All language subtitles for episode_11_sierra_leone_-_jungle_siege

The rebels are going on the rampage.

We could hear what sounded like
thousands of people trying to shoot at

What are they going to do? Are they
going to skin me?

Are they going to flame me?

Are they going to cut me open and rip my
still beating heart out? Or what are

they going to do?

Oh my god.

Oh. My. God.

I like doing something that involves a
bit of risk.

Running up hills and jumping off cliffs.

I'd be trained in the jungle.

I've been to the desert with Royal
Marines.

And I found myself at the age of 29
being promoted to major, which meant I

the youngest major in Britain at the
time.

But the downside of being promoted early
is that sometimes you get promoted out

of the jobs that involve running around.

And I was promoted into a desk job
working in London.

I found myself using the office
photocopier and moving blocks of paper.

I think, well, hang on a minute.

So when the opportunity came up to go
and spend six months working with the

United Nations in West Africa, this
seemed like too good an opportunity to

down, and I jumped at the chance.

Sierra Leone was beautiful, but it was
ridiculously hot.

It's just like somebody's holding a
hairdryer in your face.

The local RUF representative was a
character called Colonel Sharif.

He's well -educated, he spoke good
English, and we got on quite well.

Sharif told me about some of the strange
local beliefs that some of the rebels

had, and there was a lot of black magic
going on.

They say if you eat the heart of a brave
man, you'll be brave yourself.

He asked me slightly pointedly.

Are you a brave man, mate?

Absolutely not. No, no, that's not me at
all.

I just had to ask him.

You ever eaten anyone?

Yes.

Okay. Is it... True what they say.

Does it taste like pork?

I don't know.

I'm moving.

That's not what I was expecting. That's
not what they teach you in the

recruiting brochures about what the bad
guys are going to be doing.

We drove about 150 miles into the middle
of Sierra Leone to a town called

McKinney.

There were approximately 10 ,000 armed
combatants in McKinney. The kids whose

average age was about 12 years old.

The militias would recruit child
soldiers by killing their families, so

family that the child soldiers had left
were the militias.

I saw two five -year -olds who both
carried AK -47 rifles, which were longer

than they were tall.

These kids would do anything that they
were told.

They'd clearly been looting and
pillaging women's wigs, and they'd be

around wearing these crazy hair
designers.

What's your name? I look him in the eye.

I am Dead Body.

Pleased to meet you, Mr. Body.

I am Stuff, Captain Dead Body.

It's just a bit mad.

Pleased to meet you, Stuff, Captain.

I can see he's got his hand on his
rifle, he's got his finger on his

just want to calm things down.

How old are you?

Fifteen. And how long have you been a
rebel?

Seventeen years.

And he then smiled despite himself. He
couldn't help but smile.

That's very impressive, Captain.

End of April, it's four months into my
six -month posting.

We finally established all the
disarmament centres, but it was a bit

because nobody was coming.

Basically, we were a bit bored.

We were unarmed, but there were armed
Kenyan soldiers who'd be manning the

and just providing an armed presence.

We see a pick -up truck coming along the
road. A load of guys shouting and

jeering on the back of the truck,
brandishing their weapons.

And I see that it's Colonel Bow, the
local RUF hardliner who's driving.

And he said, my men are angry with the
fact that you are here. You are here to

disarm us. We don't want to disarm.

It's late morning, but he looks like
he's been drinking.

You can smell it on his breath.

That's unfortunate, Colonel, because we
have a job to do.

He wasn't here to make small talk.

And then he launches into a tirade of
his own. When the hungry lion roars...

the blood flows into the river, the
world will remember Bao.

He reminded me, like, of, you know, a
bad -tempered dog, like some American

bull terrier who was after a fight.

Power to the people!

and I'm sitting there all the time
thinking, shut up, you idiot.

So what would happen, Colonel, if I did
decide to disarm some of your men?

If you do bark, then you'll be lucky to
leave.

He was almost like a James Bond baddie,
the way he sort of laughed.

I'm thinking this guy's bark is worse
than his bite, but I was wrong.

So, 29th of April.

I won't forget the date because it was
my 30th birthday.

The temperature was somewhere in the mid
-90s.

Imagine the scene. It's refugees coming
along from the road. That's what they

were trying to look like.

They were very, very cagey. They were a
bit scared.

It transpired that they were rebels.

They said they wanted to hand their
rifles in.

Another guy has got a handcart full of

mangoes with a rifle hidden underneath
it.

All right.

Come inside. Bring him in.

Let's go, let's go, let's go, let's go.
Let's go. Move. Get him inside.

They were very wary because they hadn't
been told by the rebel hierarchy that it

was OK to disarm.

From Bauer's perspective, the weapons
were RUF weapons, so we'd stolen them

him.

I told the United Nations headquarters,
there is a serious risk that we will

provoke a violent reaction.

We got the response that we should go
ahead and destroy the weapons the next

day.

I then got on the phone and phoned one
of the senior British officers within

United Nations headquarters to say,
listen, sir, do you know what's going

And when his considered reply was, look,
there's a risk involved, but do it

anyway, then for me that was enough, and
I trusted my bosses, and we knew we had

to get on with the job in hand.

Yes, sir, thank you, sir.

Out.

Every one of those weapons that was
handed in to us, we'd physically

We'd take out a hammer and smash the
trigger mechanism, whatever it took to

that weapon out of action.

As I'm driving the three miles back
towards McKinney, I see Bao coming the

way with a pickup truck.

He looks angry, but he always looks
angry.

There's a group of armed men with him,
but he often had a group of armed men

with him.

Sometimes survival

comes down to judgment and skill, but
for me, it was just the fact that one o

'clock was lunchtime.

that saved my life.

I'm sitting there eating my lunch. Far
in the background, we hear some rifle

shot.

Then we hear from the Kenyans on their
radio net that there's been some sort of

attack at the disarmament centre.

Oh God.

I'd seen Bao going in. I didn't know
what the hell had happened.

My heart's starting to beat faster.

Something's going wrong. We're losing
control here.

We can hear gunfire in the distance. We
can hear gunfire on the radio.

And then we hear the final message.

We're about to be overrun.

Then nothing more on the radio.

I'm on the satellite phone saying,
listen, this has happened. What do you

about this?

Get straight on to the rebel
headquarters and tell them there's been

You started attacking the United
Nations.

Get them to stop.

We were told that we should send down a
team of negotiators and find out what

the hell was going on.

All right, we're heading over there now.

I jumped into the UN jeep, along with
the Gambian officer, and as we were

to drive out through the gate to the
compound, somebody shouted that I was

wanted on the satellite phone in the
operations room.

So I jumped out of the jeep, and my
place was taken by a Norwegian officer.

They didn't come back.

The Norwegian chap.

Press transmit on the UN radio that he
had.

So we heard these guys were jostled,
were shouted at,

beaten, stripped of their uniforms, tied
up,

and then the radio transmission ended
with a single gunshot.

If it's happening to them, it's probably
going to happen to us.

We're stuck.

We're unarmed. We're surrounded.

The roads have been closed. There's no
getting out of there. More and more

people are gathering outside our house.

A rebel truck drives along the main
road, firing shots towards our house.

Chanting, people shouting, looting.

The rebels are going on the rampage.

It's like...

A group of caged animals who've been
caged for too long and now the gates

been opened and they're out on the
warpath.

And I'm now feeling horribly aware of
the colour of my skin, the fact that I

the disarmament officer and the fact
that Bao in particular didn't like me.

Not a good feeling at all.

A small amount of relief, a small amount
of hope, when I'm visited by a more

moderate RUF contact, Colonel Sharif.

I'm saying, well, you know, what's going
to happen here?

Should we just try and drive out? And
he's saying, no, no, no, stay where you

are, stay where you are.

Don't let Bao get you.

And he's saying, Bao, it's a special
plan for you.

I'm thinking, well, what does that mean?
He says, well, he's going to eat you if

he gets you.

I'm just thinking, oh, my God.

Oh, my God.

I reasoned it would be a matter of time
before Bao would come to get us.

We should get into the compound where
the Kenyans are about 800 metres down

road.

The Kenyans are the United Nations armed
soldiers.

By this time it's broad daylight and
there's people everywhere, but I thought

might be able to trick our way out.

And I remembered a story that actually a
Canadian park ranger had told me about

what to do if you're attacked by a
grizzly bear.

You simply lay your rucksack on the
ground in front of you and the bear will

more interested in eating the contents
of your rucksack than he will be in

eating you.

So what we did was to put the TV, the
video, the fridge near the front door.

And then once their attention was,
what's happening at the front door?

That's when we went for it.

You'd never seen a group of people run
as fast as we ran, about 800 metres to

the Kenyan compound.

Come on!

You can almost become hysterical with
excitement because you think you're

to be OK.

And then just as you think you're going
to be OK... ..the reality sinks in.

It wasn't a fortified position.

in which we could fight compound itself
had a five foot high mud brick

wall surrounding it i think it was an
old catholic mission compound it had a

series of burnt out buildings we

got

out just in time

Bo was now... He knew where we were.

Check the building in the back.

I now found myself in the same situation
as two other Brits and a New Zealand

officer. The New Zealander Dave looked
suspiciously like a Brit, as far as the

rebels were concerned.

Paul, naval officer, intelligent, brave,
but what he wasn't was a soldier.

He was a submariner.

The best -trained guy out of the others
was a young army officer called Andy.

He'd just been released from hospital,
suffering quite badly from typhoid.

We didn't have very much water, we
didn't even know each other particularly

well, and suddenly we were thrown
together.

And we very quickly agreed that we'd
stick together whatever happened.

I went towards the wall to have a look
out.

The rebels were in a state of anarchy.

They were running around the town.

taking pot shots, disorganised attacks
on our position.

And I thought, well, while the rebels
are running wild downtown, I can lead a

group of men out of here, you know,
we'll get out of here, no problem.

So I got on the satellite phone and I
asked the United Nations and I asked the

Brits in the United Nations, I said,
look, would you back me if I attempted

lead a breakout from here?

I think our opportunity to escape is
now, and I think we have a good chance

success if we go now.

I was told no.

Stand and fight! Stand and fight!

But I'm going, but sir, we have no
weapons.

And he simply said, stand and fight
anyway!

Right.

I did what I was told.

As darkness fell, the rebels encircled
our position.

They then began rhythmic drumming and
chanting.

They get everybody

in the trenches.

We know that the attack's about to
happen.

This isn't a military thing that they're
doing. It's some primeval spirit

worshipping, psyching themselves up.

We could hear what sounded like
thousands of people trying to shoot at

And when you hear a bullet going
overhead, you hear it crack.

The bullets are travelling so fast,
they're actually travelling faster than

speed of sound. And you can also feel
the air pressure changing as these

go nearby.

So not only can you hear it in your
ears, but you can almost feel the air

pressure changing around you as these
bullets go.

There'd be lulls.

All the Kenyans are in their trenches
with their weapons in their shoulders,

their fingers on the trigger, ready,
holding their nerve.

There's no point shooting into the
darkness. We don't have enough

that. The guys who did have ammunition
only had 100 bullets each.

And we waited until the first rebels
started to try and climb over the walls.

And when they did, that's when we shot
back.

There.

Bang! Bang!

Bang!

Gone.

As we started hitting them and their
bodies started falling back onto the

outside of the wall, then the other
rebels wanted to back off. They didn't

to share the fate of their companions
who'd tried climbing in first.

For 20 minutes there'd be sporadic
gunfire, then for 20 minutes nothing.

And I was crawling around there
wondering what was going on, and I heard

thud.

And my immediate thought was that maybe
someone had thrown a hand grenade in.

So I ducked down and counted to ten, and
when whatever it was hadn't gone bang,

I knew it wasn't a hand grenade, so I
crawled over to investigate.

And I felt around in the bushes and felt
this object.

I picked it up and there was the sudden
realisation that I'd just picked up a

severed human hand.

The intensity of the attacks in the
morning was dying down.

It was so hot that it was just like
being in an oven the whole time.

Not only are you losing energy through
sweating, but every time you hear a

gunshot, it was like a jolt, and then
you can't relax, you

can't sleep.

And then in the end, almost like a
medieval siege, they knew that our food

water would run out, and then they'd
win.

On the third day of the siege, the
rebels tightened their cordon.

We were effectively trapped.

We received news on the satellite phone
that diplomacy had failed.

The United Nations headquarters, their
advice was that we should attempt to

escape.

The implication, if...

We stayed where we were.

We were going to be slaughtered.

For God's sake, when I said I wanted to
escape, then you told me no.

Now when the situation is much harder to
escape, you're telling me that we've

got to go for it.

We realised that we were going to have
to do something to rescue ourselves.

The outside world was not going to be
able to help.

The thing perhaps that made my mind up
for us was when...

Between that fourth day of the siege,
under the banner of a white flag, we saw

group of rebels coming into the
compound.

And they had a simple message which
said, Brother Africans, we have no fight

with you.

Hand over the white men and you can go
free.

Refuse and we'll kill you all.

And to prove how serious they were, they
skinned a prisoner alive.

i sat down with my three british
colleagues and we said whatever else

we were going to attempt to escape that
night or die trying we'd be aiming for

mile 91 which was a small united nations
held town about 50 miles to the

southwest of mckinney we'd move only at
night laying low during the daytime we

then took out our knives and cut off the
united nations badges on our uniform we

were no longer United Nations observers,
as far as I was concerned, we were once

again combatants. We were soldiers.

I made one final phone call.

I phoned my father.

And it was the only time during the
whole horrible situation, during

the whole siege, that emotionally I lost
him.

I found myself just being a child who
couldn't stop crying.

My dad was just telling me to be strong
and to keep it together and to do my job

properly.

He

knew

that this was potentially goodbye.

Our plan was simple.

We'd attempt to jump over the wall and
run through the rebel cordon at about 3

'clock in the morning when we knew that
the rebels were likely to be at their

lowest ebb.

We walked in single file towards the
northwest corner of the compound.

I was in the lead.

I went to the Kenyan corporal who was in
charge of his section.

and said, I'm a British soldier.

I have been ordered by my government to
escape.

Will you help us?

I felt strangely calm.

My senses seemed hyper, hypersensitive.
I felt that I could see in the dark. I

could hear a pin drop a mile away. And
if anybody had tried to have stopped me,

I'd have been able to take their weapon
off them and rip their head off even if

they'd shot me first. I really did feel
so alive.

I knew it was now or never. This was our
chance.

I knew I had to keep low. The guy's
close behind me.

Come round the side of the house.

I felt the barbed wire coming into my
face and it cut my lip. I tasted

blood in my mouth.

And there in the darkness I saw somebody
moving.

And I just made out his eyes.

I thought, well, this is it. What
happens here?

And then just for a split second, I
thought, you know what? The best thing

is don't rush them. Just rush past him.

In that moment of the rebels not knowing
what was going on, we were past him.

Every step was a step away from danger.

This was really working.

There was just this sort of feeling of
exhilaration. Yeah, we're riding out our

luck here. This is good.

I don't remember for a moment for those
first few hours feeling tired or

anything like that.

Yeah, we're getting there. We're getting
there. Come on, keep going, guys. Come

on, let's do it. Let's do it.

I saw that Andy was having a hard time.
And I could almost... There were almost

demons in my mind telling me, you know,
you'd be better off alone.

Push on on your own. You'll be quicker
than these guys.

Come on!

Come on, you bastards. You've not done
your share of the hard work.

I heard somebody fall behind me.

Come on. Get up. Get up, mate. Come on.

Come on.

Come on.

Come on.

We're really tired. We've not slept for
five days.

We've been drinking almost nothing.

OK, we did it. We did it for today.

Just before first light, in case
somebody was tracking us, we crawled

what seemed like a fantastic hiding
place.

As we lay there,

we heard some voices nearby.

We could actually hear people using
buckets to get water.

And it turns out that the fantastic
hiding place that we'd identified in the

darkness was all of 20 or 30 yards from
the edge of a village.

And that close to McKinney, we had no
doubt that there would be rebels in that

village.

We were on our sixth day by this stage
with no sleep, but because of the

proximity of the rebels and the
villagers, we couldn't sleep.

We lay there for hour after hour, just
being eaten alive.

My throat is swollen from the lack of
water and I could feel the back of my

throat was cracking.

I heard some stones coming through the
air. Well, what the hell's going on

There were some kids who were throwing
stones at a nearby mango tree, trying to

knock down fruit.

I was just wondering what the hell I was
going to do if one of these kids, while

trying to pick up fruit, suddenly saw
us.

I was going to have to silence an
innocent kid in order to stop our

from being given away.

By the end of the day, we knew that our
main enemy was our thirst.

If we didn't find water, we were going
to die.

There was a possible source of water, a
dotted blue line on the map, meaning a

seasonal river about five miles to our
west.

I whispered to the others that I thought
we should drink the rest of our water

to give us enough strength to be able to
keep going for a few more hours.

I remember taking the last few gulps.

I moved it around in my throat to try
and keep my tongue and my tonsils as wet

as possible.

The next few hours, they just go a bit
hazy. We were all in and out of

consciousness, stumbling.

When you get badly dehydrated, you stop
sweating, and when that happens, your

body temperature goes up, and very
quickly you can pass out, and it leads

your death.

We stopped, then we...

We were going to die. We had to keep
going.

This was our sixth night with no sleep.

In the staff officer's handbook, they
tell you that after 96 hours without

sleep, a soldier is effectively useless.

We'd gone almost double that period.

There was this.

big african lady in a white shawl who
was along by our side and i had no idea

what she was doing there and i knew it
was a hallucination but it didn't make

go away

eventually

we saw what looked like the trees that
would be next to a river bank.

And then we could make out the river
bank itself.

Came over the bank.

There was no running water.

I thought maybe there'd be some small
puddles. So I went down on my knees,

feeling around me as best I could,
feeling for small patches of moisture.

Still nothing.

There was no water.

And I just remember falling back against
the bank and looking up at the sky and

wondering what was going to happen next.

We were in a tropical jungle, and yet I
was about to die of thirst.

I was too...

Tired and thirsty to be scared. I was
too tired and thirsty to be in any sort

pain. I was thinking I'm about to die
here. I've done everything I can. I've

tried. I've failed. This is it.

And then as we were lying there keeping
still, we heard the noise.

Frogs croaking in the darkness.

And it struck me that where there were
frogs croaking, surely there had to be

some water.

It was just the act of being silent that
had given us that one opportunity we

needed.

We found some small muddy pools.

There was leaf mould, there were dead
insects in the water, there was all

of scum.

But it was just the best water we'd ever
seen.

We took our water purification tablets
out and using five times the normal

doses, we started drinking.

Looking at the map, I considered that we
were probably now far enough that I

could call for a British military
helicopter to come and rescue us.

I pulled the satellite phone out,
pressed the on -off switch.

Nothing happened.

Whether moisture had got into the
battery, whether I'd banged the

phone against a tree the night before, I
don't know.

but it wasn't working there was

nothing more we could do

When I woke up after maybe 20 minutes,
just a little bit of sleep, I felt just

little bit more rational again.

Let's go.

I thought we should just keep going as
we are. As a commando, you learn that

of the basic rules is that you move only
at night. You hide during the daytime

when people can see you.

But I think it was Paul who said, Phil,
we're going to have to change our

tactics here. We're moving too slowly.

Moving at night is not working.

I'd become fixated on my plan, and maybe
my plan was not the right one.

It had taken us two nights of effort to
go less than a quarter of the distance

we needed to go to get to safety.

We'll find a guide.

Find a guide.

We have to take a chance.

We have to kill someone.

If we were going to find somebody to act
as our guide, though we were going to

have to trust our lives to someone who
we didn't know.

In the morning, what we did was to crawl
forward to where the forest met some

agricultural land.

200 yards from the edge of the forest,
we could see a small farm.

Four mud brick buildings with thatched
roofs on the top.

There were no animals. I guess the
rebels had taken the animals away, but

people were still trying to farm. And
that was the first good indication.

And then we saw an old man.

A man, maybe in his early 40s, but by
Sierra Leonean standards, he was quite

old guy.

While this guy looked like a civilian,
his sympathies could be with the rebels.

Though we were terrified, maybe somebody
would appear with a gun.

It may sound like a small thing, a
stupid thing, but I knew the rebels, and

last thing they did was do an honest
day's work. So when I saw this guy

working hard in the field, I thought,
this looks like a normal human being.

This was going to be a gamble.

Suddenly I'm in the middle of an open
area and there was nothing I could do to

hide myself.

But at the same time, there was almost a
sense of relief for the first time in

several days.

I wasn't...

acting like a fugitive. I was walking
tall, I was proud.

I remember the wind blowing around and
the sun was in my hair and I just felt

like a real human being again.

As we approached, I just initially saw
in his eyes that he was starting to

and then when the beginning of a smile
became a big, broad smile, I just knew

that it was the beginning of the way to
safety.

From that point on, friendly locals were
going to hand us from village to

village, from guide to guide, to enable
us to get back to our UN safe haven.

We were safe for now.

But although I didn't know it at the
time, for me, the biggest challenge was

to come.

I'm sitting there on a wet and windy...
Thursday, staring at the computer

screen, I suddenly felt my left leg
going to sleep.

So I stood up and I walked round the
office, shook out my leg a bit and sat

down.

Then my right leg started to go to
sleep.

And then as I sat there, I felt a
creeping numbness coming up my body.

And by the time I was rushed into
hospital that night, I was effectively

paralysed from just beneath my ribs.

Turns out that I'd brought home a virus
that was causing inflammation in my

spinal cord.

Whether it was something I ate,
something I drank, an

insect that bit me, guess I'll never
know.

The 50 feet that I had to walk on my own
to get to the hospital toilet

before I was allowed to leave hospital
was in some respects harder than the 50

miles I had to walk through the jungle.

The wheels of justice finally turned,
and Bao finally got arrested.

Mr. Bao sentenced to a term of
imprisonment of 25 years.

Then hopefully, Bao will spend the rest
of his life in prison.

The bad guys don't always win. The good
guys sometimes win too.