Lee rig incident yeah yeah and Southeast London yeah yeah blessing and then 10 years ago yeah and then um we started getting death threats through the media saying they wanted to kidnap a Muslim Soldier and also to cut my head off for the stuff i' done in African oh M and then then through intelligence we found out uh there was a car in Birmingham that police raided did it and had my photo in the car they were going to come to kidnap me and the car was all lined out with plastic and everything yeah so they wanted to really cut my head off Jesus yeah so we had to go and hideing for three years so your daughter she she was going for a yeah she was going for a GCS at the time she had to have an armed escort into school and sit in a big hall room with one chair one table on her own with armed people at the door taking a taking a [ __ ] I get upset I've um don't really didn't want to bring it home you know didn't want to bring it home at all especially to my daughter yeah [ __ ] unfair yeah you know but it was what it was how did she deal with it your daughter doesn't really talk about it to be honest you I haven't really spoke to her about it yeah sort of like just give her a cuddle I think it be right you know would you ever speak to her about it no I think he's dead and buried yeah no Point opening them wounds they're scarred now you know what I mean so I don't want to start thinking she I she is a bit she always looks for exic SS she always doesn't like crowded places and stuff like that you know she's um aware of her surrounded more now than she was due to the incident yeah how angry were you [ __ ] angry yeah and do you know what the mod came in um armed escort came into my house at the time before we got shipped off to um we lived in Camp for 4 months in the wire and then we got shipped out to a secure house um with armed response um Panic alarms on the house and everything and then you had to film on the Windows you know there a a bomb went in it just suffocate it and stuff like that we had a panic room um everything in this house we there well we're there for three years yeah three years and then um where was that in the country where we were yeah the Panic house it's in s it's in s okay yeah don't mistake some else is there you know what I mean oh yeah oh yeah yeah on that road how did you when I can't even get my head around this bit but you're in a you're in a in hiding your daughter's been affected your wife's been affected you're been affected and that the Army seemed to have got away with it and the Press have seemed to got away with it there's no there's no sort of action taken against that no we sued the mod you did did you yeah we sued the mod okay and um soon find out that my sister that I hired was in cahoot the mod he got a better payout than I did right but it wasn't about the money was it it was about principal principal the whole thing yeah were you carrying at that time you think I you know if some's off to me I'm carrying I've got I'm loaded with weapons here just in case I was carrying KN yeah okay yeah I don't care about the knife flws yeah it's my life at the end of the day if a [ __ ] van pulled up blogs jumped out [ __ ] I'm biting noses you know I'm 19 Stone 6'4 yeah and I always said they got to get him in the [ __ ] van first and I will fight [ __ ] dy I bought your knob up if I had the chance do you know what I mean you know it doesn't bother me yeah you know but all I always said to Tanya I always said to her I said look I've left the Army now I want to give everything back to you and I'll spoil her as much as I can you know so she doesn't have to go through like that any any of again I don't think even her family knew what she went through not at all no one understands what that woman's gone through you know and she's still here now amazing how long you been with it 20 years 20 years yeah yeah massive respect to her sticking by you massively yeah through my TOS through your lows massive through my lows I'm a changed man you know I used to be like um Life of the Party sort of thing social Ang grate pull the pin I'm off not anymore don't go out more don't go out I go to the gym at half three in the morning so it's empty you know um I don't go to crowds don't I try and I sleep but it's all drug related if I don't have the drugs I don't sleep you know and yeah she stuck by me for all that yeah knowing my when she met me I was life of the party to see my degress of my character when were you at your lowest point we went to America to live um we lived there for three years and um I try to shoot myself yeah I put a gun in my mouth and I try to and I was screaming tan was in England at the time and I was practicing with his gun where do I do it and had a dog little yorky teria Betsy her name was she was my best mate we done [ __ ] everything together she passed away last year this year yeah last um last June and um how was that for you my best mate you know and um my birthday in November just gone Tanny got me another dog little Westy called Steve and he he's filled a big hole in my heart that Betsy left you know what did Betsy mean to you [ __ ] she said my life I remember sitting in the kitchen table the back of the sofa and she was on the back of the sofa I put the round in it was a heckin cck 45 handgun and I put it in my mouth and I just squeez the trigger like that squeezing it back and Betsy looked me straight in the eye and she went out of her head and she went out out the other side I took it out unloaded it put it to one side I cried and I cried and I cried yeah she saved my life yeah I suffer from it now like it's called suicide isolation I think about it all the time I think about it all the time you thinking about taking your life all the time yeah all the time all the time stuff that I've done stuff that I've seen you know pills don't pills aren't the answer talking yeah talk talk talk talk talk let it all out but you can't help the way you feel you can't help your pain you can't help what I've seen and what I've done and my Pain's real you know it's horrible and some days yeah I struggle I struggle I struggle all the time my wife knows it as well she's she's sort of became my carer in a way you know sort of caring for me but yeah I'm still here though yes still do mhm yeah I always said I couldn't see myself Beyond 46 couldn't see myself Beyond 46 49 now so you got your beautiful wife and your daughter and your lovely dog yep yeah but trouble is you don't think of them with you in that frame of mind you become some you become sort of selfish in a way you just want to [ __ ] end it yeah stop the pain you know I got a voice in my head I take meds for it and it just says I'm vile that's all it says I'm vile repeats itself constantly in my [ __ ] head you V why why I don't know I haven't got a clue do you know what it's a it's a male voice right hand side in this side it says I'm vile all the time I take meds for it and the meds calm it down but when I laugh it gets louder and when I laugh a big gut laugh it gets so [ __ ] loud it's like in my face like just shut the [ __ ] up just shut the [ __ ] up Craig what's the point what is the [ __ ] point are you aware every time that little man speaking to you all the time yes yes like going with e on I can hear it yeah it's constant it's like a rhythm you know is there any help out there that can help that I pay for my own therapy I see a guy Ross Ross his name is he's like five minutes from my house I see him every Thursday to be honest with you I haven't seen him for a couple of Thursdays because I'm just sad and that's how I feel sad and Tanya says why are you sad and I said I don't know I'm just sad I feel sad and I think that's another word for depression but I don't want to admit it yeah you don't admit the word depression yeah not at all I feel sad and that's how I feel yeah how do you feel happy I haven't been happy for [ __ ] ages and that's my wife makes me happy being with her but I haven't been happy for ages how long you not been happy for since I left the forces which was what 2010 yeah 20 2013 yeah so 10 years yeah I miss it every day they came for that door now I'll go with them I wouldn't think of my family it was always the Army first family second it was always like that is that the same now no it's always family first first yeah always think a you know if I had a th000 pound in my pocket I'd spend it on her rather than me and I've always told her that yeah you know but yeah just like I said I'm just depression is a horrible thing when he gets old of you you know and is that sadness come from everything you've seen in Kosovo massively massively the kills the everything that's gone on yeah and there's been no support or help from the Army at all no at all you gone you're gone in my eyes you feel used by the Yeah massively yeah yeah when you go on tour I was [ __ ] going everywhere or we need a sniper S Quake cuz I could shoot yeah and I didn't complain it was my job and I did it you know we need to do this we need to do that oh okay I'll do it yeah I'll go I'll go never ring T you up quickly babe I'm off out now come off a 9 day op Babe by here I'll just have a quick shower and something to eat and I'm off out again love you everything's fine everything's good you know I phoned her up once in in Iraq we need we need get overrun in this building and we had a a sa phone it was red and I phoned her up and I said to her I said I love you you know and she goes yeah I love you too what's that noise I said don't worry about that I said I'll promise you promise you I'll phone you in the morning I'll phone you in the morning I yeah I did I did I phone you in the morning yeah knew got overrun place called the P jock in Iraq only got like 18 people there it was next to a prison and they tried to overrun the prison to release all the you know head heads of uh the terrorist Cs and um yeah just you overrun they were coming from everywhere yeah what made you phone your wife then because I wanted to hear her voice and the last thing I [ __ ] heard was her voice yeah did you think you were going to die yeah I did yeah yeah yeah they were fine RPGs [ __ ] machine guns he just [ __ ] that wh yeah how did you get away with that one kept on fighting British British forces mentality you know just [ __ ] fight and that's what makes us unique we got [ __ ] kit we make it [ __ ] work and that's what's Mak us that's what makes us the best in the world and what we do you know we got the fangle dangle stuff well nowadays we have we got drones and everything now but you know but you just with the kit you got you make it wor yeah do you know how many confirmed kills you've had I don't want to say really yeah you know or for curse or anything yeah it's not about the killing it's people saved yeah yeah with Tanya what do you think Tanya's gone through over the last 20 years hell yeah yeah just um no one understands that's what upsets me no one understands what the partner goes through no one understands what they have to live with with somebody with PTSD civilian or military doesn't matter and it's hard and they should get a lot of credit for it she should get a lot of credit for it my mate did four tours with um my number two he's um his Miss has left him he's been sectioned he's trying to top himself in a [ __ ] State way he said it never happened to him I got discharged first I said he saw some stuff with me and he he [ __ ] just rupted him he just couldn't control it lives in it's funny um and see I phone him all the time text him all the time just to make sure he's still here you know and if he needs me I'll be there he lives in Yorkshire now and uh me and tell you go to London to do another podcast and she goes um I need to go for a week put his Services about to Pish because can we go to that one up there it's got a costar's coffee in it so yeah no worries pulled in there she went for was I stood by Smiths and I heard cigg Harrison I looked who he was [ __ ] 20 stone massive beard long hair would I would have walked past him he was fit when I last time I saw him everything and I but but down and cried and he started crying we just cuddled each other for ages in the middle of a [ __ ] service station two blos and everyone's going like that and Tanya came out and she gave him a big cuddle and then he goes come look my service dog your service dog he goes yeah come look at it and he had um a Volkswagen Camper lowered suspension thought nice wasn't lowered the size of his [ __ ] dog a New Foundland he called it Hagrid he's massive he got out of there like Digby you know what I mean massive [ __ ] do like [ __ ] you know yeah yeah but um he Squadron helped him not the regiment or anything he's Squadron The Lads did off their own back they did a 100 mile uh Burgen March raise enough money to get him a service dog which is just [ __ ] outstanding yeah you know and now he's just can't work he can't go out doesn't do much and feel for him sniping is a curse yeah you know yeah how old is he do you know how old is he got in his late 30s now easy yeah late 30s only late 30s and he's [ __ ] mate yeah 11 to bits yeah you got to when he's wiping your ass in a hole somewhere yeah Yeah you mentioned PTSD how difficult was that been for you very difficult it's crippling absolutely crippling stops you going out stops you socializing if you don't understand somebody with PTSD you'll never understand it a person with PTSD would always understand somebody with ptst somebody who hasn't got it and you become a changed man they sort of back off and you sort of lose contact with them people because they don't want anything to do with you because you are changed they they don't support you they they doesn't want anything to do with you because you are depressed you're not having a laugh you're drinking lots or have you taking drugs or whatever to suppress the feelings exactly yeah you know your family eforce breaks down to this you got a strong woman behind you understands you know that's PT's ho it's a [ __ ] dark place a dark place like I said no one understand it unless you go through it you know and I always say civilian PTSD is different than military PTSD which it is yeah but it's PTSD is PTSD it's postmatic stress you know and it goes like a train track it will never cross over because it's you know never combine it but it would just go level with it and that's why you know people need to understand that even civilian is bad as well you know I've got cptsd because mine's multiple incidents apparently yeah same with my number two multiple incidents but or you get ptst or you get pts which is you know always goes down in categories is yeah but there's nothing out there these Charities are [ __ ] as well yeah massively [ __ ] they're just more more interested in getting money for stuff yeah know don't get me wrong they've helped some people but I've reached out to them and no one's helped me what's the solution I think did I did I say it did I um I think when you leave the Armed Forces you should get monitored for two years after the Army should monitor you for two years and track you down and keep an eye on you and hopefully doing that the Army can then pay instead of this goes back so I remember been in the papers not myself but the M mod was in the papers because they get a budget each year of the government and then that budget gets Spread spread around the different regiments and he said there's your budget for the year could be a million or something and they have to spend that budget so if they don't spend it they won't get the next yeah amount because they think oh you had a million left over so we going to give you 2 million this year instead of three they're they're spending on light bulbs and they're charging seven quid for a light bul 20 quid for a light bulb remember being in the papers what they were paying these workmen to come in to do work because they had to get rid of this money instead of wasting your money doing that they should monitor soldiers two years after they leave the armed forces and that will cut down hopefully suicide rate homelessness alcoholics drug taking everything because the Army is dipping the hand in their pocket and helping you get counseling helping you get housing helping you stop suicide stuff and that's what they should do massively 100% never ever ever [ __ ] happen never [ __ ] happen and even if you got a petition together with 10,000 signatures in it still won happen and then it goes to Parliament still won't [ __ ] happen yeah still won't happen there's a famous picture isn't there um it was on my Instagram of the houses of Commons and and it was packed absolutely packed standing room only and even that you had to squeeze in in the houses going it's quite a big place and there's another picture with six or seven people on the seats all right one was for veteran suicide the other one's for MP's pay I'll let you figure out which ones the MP's pay was and that's on my Instagram that picture and I always say it [ __ ] disgusts me because yeah no one has anyone competition for this has anyone grabbed this by the like someone a big character like yourself or a big Phi Campion or someone to say we need to do something about this we need to get no money back into the system for because it will never [ __ ] happen it'll never happen and whatever money some gets spent on it would get sucked up in somewh else it doesn't get 100% on that Soldier you know H when you left in 2013 did you leave with a pension yeah I left with a pension I had to fight for my pension you did yeah I had to fight for it why would they not just give it to you off the bat I tell you what there's a new pension there's a new pension scheme out now yeah it's 2007 pension scheme so when I joined in the '90s I was on the 200 and sorry the 197473 pension which was a good pension and then he bought the 2000 pension in so when you join the Army now you're automatically on the 2000 pension but the 1970s pension it starts straight As you finished 22 years color service you get your pension starts straight away now this 2000s it starts when you're 60 odd or 65 because they've worked out that soldiers die between 60 and 70 so they're saving themselves money yeah and if no and if people now CRA it's not like of course it [ __ ] is it's conspiracies isn't it that's what it is they're saving themselves money why did you have to fight for your pension because I got I got um misdiagnosed with my brain trauma yeah I've got and they they didn't give me the full amount that I was entitled to so I went to court twice to fight for my pension and I think it was two years ago I won my case I won my case yeah because I remember the first court hearing I went to the judge I stood up I was in a suit hair nice shaved tie regimental sniper tie suit on everything and I stood there and she goes do you want Mr Harrison you seem a capable young man okay I say you don't [ __ ] know me and she goes Mr Harrison I said you don't [ __ ] know me he didn't know what I'd go through every [ __ ] day and my solicitor I took with me he said you should have tipped there with scruffy hair not shaven tie undone [ __ ] food marks on your suit and you would have got that why would I got to pretend some that I'm not I'm a smart [ __ ] proud man yeah you know yeah I had to fight for mine most some people have to fight for it yeah give an example of how much a pension was before you had to fight for it per month how much would they give you once you I don't know my wife deals with all that rough so we know a rough amount so I think it was about 800 it's all taxfree so you get 800 quid a month guaranteed and then you were like hold on I'm fighting this I need more than this to live yeah and what is it today um you you well you can get up to about two grand okay yeah you can get up to about two grand because you get other stuff added on to that because you entitled to stuff but yeah it's you had to fight for that oh yeah yeah after fighting for your country and saving hundreds of hundreds of our men yeah they don't they don't [ __ ] care you know once you leave the Army as you you're just SP out yeah exactly you're just a civilian now you just got to offend for yourself it's weird leaving the Army because you don't you got to pay bills yeah they don't teach you that I know it's stupid because you're you're an adult but they don't teach you that you know and stuff like it's weird it's just you just get [ __ ] hoofed out do you ever feel lost when you left the Army massively I still feel lost now yeah yeah purpose you know I'm sit in my car sometimes and I cry and I ring tan up go you're okay I says yeah I call it having a wobble so I'm having a wobble and I sit and cry and cry and cry and scream and shout sometimes I lose my voice it gets all husky cuz I'm shouting so much you know because I just want to [ __ ] let loose and I yeah I feel massively in the Army I join when I was 16 yeah you know and left when you were I done 23 years I done a thing called then which you after your 22 years you sign on for another five and um that's what I signed up for that's why I done 23 and um but yeah I miss it [ __ ] every single [ __ ] day I'll miss it even the [ __ ] I miss it's it gives you a sense of purpose is there no way is there no angle for you to get back in is there no angle whatsoever to be involved with the Army again and lead from the front not going into dangerous places but leading the front teaching or get yeah I'd love to i' love to be at the sniper school because down in bovington where they teach just down here in B tank driving that's where we learn to use the cvrs and all that tanks and all that and they got their ex the instructors or ex Army structors and they get paid more being a civilian than they do when they was in the Army so they've left the Army and become a civilian I'd love to go down the sniper scor so how can we make that happen because it's what's the point I got PTSD haven't I so that would mean that you they wouldn't allow you in there yeah they think I go [ __ ] mental with a gun or anything but it wouldn't it give me a sense of purpose to do something do you know somebody reached out to me from Ukraine wanted me to go Ukraine and teach sniping and then Boris Johnson said anyone going over there gets for being a terrorist so I was so tempted and do you know what Tanya said to me it's because you're broken Craig you're broken I looked to the mirror and goes I am broken but up here is not telling what this is is doing yeah yeah yeah you know so isn't it funny you just wouldn't know no like here today I just wouldn't know if we hadn't had this conversation you wouldn't know what's going on in your mind and what you've seen and what you've done I daydream yeah but by daydream about [ __ ] stuff negative stuff you know I don't Daydream like I'm going to have a holiday next year and [ __ ] Barbados or something you know I don't think that's be beautiful I just day dream about [ __ ] stuff example people I've killed how could I done it better where would they be now if I didn't do it okay I always think where those those women I saw in Kosovo yeah what are they doing now yeah I wonder what they're doing now you saved those women yeah wonder what their lives are like you know it's just but yes you you can't I live for today yeah so when I wake up in the morning and I tell people this when I wake up in the morning I put my feet on the floor and I say it to myself I'm committed I'm committed and I say it just for today yeah cuz I don't know what tomorrow's going to bring or next week or the week after the month or the year after I want to live for that day once I've done that day I get up in morning the next morning go committed for that day and I take every day as it comes I don't look at the future I don't know what it's going to hold I might not be here sounds hor doesn't it it does but I'm not scared of it you're not scared of death not at all my wife keeps me here my dog now Steve he keeps me here my daughters keep me [Music] here but depends how low I go you know over in it it is I say it all the time to my therapist he says I'm glad you're here Craig today I'm glad you're here and you're an absolute hero Craig I'm not a hero not a hero at all listening in my eyes you are people have never come back they're Heroes people never come back people have lost their legs and arms they're Heroes some days I wish I lost a leg or an arm because maybe I have something to show for my bow scars instead of having mental health or PTSD or having them internal injuries cuz I say to people I got blown up did you yeah I got blown up got shot got shot here shot in my about [ __ ] on my helmet [ __ ] wiggled one place at the wrong time and they look you up and down okay what you looking for [ __ ] missing arm missing leg I was lucky was lucky you know I was bet over eating a quality Street bent over yeah I got blown up it's in a quiet street so just bent overo let's get quality Street sponsoring you exactly yeah that' be good one that yeah what makes not taking into account your wife your dog Steve and your daughter apart from that what makes you happy I think I run now a Bushcraft school called the Maverick survival school yeah and I set it up for veterans first of all and all veterans come down to Fe I don't make any profit from it and then I realized it's just not veterans that suffer it's first long responders that suffer civilians suffer so everyone comes down to the school you know and some of them pay some of them doesn't yeah where's that based based in Bishop's wam um in in um farum near Portsmouth okay and um does that give you purpose it gives me something does that make you happy passing my knowledge onto others but there's different types of Happiness isn't there there's happiness where you're par me there's happiness where you're happy making other people happy yeah but you take my mask off that I live behind every [ __ ] day I'm not happy every people are happy good actor yeah good actor you know that's what you become a good actor until sometimes you your mask slips off and you people see how ugly you you not you are but how ugly the PTSD is and how much depression he's got hold of you yeah you don't like you say you wouldn't think sitting here with me but I'm a good actor yeah I want a lot of medication as well do you believe in the medication yeah I do yeah yeah and I say to anybody that's suffering with PTSD mental health it's not the [ __ ] answer it's not the answer but it helps put you on that even kill stop me dropping I have you kill to drop so can you feel when you got can you feel you dropping and that's when you go right give me the and then to bring me back again and you how long does it take that feeling to come back to like that again I went cold I went cold turkey for one day and was [ __ ] yeah t I was crying yeah for one day and I took my meds CU they [ __ ] my meds up at the pharmacy so I missed a day and um yeah the next day I felt fine just loaded back up again you know I know you say you got a therapist every Thursday have you looked further field at all or you just happy with your Thursday therapy is a fur field if anyone's listening out there can help and and unlock and try to find some happiness within you or to help deal with the trauma that you've gone through have we look have you look further field at all people have offered yeah to do stuff um but Ross helps me a lot and he helps me understand things you know and you can't have too much therapy because if you have one therapist tell you to do something else and another therapist never fist never therus you're going to no one's got any synchronization in what you're doing is there no one who's top of their game dealing with this someone in America or someone in Great Britain is at the top of their game dealing with people who've seen and been around serious trauma you got to pay for it you got to pay for it and some of these veterans that are homeless or out and about or stuff like that you got to pay for it these little chates if I'm talking I'm talking personally for you are you saying you still got to pay for it and you can't afford to pay for it if even if there was someone yeah a lot of money therapy a lot of money what sort of money I know somebody who spends 250 quid a week a week on therapy they travel to London would you pay if would I [ __ ] 250 quid if it was paid for you if 250 quid was paid for you knowing that this could be the key to opening up the happiness within your soul and dealing with the trauma that's G on I tell you one thing right um therapy yeah okay they only give you a certain amount of sittings that's it Ross I've been seeing him for four years yeah all right and I see him how many I can see him every single day if I want yeah and I pay him and he doesn't look at the the clock like this yeah or go I've seen therapist too and I'm go and I always say what are you looking at your watch for have I got to go and I I I turn it on them yeah well you've only got an hour that's all I've got is an hour Ross I can say for two three four five six hours I'm the sh it sounds perfect for you massively but then you go to these other therapists and they says right I went to a one charity all right if I met Ross and I was seeing him um for four five months and they said do you know Craig you've had eight sessions with us we only do six we've given you eight sessions or 10 sessions something like that and I said we've given you exra sessions because we think you needed it I said okay and I goes what's going to happen now Craig is you got to reapply and then within six months if you haven't heard anything come back and we're sort of I could be swinging from a [ __ ] Tree by them yet they they publicize themselves as a charity and they want money coming in and this coming in and that coming in yeah okay yeah I don't sharpen an axe but very bitter very bitter and that's I'm at the moment getting my school as a charity yeah so everybody could come free yeah good for you man yeah and it'd be nonprofit yeah any money that anyone donates to the school would go into bu equipment to go in to buy more land get the wood block bigger stuff like that yeah and that's what I want it to do because it's shut down at the moment because I shut down in October till March and then reopen again for the year yeah I'm fully booked March fully booked April halfway through May I'm near fully booked bull yeah but just Word of Mouth people coming down stuff like that and it you know we start Friday night we finish Sunday afternoon and we just do everything to do a Bushcraft and on that Friday night to Sunday afternoon you giving your knowledge to people does that make you happy it does yeah but there's two different types of Happiness like I said there's two different types there's ones where you can par knowledge other and you you chuff to yourself you think I want to learn I want people to teach sorry I want people to learn of me you know and there's depression happiness where you're just not happy with yourself you just don't like yourself and you like okay so when they go off their tents Tanya said Craig you got stay up a bit later cuz I like being on my own I go to my t I get me head down at night early sometimes after 7 8:00 and people are around the campfire she says I have to mingle more but don't want it I don't want it fair enough you know that's me yeah yeah I hear you you know I've she goes you've always been like that you know I said yeah but it's good C where can people find your business here how can we have how can we let people know about it go onto the Google and then put the Maverick survival school yeah and it will come up straight away and then all the information's there there's an email there as well and that go straight to my email and I'll answer you send you some dates if you want to come down you come down fantastic yeah you don't need to bring any kit if you don't need to I've got loads of Kit um I lend people no point dipping your hand in your pocket to get expensive I've got tent sleeping bag rooll mats pots pans everything for you so you just come down and enjoy the weekend you know and that rest bite that you get people are grateful for it m people say you save my life Craig for what you've talked about and what's good about my school is Ross comes down yeah and he comes down on a Saturday night and talks and talks to everyone Brant and if you want to talk to him privately you go for a little walk and he's got a little circuit he does so if you have a long talk he goes on a long walk if you got a little talk he goes a little walk and and he gives you advice and he's he's in you know he's in contact with LZ and lasses now that still that you know that he does off his own back as well to help veterans and people that are struggling you know and that's what's different about my school it's weird cuz Friday they tip up you don't know each other and people are talking and introducing themselves and everything like that Saturday night you can't shut the [ __ ] up yeah you know because I get into do stuff like team stuff team building stuff like tracking and stuff like that and everyone gets involved everyone gets everyone starts talking brilliant you know and that's what it's all about that's what the Maverick school's all about bringing people together and do you find like speaking now you feel better for letting things out yeah I do yeah but some some stuff I bottle up yeah some stuff I bottle up and keep to myself people don't need to know yeah Ross knows yeah Tanya knows that's all they need to know yeah you know life in it they a real special person Craig I don't feel it Tanya says that to me you are I'm just me I'm just me and like I said I'm grateful for being here today and I'll wake up tomorrow and I'll be grateful for tomorrow as well you know yeah Craig where can people find you if they want to reach out go on my Instagram um C Craig Harrison and then put in there I answer Tanya helps me a lot do my Instagram yeah but we answer every single message every single message I got over 30,000 followers and I must have talked to every single one of them I haven't ignored one of them and if I have I will get to you yeah I apologize but yeah I I answer everybody anyone listening out there or watching please reach out to Craig I haven't got the answer yeah not at all I don't think no one's got the answer but sometimes I can relieve your pain a little bit yeah and there might be someone out there Craig who reaches out who may be able to relieve you a bit of pain as well we don't we don't know yeah quig I've really really enjoyed this it's been deep and emotional one yeah I really thank you for your honesty and no worries you are a superhero no in my eyes you are in my eyes you are than anyway yeah and I thank you you're honestly in coming on and I'm really glad we've done this episode yeah good you're a proper gentleman thank you good man mate yeah thank you no wor f h mate mate [ __ ] that was amazing thank you that was [ __ ] amazing [Music] mate wow 180 episode we've done that was amazing mate I take every day yeah I can say that every day and tomorrow will be a blessing yeah that's it don't do anything like you got a beautiful wife and daughter and Steve the dog but I saying you um you come very selfish hey I can only go on from me you look look like a superhero and I know you say no I'm not no I'm not no I'm not but you are yeah I've did some things in my life yeah you have you've certainly lived an eventful life yeah m [ __ ] hell that was so powerful thank you so powerful thank you no thank you Craig that was unbelievable mate I've never had an episode like that after 180 episodes that's real M good man cool feel like I've got to know you like you know well [Music]
