Bravo Two Zero

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Bravo Two Zero (B20) was the name given to an eight-man British Special Air Service patrol that was tasked with severing the main communication line between Baghdad and north-west Iraq and finding and destroying Iraqi Scud missile launchers during the Gulf War. Bravo Two Zero was the patrol's callsign. The controversial patrol, mostly a fiasco from the start, has been the subject of several books and two TV movies.

Contents

[edit] The patrol

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On the night of January 22, 1991, the eight man team was inserted into Iraq by a Chinook helicopter.

The team moved across 20 km (over 12 miles) of Iraqi desert and found a wadi (dry river bed) in which to hide during the day. Soon they discovered that they had the wrong radio frequencies, and could not contact anyone on the radio. The patrol was stumbled across by a young goatherd who reported them to the Iraqi authorities. A shootout with Iraqi armoured and other forces followed. They did reach a designated emergency pickup point, but the helicopter never appeared.

According to some accounts there were no Iraqi forces nearby, only Bedoin civilians. The goatherd told his father and grandfather -- both former Iraqi Special Forces members -- of the SAS soldiers' position. As Bravo Two Zero retreated, the two Bedoin men reportedly fired warning shots over their heads.

The poorly-equipped patrol then attempted a gruelling march of nearly 300 km (over 186 miles) to exfiltrate northwest to the Syrian border. The team lost contact with each other through miscommunication and became separated while suffering freezing weather, including snowstorms. Three members of the team died, another four were captured and only one, Chris Ryan, reached Syria after eight days.

The captured soldiers were moved numerous times, enduring torture and interrogation at each successive location. They were last held at Abu Ghraib Prison before their release.

[edit] Patrol members

Except as noted, these names are pseudonyms or nicknames used by McNab and subsequent authors.

  • Andy McNab (pseudonym) (Captured by the enemy later released, author of Bravo Two Zero)
  • Chris Ryan (pseudonym) (The only member of the patrol to escape, author of The One That Got Away)
  • Bob Consiglio (real name; killed by enemy fire)
  • Steve 'Legs' Lane (real name; died of hypothermia)
  • Vincent Phillips (real name; died of hypothermia)
  • Malcolm 'Stan' McGown (Captured by the enemy later released)
  • Mike Coburn (pseudonym) aka 'Mark the Kiwi' (Captured by the enemy later released, author of Soldier Five)
  • 'Dinger' (Captured by the enemy later released)

[edit] Literary accounts

  • The first public mention of the patrol was in the autobiography of Lieutenant-General Peter de la Billière, the commander of the British Forces during the Gulf War. The autobiography entitled Looking for Trouble: SAS to Gulf Command - The Autobiography (ISBN 0-00-637983-4), only mentioned Bravo Two Zero in passing, but it broke the ground for further books to be written on the patrol.
  • The leader of the patrol published an account of the patrol in a book titled Bravo Two Zero (ISBN 0-440-21880-2) under the pseudonym Andy McNab.
  • Soon, Chris Ryan published another account, The One That Got Away (ISBN 0-09-946015-7). It criticized McNab's leadership of the patrol.
  • Both the above accounts are critiqued in a book by SAS veteran Michael Asher, The Real Bravo Two Zero (ISBN 0-304-36554-8), where in post-war Iraq, he followed the path of the patrol and interviewed local Iraqis who witnessed the events.
  • A further account, Soldier Five by Mike Coburn (ISBN 1-84018-907-X), published in 2004, aimed to "set the story straight", especially with reference to criticism of some of the deceased team members in previous publications.
  • The ex-SAS warrant officer Gaz Hunter was the leader of B Squadron SAS at the time of the gulf war, and wrote about it in his autobiography "The Shooting Gallery". In particular he criticises the way that he and his fellow B Squadron staff sergeant were sent to Colombia to help the Colombian military in combating the drug cartels while their squadron was sent to the gulf without them.

[edit] Film accounts

Chris Ryan's book was turned into a TV film, also entitled The One That Got Away, in 1996 (IMDb page).

A TV movie, Bravo Two Zero, based on the Andy McNab book followed in 1998, starring Sean Bean and directed by Tom Clegg (IMDb page).

[edit] References in popular culture

In the film Buffalo Soldiers the tank that rampages through the German town uses the callsign Bravo Two Zero.

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