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‘Well, I don’t know about you, but if they do it again I’m not taking cover in that fucking thing – it’s full of petrol.’ I was shocked at what we’d done. The staff sergeant mumbled his agreement. There was more to it than just the petrol and the exposed position of the vehicle. The worst of it had been the claustrophobic and narcotic effect of being in close proximity to other people’s terror. We’d all set each other off.

Next to the boiler room door stood a large square chimney running up the outside of the building but offset from the wall by about two and a half feet. Where it disappeared into the ground, between wall and chimney, was a concrete-lined well about four feet deep. Perfect for two people. That’s where we’d be going next time.

Together we found a couple of hefty slabs of concrete, a manhole cover and some sandbags, enough to create some form of overhead cover against splinters. Twenty minutes of grunting and heaving warmed us up considerably. I was pleased. The chances of a shell actually landing on us were slim. Satisfied that we knew where we’d be going next time, we retraced our steps into the warehouse and parted company.

In the warehouse I spotted Brigadier Cumming, Colonel Field and his RSM, Graeme Furguson. They were chatting and laughing, an encouraging sign. Someone had produced an urn of sweet tea. There was plenty of nervous chatter and laughter, a strange but perfectly normal reaction to stress. I asked the Brigadier where he’d got to.

‘Oh, I had a marvellous time. I was in the command APC. They even made me a cup of tea!’ He seemed quite relaxed about things. I recalled the 432s clustered somewhere round the back of the building. At least he would have been spared the running commentary and the clock-watching.

The CO and RSM were doing their leadership bit, moving among the soldiers and chatting. It all helped. It was time to try and get some kip so I wandered back to my sleeping bag only to be confronted by a disturbing sight.

Standing in the half-shadow, just beyond our bergens and sleeping bags, were three soldiers. With them was a young Sapper lieutenant supported by two others. He seemed to be trying to get away from them. But, they weren’t so much trying to restrain him as calm him. One was holding his left arm and patting his shoulder while the other was attempting to soothe him. He seemed oblivious to them both. His eyes, unfocused, wild and staring, said it all. His lips trembled slightly. Occasionally he’d gulp hard and nod his head, but his eyes just kept staring. He’d had it. Genuinely shell-shocked.

‘He all right?’ I asked, approaching.

The one on the left shot me a glance. ‘He had a bad time of it this afternoon. This last lot …’ He didn’t bother finishing the sentence.

‘He’ll be fine,’ chimed in the second, which really meant ‘leave us alone’. I was only too glad to. It was unnerving seeing someone’s soul stripped bare, so starkly reminding me of my own terror.

I thought the Serbs were bound to shell us again so I didn’t bother taking anything off. Somehow I managed to cram myself into the sleeping bag still wearing the flak jacket, but I couldn’t zip the bag up over the bulk. It was a wretched night and I suppose I was still edgy. I dozed fitfully on the cold concrete while freezing air seeped into the bag. They had the last laugh: there was no more shelling that night.

Breakfast was a subdued affair. I found a place opposite Seb at one of the wooden trestle tables in the makeshift canteen in one of the halls. He was talking about the shelling, banging on as if none of us had been there. I suppose it was just a delayed reaction or just his way of getting it out of his system but it was irritating and he was making me distinctly nervous. I didn’t need an action replay over breakfast.

‘Seb, it’s over, it’s passed. Just drop it.’ It was precisely the wrong thing to say. He rounded on me angrily.

‘Yeah, that’s right, rufty tufty Para. Easy for you to play it cool, especially if you’ve been through it loads of times. For some of us it was our first time.’

I was stunned by his presumption. Suddenly, I didn’t feel like breakfast, got up and walked off. In the following six months Seb and I could barely stand to be in the same room as each other. The atmosphere would always be tense and uncomfortable. Was it because he thought I’d seen him lose it that night? Who knows. It’s strange and sad what these things do to people.

Before we left Brigadier Cumming inspected the night’s damage. In the compound where we’d taken cover in the Spartans stood a row of four-tonne trucks some thirty metres forward of the APCs. Nearly all were shrapnel-damaged and sagging forlornly on punctured tyres. The walls of the warehouse were deeply scarred. To one side of the warehouse two Land Rovers had been completely destroyed. A shell had landed fifteen metres on the other side of the compound fence and shrapnel had ripped through their soft aluminium sides, turning them into sieves. It was a sobering sight.

Not one shell had landed within the compound. Further analysis revealed that the shells had landed some 100 metres forward of the camp with the nearest landing about seventy metres away. How could the Serbs have managed to converge all their guns on one spot and yet drop all the rounds short? Maybe it had been deliberate, a warning – stop allowing the Croats to fire their guns from behind UN buildings. Another suggestion was that they’d intended to hit the warehouse but had been working from old and inaccurate maps. I doubted it; they’d recorded that particular DF during the day and would have known to ‘add one hundred’.

In all some thirty-three 152mm shells had been fired that night. Astonishingly, no one had been hit. Two things had saved us. The first was the row of four-tonne trucks which had absorbed some of the shrapnel, the second that the Serbs had been using old stocks of shells which had burst into large lumps of jagged metal. Although these looked menacing, they travelled less far and quickly lost their energy. Modern artillery rounds fragment into splinters one third of the size and travel three times further. We’d been lucky. The TSG incident so disturbed the politicians back home that a Naval Task Force, including a regiment of 105mm light guns, was quickly dispatched to the Adriatic.

We departed TSG at 0900 hours. Brigadier Cumming was keen to get back to Tac in Fojnica as quickly as possible. Another crisis was brewing. While we’d been racing down to TSG, a French APC transporting the Bosnian Deputy Prime Minister, Hakija Turajlic, to the airport in Sarajevo had been stopped by Chetniks, Serb irregulars. After a stand-off, they’d gained access to the APC through the rear door, machine-gunned the interior and murdered the Deputy. The UN’s future in Bosnia looked short-lived.

We crossed the almost featureless Duvno plain before picking up the road which ran along the plain’s eastern edge. At the Lipa checkpoint the Brigadier decided that we’d reach Fojnica quicker if we took Route Square along the Dugo Polje valley and thence drop down off the ‘mountain’ to Jablanica. It was a favourite route and spectacularly beautiful. We drove for half an hour in silence. Eventually Corporal Fox broke it.

‘Well, I don’t know about you … ,’ he drawled, addressing no one in particular,‘… in a way I’m glad we went there, but I wouldn’t ever want to go through that again.’ We said nothing. There was nothing to say. He’d spoken for us all.

We’d begun the descent into a breathtakingly steep valley – a wild, almost prehistoric place of towering black mountains, jagged rocks and shimmering ice, both bleak and forbidding. Some of the previous night’s terror entered my thoughts. How on earth had I got myself into this mess? Almost a year earlier, amid the arid wastes of Iraq and Kuwait, I’d been desperate to get to Yugoslavia. Now I wasn’t quite so sure I hadn’t made a terrible mistake – one all of my own making.

THREE Operation Bretton

October 1997 – Ian, UK

I’m sitting down, leaning forward, my stomach a fire of anger and fear. Legs crossed, one foot kicking uncontrollably.

I’m fiddling like mad with my watch strap. I can feel the fire welling up about to engulf me. I’m struggling to suppress tears of rage and frustration. I’m trying to explain but I’m just burbling incoherently. The man opposite me is a saint. I’ve met him before – in a past life. I mean, he’s seen me before, after the first time. He’s a lieutenant colonel, also a psychiatrist, the only one worth seeing. His name is Ian. He’s got a clipboard and a pen, but he’s not writing. He’s just looking at me, listening to me ranting.

‘I should have come to see you a long time ago, but I couldn’t. You just can’t … I mean, you try and get on with your life, put the past in a box and sit on the lid by busying yourself … of course, they’ll always tell you that the support is there – all you have to do is ask. But it’s not really there at all … let me tell you, your sort of help is virtually inaccessible.’

‘How do you mean, Milos?’ He’s frowning.

‘It’s the culture … it’s a cultural thing.’

‘Culture?’

‘Culture, macho Army culture. Can you understand what I’m saying? Y’know, you’re a major in the Parachute Regiment or whatever. In that culture you can’t show weakness or flaws. No one can. You’re supposed to be strong. So you wander around keeping it all inside, pretending everything’s okay … you bluff those around you, you bluff yourself …’ I’m close to tears now, ‘… but deep down you know you’re not well. You’re ill and need help but you can’t ask for it because you’re trapped in a straitjacket which is put on you by your peers, by the culture, by yourself … because you are the culture …’

‘So, why are you here now, Milos?’ his voice is soft and gentle, probing. ‘Why did you ask to see me?’

I stare out of the window at the sea. Why indeed? It’s choppy and green-grey. The waves are flecked with white horses. Why? The nightmare of the last five days flashes through my mind. It had been an unimaginable nightmare – it still is – and had it not been for Niki, my girlfriend, I’m not sure I’d be sitting here with Ian.

I’d held myself together long enough to answer their questions. They hadn’t finished with my house until past six in the evening. The questioning – in an interview room, all taped – had started at six thirty. Fortunately Issy, my solicitor, and I had been able to see the questions beforehand. It was all about phone numbers, phone calls to the former Yugoslavia, just as I’d expected. Most were instantly explicable and innocuous. It boiled down to three which weren’t. I told them the truth, but not all of it. I couldn’t bring myself to start talking about the List and about Rose and Smith. They’d have to find that out for themselves. The interview had lasted for no more than about twenty minutes, after which one of the policemen unexpectedly announced that I was on police bail. Just like that.

Curiously, he’d looked at his watch. ‘We’ll get this thing wrapped up by Christmas, so, let’s say bailed until eleven o’clock on 11 December – back here at Guildford police station.’ I was stunned. Oh, you’re confident of yourself, mate. Think you’ll get this cracked in a couple of months? You’re about to open up a real can of Balkan worms.

Before Issy left and I was handed back to the Army, she let slip two snippets of information – something about the Bosnian ambassador making a complaint and that the police had mentioned that they’d seized my diary from Bosnia, which apparently contained ‘evidence of disaffection with the West’s policies’.

After the questioning, I was led to another room where two colonels from Bracknell were waiting. One was in a suit and the other, a very tall, thin Guards officer, was in uniform. The Guards officer simply read out a typewritten statement from Bracknell to the effect that, due to the serious nature of my arrest, my vetting had been revoked and I therefore could not continue on the course. Forthwith I’d be posted to the Parachute Regiment’s headquarters in Aldershot. With that he dropped the paper into his brief-case, snapped it shut and brushed past me without so much as glancing in my direction. I felt like dirt, a leper standing there with no tie or belt.

The other colonel, Dennis Hall, was kinder. He explained that he’d been tasked to look after me. He asked me not to discuss the case with him and, with that, his driver drove us the ten miles to Farnham. It was dark and raining heavily.

My house had been taken apart. They’d removed just about anything they could lay their hands on. On the table lay a number of blue seizure of property forms. The words ‘OPERATION BRETTON’ were printed across the top of each. They had mounted an operation against me.

I’d quickly scanned the house. None of it really made sense. Why had they left that? That would have been useful to them. Why had they taken a whole pile of novels and Latin textbooks, and a sheaf of sandpaper? What possible purpose could they serve? Why had they taken that picture but left that one? Then I spotted it.

They left a Coke can in the kitchen. I don’t drink Coke at home – ever. They were drinking and eating while ransacking my house and then left their rubbish behind. A specialist search team? Nothing but a bunch of incompetents. They’re not professionals, they’re just Plod from the MoD.

I’d found a bottle of red wine in the fridge. At least they hadn’t touched that. Having opened it I then rang my mother. I had to. She was alone in Cornwall.

‘What!! Milos, I don’t believe it! After all you’ve done for them …’ Her voice was cracking and breaking over the connection. Then she got angry, ‘It’s the Muslims, Milos, the Muslims and the Americans!’

Things happen either by cock-up or by conspiracy. In my experience, usually the former. In any event the phone was probably tapped so I asked her not to jump to any conclusions and told her that a mistake had probably been made. I didn’t believe a word of it and neither did she. We agreed not to tell my sister.

Half an hour later L-P, a friend from the Army, called from a bar in London. He’d been interviewed by the MoD Police while I’d been in my cell. ‘Milos, don’t worry. I’m behind you all the way. One hundred per cent.’ He couldn’t discuss anything, certainly not over the phone. I didn’t want to know anyway. All he had to do was tell the truth. I trust him with my life. His call perked me up slightly.

As I polished off the wine I stared at what was left of my house. It wasn’t mine anymore. It was theirs now – they’d taken my life, my mementoes, dismantled my museum and carted off a large part of me. I was a squatter in my own home. I felt hollow and sick – this is what it must feel like to be violated!.

I awoke the next morning curled up in a little sweating ball. I’d had another of those vivid dreams from over there. Everything was an effort; dragging myself out of bed, shaving – I’m staring at myself in the mirror, mindlessly pulling the razor across my face. I’m staring into my eyes. I can still look at myself in the mirror, because I know the truth. But I feel like shit. I’ve got this horrible squirming, sinking feeling in my stomach. I feel weak, sweaty and queasy. I stare at myself, razor frozen in mid stroke – Traitor? No.

I smoked a couple of cigarettes. At nine-thirty Colonel Hall arrived to take me to Bracknell to clear out my room. Before we reached the car he stopped, looked around and said in a low voice, ‘Look, I’m breaking the rules by saying this … don’t feel as though you’re on your own in this. You’re not. A lot of people are backing you on this but they can’t tell you. People like Rose and Smith cast long shadows.’ It was something to cling to.

When we arrived at Bracknell the students were in a lecture. Just as well because I didn’t want to see any of them. Plod had gutted my room – laptop, printer, keyboard, monitor, books, books, books – all issued – gone. Gone also one copy of Playboy, my Service Dress jacket and my medals. They’d even unpicked my miniatures from my Mess Dress jacket.

It took me less than half an hour to pack up my room. We then drove back to Farnham in convoy. I dumped my stuff without bothering to unpack it and jumped in with Colonel Dennis. Next stop Regimental Headquarters, The Parachute Regiment in Aldershot to see my new Commanding Officer, Lieutenant Colonel Joe Poraj-Wilczynski, the Regimental Colonel. We’re old friends. He was shocked, didn’t really know what it was all about. All he’d heard was that I’d been arrested, kicked out of Staff College and that I was to be under him for welfare matters. Joe gave me a cup of coffee and Colonel Dennis returned to Bracknell saying he’d send his driver back for me. I still had to collect the motorbike.

Joe and I chatted for about an hour. He explained that, as my CO, he couldn’t be privy to any details about the case and that we’d have to confine our conversations to other matters. This was a blow. I was rapidly running out of people to talk to.

The driver took me back to Bracknell. When we arrived I discovered that I had to go and see my Divisional Colonel, Colonel Hamish Fletcher, also a Para and an old acquaintance. As I walked into his office he stood up and just stared at me. It looked as though he’d been crying, but he hadn’t – bad flu. Concern and worry were etched across his face.

‘Has someone stitched you up, Milos?’

‘Don’t know, Colonel.’ Really I didn’t.

He continued, ‘I’m not supposed to say this to you or talk to you about it but, when you were arrested we had a meeting with them and I told him in no uncertain terms. I told the spook that …’

‘Spook? Y’sure, Colonel? It was MoD Police who arrested me.’

‘No, this guy was definitely a spook and I told him, “You better make sure you’ve got this right. He’s thirty-four, last chance at Staff College, and you’ve just blown his career apart. If you’ve got this wrong he could just turn round, resign and sue the MoD!”’

I blanched. Thanks for the support, but I wish you hadn’t said that. Now they’ll be under added pressure to prove a case, to fabricate something.

‘Your posting order’s being sorted out now. I’m popping over to Aldershot this afternoon with it. Where will you be?’ I told him I’d wait in Joe’s office and with that I went, collected the bike and sped off to Aldershot.

Colonel Joe had some more unpleasant news for me. He produced a long secret signal which he’d received from someone in the MoD. It was a set of Draconian instructions detailing what I could and couldn’t do. I was forbidden from having any contact with anyone in the Services and discussing the case. If I did they’d be obliged instantly to record the details of the conversation and report them to the MoD Plod. But I was free to organise my own defence!

Colonel Hamish arrived at five with the paperwork. He told me that General Rupert Smith had phoned him from Northern Ireland and that his first question had been, ‘Has he been spying for the Serbs?’ Colonel Hamish had told him ‘no’.

‘Well, you told him right, Colonel. I haven’t been spying for the Serbs!’

Before I left for Farnham, Joe asked me if there was anything he could do for me on the welfare front. I’d thought about it long and hard in the cell and throughout the day.

‘There’s only one thing I want right now, Colonel. I want to see a doctor, and not just any doctor.’ I told him about Ian. Joe wanted to see me on Monday. Till then I was free to do my own thing.

I arrived home at five-thirty with a splitting headache. I hadn’t eaten for forty-eight hours but I wasn’t in the least bit hungry. I tried to turn the key but the front door was already unlocked. Niki was lying on the sofa with Frankie, her dog. She’d come down from London for the night. She had a christening in Camberley the next day and we’d made the arrangement the previous weekend. She smiled brightly at me. ‘I’m bored with this revision. How’s your day been?’ She had an Open University exam to sit on the following Wednesday.

I sat down heavily in the armchair, loosened my tie and just stared at her. She frowned.

‘Notice anything different about the house, Niki?’

Her frown deepened. ‘No, not really. Well, sort of cleaner, less junk. Come to think of it, have you had a clearout?’

‘Sort of …’ I closed my eyes and took a deep breath – here goes! – ‘Nix, I was arrested for espionage on Thursday … I’m on police bail …’

She stared back at me uncomprehendingly. The next four days were a nightmare, so bad that I can’t recall them.

And now I’m sitting in front of this bloke Ian, who’s asking me why I’m here. I’m staring out of the window wondering why there are no yachts out there on the sea. Must be at least a force six – perfect perfect day for a sail … Why am I here?

‘Why am I here, Ian? … I’ll tell you why. I’m here because I’ve got nothing left, nothing. That’s why I’m here.’

‘Nothing at all?’

‘That’s right, nothing!’ I struggle to control my voice. ‘Look! The Army’s a great life-support machine. It provides you with all sorts of crutches … well, life-jackets really. They keep you afloat and everything looks fine to the casual observer …’

‘Life-jackets?’

‘Precisely that. The uniform is a life-jacket, so is the job. They prop you up and keep you going … you know, you stick on the uniform and the beret and bingo! You’re a company commander. But when you take off the uniform, when you get home in the evenings or at the weekend and you step through the front door – alone – you step back into the museum and the pause button on the machine in your head gets pressed. The tape starts running again, and you’re back there. You’re somebody else and you’re back there. Everything else is irrelevant because being back there is more real.’

‘Where’s there, Milos?’

‘The Dark Side, Ian. You’re back on the Dark Side. That’s what we called Serb-held territory. That’s it then, by day or during the week you’re a major, Parachute Regiment, MBE, company commander or student. But at night or during the weekends you’re somebody else, you’re Stanley again … Mike Stanley, fixer, useful tool. You won’t believe this, Ian, but people still ring me up and call me “Mike”. Geordie does all the time. And I still get letters dropping onto the carpet addressed to this person called Mike Stanley … there are still people out there who don’t know me as anything other than Mike Stanley!’

‘And now? Who are you now?’ he asks gently.

I think hard. I’m not sure of the answer. ‘I’m both, Ian. Or maybe I’m nothing … a hybrid, a monster.’

I lapse into silence. I’m fiddling with the bezel of my watch – round and round and round, click, click, click, click, click, click. Ian’s waiting for me to say something. A thought enters my head and makes me instantly furious. I look directly at Ian.

‘I still can’t believe it, really, I can’t … I mean, you can’t dream up a more tragic joke. It’s a sick joke!’

‘What is?’

‘Names, Ian. Our names! I mean, I can’t believe it. We’ve got thirty years experience in Northern Ireland, thirty years of living with the terrorist threat, thirty years of developing systems and procedures for personal security, of protecting people’s identities … and what do we do with all that experience? Do we transfer it to the Balkans … ?’ I’m gulping for air. I didn’t wait for him to answer,‘… do we hell!! D’you know what names they gave the three of us? The first two they called Abbott and Costello. Can you believe it? And then I flew out as Laurel and then they changed my name to Stanley … Abbott, Costello, Laurel and Stanley. Big joke, Ian. Very funny if it wasn’t so serious. It’s our lives they’re playing with!’ I’m breathless, furious, almost shouting.

And then quietly, ‘Ian, Abbott was blown after only three months there. The Croats found out who he was, threatened to kill him, just because he was a Serb. He was removed from theatre within twenty-four hours. He never came back.’ I lapse back into silence. Staring at my boots. Big joke.

‘Has it always been like this, Milos?’

‘Like what?’

‘This double life of yours. Has it got progressively worse or has it stayed the same? You’ve been back two-and-a-half years now …’

I’m not sure what to say. I think hard for a moment, ‘...’ 95 was quite bad, the last half of ‘95. I had a naff job with the Territorial Army up north, did a parachute refresher course, my Company Commanders Course. It sort of kept me busy, but I was back there when I wasn’t busy. 1996 was so busy, that’s when I was Company Commanding in 1 PARA – twice in the States, once in Northern Ireland, once in France, in between exercises. Just didn’t stop, I wasn’t on the Dark Side much. Thought I’d cracked it. Put all my demons in the box and locked the lid.’

‘And?’

‘And then, Ian, I went to Shrivenham. Nightmare. Suddenly you’re a student along with ninety-nine others, all on an equal footing. No responsibility, except for yourself; no soldiers to look after; no careers to manage. This year has been a nightmare. It’s just got worse and worse. More and more polarised. It’s the routine.’

‘Routine?’

‘Predictable, bloody routine. Monday morning to Friday afternoon you’re a student. Live in a room there. Work hard. Drink Diet Coke only, watch the diet and become an obsessive fitness fanatic.’

‘And then?’

‘And then, get home Friday evening. Walk through the door of the museum. Tape starts playing and I’m there again on the Dark Side. Sink a bottle of red wine, stagger up to the pub, few pints of Guinness …’

‘How many?’

‘Five or six maybe. Sometimes I get a kebab, sometimes I forget to eat all weekend. Saturday’s the same. So’s Sunday. I’m there on the Dark Side with all my friends, dead and alive. And then Monday morning I drive to Shriven ham where I’m a student again, for another four and a half days. And that was my life. You keep it all inside you.’

There’s a long silence. ‘That’s why I’m here, Ian. I’m here because when something like this happens, something big that explodes your fragile world, something that removes all your crutches and life-jackets …’ I can feel tears welling, that’s when you realise that all those things were nothing, that you’re still where you’ve always been – on the Dark Side … ’

‘Is that where you are now?’

I shrug, not trusting myself to speak. Not really knowing the answer.

Another long silence. Ian very quietly, ‘Do you want to come back?’

I can’t speak. I nod my head and then shake it. I really don’t know.

Ian’s scribbling something. I try to get a grip of myself.

‘How do you see the future?’ he asks quietly.

‘Sorry?’ He’s suddenly changed tack and caught me by surprise.

‘Do you see a future for yourself? I mean how do you see your future?’

‘I don’t. There isn’t one. There is no future on the Dark Side. I suppose I’ve been drifting ever since I got back. I’m still there, but I’m back. Does that make sense?’

Ian nods. We’ve been at it over an hour. Me burbling, him listening and making the occasional note.

I’m staring out at the sea again. It’s getting dark there. Winter’s definitely on its way. It’s dark, cold and lonely out there. Ian’s asking me a whole load of practical questions: sleep patterns, dreams, panic attacks? Alcohol intake, diet? How’s your libido? Sex life? Steady relationship? I answer him as best I can, but I don’t take my eyes off the sea. My answers are automatic. I know myself so well by now, I don’t even have to think about the answers.

‘If we’re to do any meaningful work we need some sort of structure to work from. When did you last see me?’ He sounds quite businesslike now.

I’m still looking at the sea. ‘November ’93 after my first year there.’

‘That’s right. I’ve got the notes somewhere, but I think it would help if you took me through it … from the beginning …’

‘The beginning?’ The beginning? When was that? Where did it begin? This century? Last century? When I was born? The recruiting office in Plymouth? It began all over the place. Where to start? Kuwait in the desert, that’s as good a place as any.

‘Milos?’

‘Yes.’

‘Where did it start? What was it like?’ What was it like?

I tear my eyes from the sea and stare at Ian. I don’t really see him. What was it like?

I’m speaking slowly now, more measured. ‘It started in Kuwait and turned into a living nightmare. It was a completely upside down world – Alice-Through-the-Looking-Glass – warped, weird, back-to-front. I can’t begin to explain what it was like.’

‘Well, why don’t you just tell me about the job? Start there.’

‘Job? Interpreter?’ I pause for a moment. Was that it? Just that? ‘Only for a short while, Ian, just at the beginning.’ I’d hated interpreting. It had given me hideous headaches and in any case I just didn’t have that computer-like brain that the job requires.

‘Well, what was your job then?’ What was it? How do you describe it? It doesn’t exist in any job description that the Army has ever heard of. What was it … in a nutshell? I’m thinking hard now and it comes, absurd though it sounds.

‘Ian, I was a fixer.’

‘A fixer?’

‘Yeah, that’s right – a fixer, a sort of go-between … for the UN, for Rose and Smith … you know “go-and-wave-your-magic-wand” stuff.’

‘That’s the job they gave you?’ He sounds incredulous.

‘No, not really. It sort of just happened by accident. It evolved I guess … by accident.’

‘Okay then, but what exactly did it involve?’ I can see he’s not getting it.

‘Involve? Just about everything. As I’ve just said: “go and wave your magic wand at the Serbs … fix this … sort that problem out … get ’em to see it this way … get the hostages released …” on and on and on. There was no job description, just sort of made it up as I went along.’