Fifteen Days Stories of Bravery and Friendship, Life and Death from Inside the New Canadian Military

3 August 2006 "Blackest day of my life. Four perfect men lost, seven others injured. . . . The day will be marked by acts of heroism some witnessed, some described to me. I will have to tell the story someday, when I can do so without choking up." from Ian Hope to Christie Blatchford Saturday 8/5/2006 1:40 p.m. By July 2006, Task Force Orion was a killing machine. Named for the conspicuous constellation of stars known as the Hunter, Orion was the Canadian battle group made up of the soldiers of the 1st Battalion, Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry in Edmonton; a company from the 2nd Battalion and a battery of gunners from 1st Royal Canadian Horse Artillery, both based in Shilo, Manitoba; and combat engineers. Even into the early spring, the soldiers of Roto 1, as the sevenmonth tour in Kandahar Province was called, had confronted many tests that tax a soldier's resolve and ingenuity. But they had yet to face fullfledged combat. The troops were being blown up regularly, killed and maimed by Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) planted by an enemy who went unseen and largely uncaught. They met endless groups of village elders, and older Afghan men who appointed themselves elders, in countless shuras, or consultations. Most of these were peaceful, if occasionally galling, because the soldiers suspected, and in a few cases damn well knew, that some of the same men laying bombs by night or with certain knowledge of who was doing so would sit cross-legged with them by day, swilling glass after glass of chai tea and nodding agreeably. The Canadians patrolled on foot and in armoured vehicles and spent long stretches exploring territory, climbing stony hills, searching caves, and living rough far away from the huge base at Kandahar Air Field (KAF) or the little strong points they periodically called home. "We were basically introducing ourselveswe're not the Soviets, we're not the Americans," Chief Warrant Officer Randy Northrup, the Patricias' Regimental Sergeant Major (RSM), says of their long, slow start. "We were pissing in our corners. Our mantra was, Go do something, in case he just don't know who his daddy is." I spent four or five days in March 2006 out with Alpha Company's 3 Platoon, and the only nerve-racking moment came as we were climbing to 6200 feet and a boulder gave way under Captain Sean Ivanko, who was checking out a far-flung cave. He dropped several heart-stopping feet before nimbly grabbing on to another chunk of rock. Things were so quiet in those days, even pastoral where we were, that I remember wondering to myself, in that remarkably condescending and vainglorious manner journalists the world over have perfected, if the Patricias weren't playing soldier and maybe laying it on a little thick for my benefit. In any case, for all that they dared, tried to tantalize, and practically begged the enemy to reveal himself, in those early months he did not. LieutenantColonel Ian Hope, the Patricias' commanding officer, remembers that they'd receive intelligence that the Taliban were in a particular area. "Where are they?" "Everywhere." "What villages?" "All of them." "When?" "Every day." "What about the mountains?" "In the mountains too." The Taliban almost certainly were there, probably much of the time, but this was their turf, and they alone would decide when the battle was on. "They weren't ready to fight," Hope says. "They weren't ready tBlatchford, Christie is the author of 'Fifteen Days Stories of Bravery and Friendship, Life and Death from Inside the New Canadian Military', published 2007 under ISBN 9780385664660 and ISBN 0385664664.