A Million Bullets

In May 2006 a small British Army force was sent to the Helmand province of Afghanistan. They were to keep the peace and perhaps help to build some roads. The defence minister said the mission could be carried out 'without a shot being fired'. But there was no peace to keep and the province quickly turned into a battle zone. The fiercest fighting was in the small, dusty town of Sangin, where the soldiers of 3 Para, a regiment of the 16th Air Assault Brigade, rapidly found themselves besieged by a determined and well-armed enemy. By July they were isolated and surrounded. They were running out of food and were down to boiling river water. In temperatures often approaching 45C, they came under attack three to five times a day, every day for over seven weeks. At times they were assisted on the barricades by non-combatant regiments who were trapped alongside them: drivers and mechanics of the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers who had never fired a mortar or a machine-gun in their lives before. The siege lasted for 52 days. Over 400,000 bullets, 700 dead Afghans and 6 VC recommendations later, James Fergusson brings us the gripping story of those 52 days.