"Энди Макнаб. Немедленная операция (engl) " - читать интересную книгу автора

went on leave for a couple of weeks, then reported to the Rifle Depot
at Winchester. I felt a mixture of excitement an worry as the eleven of us
joined a platoon of adult recruits on their last six weeks of training.
Compared with I.J.L.B, the discipline was jack shit.
Once we'd finished our work for the day, we could get changed and walk
but of the guardroom and downtown.
At the end of the six weeks we got our postings. If you had brothers in
particular battalions, they could claim you; otherwise, you just stated a
preference and kept your fingers crossed. Third Battalion were known as the
Cowboys and the 1st were the Fighting Farmers.
two RGJ were in Gibraltar but due to come back to the UK quite soon for
a Northern Ireland tour.
I asked to go to 1RGJ because of the boxing and because they were due
to go to Hong Kong. So of course, I was sent to 2RGJ. I wasn't best
pleased-especially when I found out that they were called the Handbags.
"Where do you come from?" the color sergeant asked me on the barrack
square, as I stood blinking in the brilliant Mediterranean sunshine.
"London."
"I can hear that, you dickhead. Whereabouts in London?"
"Peckham."
"Right, go to B Company."
My rifle platoon consisted of sixteen blokes. We'd been told that when
we got to the battalion, they would get hold of us for "continuation
training"-indoctrination into their special way of doing things. But 2RGJ
was snowed under with commitments; they were all over the Rock, on
ceremonial and border duties. Everybody was too busy to give the five of us
any attention, and our first couple of weeks were spent just bumming around.
" went into the main street the morning after I arrived.
As far as the eye could see, there was nothing but shops full of cheap
watches and carpets from Morocco, most of them run by Asian or Arab traders.
I bought my mum a peacock carpet for a fiver, with a pair of flip-flops
bunged in. I thought, This is wonderful; I've only been here a couple of
days and already I'm cutting majorleague deals down the kasbah.
Full of enthusiasm after my year of training, I was raring to go.
I thought the posting was brilliant: We were in the Mediterranean;
there were beaches; there was sun. It was the first time I'd ever been
abroad, apart from my day trips to France, and I was getting paid for it. So
the attitude of some of the other blokes came as a bit of a surprise. Some
of the old hands seemed so negative; everything was "shit" and "for fuck's
sake." Or, very mysteriously, it would be "I'm just going to do some
business," and off they'd go. It took me awhile to find out what they were
doing.
The majority of teenagers who joined the army had been exposed to some
illegal substances. It was part of the culture, and they took that culture
in with them when they joined. I had never been interested in drugs myself,
mainly because I hated smoking and had never been exposed to them. I'd heard
all the terms but didn't exactly know what was what. And now when I did get
exposed to the drug business, it scared me; it was something totally alien.
Drugs, I was told, had always been a bit of a problem.
Once, when the battalion came back from an overseas exercise, a fleet