Dog Soldiers: Part 1 of 3: Love, loyalty and sacrifice on the front line

‘Socks. Oh my God, socks. They are a f…ing life-saver, Mam. Pardon the language, like, but my feet might get some feeling in them now. Imagine 35–40 degree heat walking around the pissing desert for six hours at a time.

‘Tell Dad I got to throw my first live grenade the other day. Mint! Absolutely mint! I’ll tell you about it when I’m home. Ha! Ha! Ain’t had chance to let my rifle do any work yet but hey there’s 5½ months to go.’

Looking back, knowing what I know now, I still understand my son’s excitement because this was what he wanted to do. This is what he had trained so hard for, and there he was, in his words, ‘living the dream’. And of course the dream job came with a dog.

It must have been in his second bluey home that Kenneth told us that he had been taken off protection work and had, at last, been assigned an arms and explosives search (AES) dog called Diesel.

‘I haven’t got a complaint about him at all apart from he loves other dogs too much. I’ll have to watch that when we’re working coz the local dogs will kill him if he gets too close. What else can I tell you except, don’t worry … If anything was to happen to me you would be notified quickly enough. They would either ring your mobile or home. Not going to happen.’

Every letter after that was signed off not just by Kenneth but with love from Diesel, too – never forgetting the mini paw print. My son was happy and so was I because now, wherever he was, he would not be alone.

Through March and into April Kenneth was in Afghanistan but his letters betrayed that his mind was still at home. He had to post his mobile phone back to me and of course there was a bill to pay. I could tell that bit of admin was worrying him, and so for the same reason he authorised me to deal with all his post that came to him at our home. I didn’t mind, after all, as there was little he could do about all that from where he was. Trying to deal with a call centre from the comfort of your own home is frustrating enough but it’s near impossible when you have to book telephone and internet time at Camp Bastion on equipment that’s shared with several hundred other people. Besides, I liked to feel needed. That was normal, as a mum.

I was already missing Kenneth’s constant cries of, ‘Mam, could you just … Mam, while you’re in town could you pick me up some …’ There was always something he wanted me to get for him, even when he was home.

I’m not just saying this because he was my son, but he was a good-looking boy and he liked to look smart even when he was in casual clothes, which included his beloved Newcastle United football shirt. Kenneth liked specific toiletries so his shopping list would be pretty detailed and he wouldn’t be seen out of the house without hair gel. His sisters were always complaining that he spent too long in the bathroom and it was a family joke that if you didn’t make it into the shower before Kenneth you would be waiting forever!

It was no surprise to any of us that his blueys almost always contained some kind of shopping list. It made me smile thinking of him sitting on his camp cot in the desert, paper resting on his knees – just as he did as a boy doing his homework – pen poised ready to scribble down all the things he had been saving in his head.

April 2008, his first bluey after just being posted to Camp Roberts at Kandahar Airfield said:

‘Hi Parents … How are we today? I’ve been good since the last time we spoke and fully integrated with my battle group. That sounds quite scary really, “battle group”. Ha, ha. Me going into battle is probably never going to happen and I’ll never get a chance to get some rounds off as the Platoon I’m with will do all that for me. It would be an experience, I reckon, and nice to see how I would cope with it after all the training. Be good to kick in and really enjoy it. Diesel is doing well. He’s chasing flies at the moment in the living room at the kennels I’m staying at … My new address means you won’t have to send stuff through Bastion anymore so you can get things to me a lot easier.

‘I have a list of things needed or liked. Not necessarily to be sent all at once … and I’ve asked Jeni to send some stuff so if you can tie in with her plz … at least I will have them for when I get back from the job I’m going on. So, watch, trainer socks, baby wipes, photos of the family, Bonjela, something to cut my nails with other than my bayonet, under crackers (pants) and dog treats and toys for Diesel – oh, and a digital camera (there was one in Argos quite cheap). There are cameras out here but they are six megapixel shite … and the phone I sent back to you is bloody five million pixels. I wanted a better one to keep pictures of my experiences here. I should have thought about it long before this, like.’

While his dad got questions about the car and if it had been fixed yet, and the state of Newcastle United, Kenneth made sure his girls did his shopping! He knew we would run around and made sure there was always one parcel on its way and another being made up. We soon got used to the delay in his requests coming in, the parcel leaving home and arriving with him. Numbering the parcels helped, too, so he knew what to expect in each and which email or letter it corresponded with. It was a bit of a science, really, and certainly there was nothing random about it.

Of course, there was the odd challenge, like the time he asked for Drumstick lollies in a bluey on 10 April:

‘Thanks again for the watch and the socks. Guys are already sick of the T-shirt and me getting news of Newcastle victories. It’s great! Oh, Mam, can you find me some Drumstick lollies? I had a craving for them along with some malted milk biscuits. Ahhh, I know it’s hard maybe to do but a “brew” kit – some real teabags. Sugar I’ll be able to steal and we’ve got dried milk but a packet of real teabags plz. I miss a good brew. Oh well, speak again soon. All my love as always, Ken xxx and Diesel xxx’

Sometimes, in those early days of Kenneth being in Afghanistan I forgot that I was sending this stuff into temperatures of 30 to 40 degrees plus. I was over the moon to find Drumstick lollies aplenty in our local shop. As I grabbed a handful out of the box on the counter I imagined the broad grin that would appear on my son’s face when he opened the envelope and there they would be, along with his requested biscuits, sports mags and back copies of the Newcastle Chronicle, plus the little surprises that Jeni and Steph had prepped for him. Envelope sealed and addressed to Lance Corporal Kenneth Rowe, Dog Handler, Op Herrick 8, I felt pure joy as the woman at the post office took it from me. To me, it was already on its way.

Then came the ‘thank you’ bluey:

‘Hi Mam, Received your parcel today which was a nice touch – everything was crushed and melted, like. The Drumstick lollies were open and had leaked onto the newspapers with the melted chocolate off the biscuits! … Never mind … I’ve been putting some weight back on but just on my stomach … not good … I will have to go running when I get home. You get any passes for the gym?’

I tried a second time with the lollies and all landed successfully – wrapped and intact. Kenneth must have decided to share them out or the opening of his parcel had attracted a crowd because he wrote to say: ‘… can’t believe how much a small thing like a Drumstick lolly can put such big smiles on the faces of four grown men!’ I like to think of him sitting eating the lollies – bought in a little shop in Newcastle – with his mates in the dust of Afghanistan.

He always said the parcels were a massive boost to morale and there was always huge excitement when the post arrived – it didn’t matter whose post. The contents of letters and parcels were always likely to be a source of comfort, amusement, relief, joy and sometimes ridicule from their mates. Kenneth’s parcels always had to have that extra something – for the dog. Non-melting, of course.

After that I was much more careful about wrapping each item before adding them to his parcels. Sending things when he was based in Northern Ireland had been much easier – searing heat was never likely to be a problem there, although drowning would have been no surprise as every letter and phone call featured a rain report. From March to April 2008, almost every letter from Kenneth featured the weather, but it was all about heat and dust, rain and sand.

At first the sunshine was a novelty and there were plenty of ‘no time to sunbathe’ jokes and tales of sunscreen shortages. Kenneth liked the sun and he had inherited my olive skin but the Afghan heat was too intense even for him. Soon it began to affect everything from his sleep to his general morale. By the end of April he was wishing for snow and when the rain came he wanted it to go away. Kenneth was never shy of a good moan, and I’m sure his Army mates were used to it, too, but once he had said his piece he admitted he felt better: ‘rant over’.

Kenneth worried about Diesel, too. He always told us how well his dog was working, but shelter and rest were important and Kenneth’s Bergen was always packed with food, treats and a blanket for Diesel. Whatever the weather had to offer, Diesel would be OK. If Kenneth had to dig in for shelter he dug a man-and-Labrador-sized hole. If there were sandbags to protect the hole from the rain Kenneth explained how he had extended the sandbag wall to protect his dog, too. That dog was his mate as much as any other soldier there.

Plans for his deployment out of Kandahar Airfield (KAF) in mid-April had been held back so the days waiting meant more time to write letters home. I loved getting the extra letters but I didn’t like hearing Kenneth’s frustration. ‘That work I mentioned has been postponed for now so I’m still in KAF living the dream! … How’s life back in Newcastle?’ If the letters weren’t very short, they were very long and full of detailed questions about his dog at home, ‘K’, and the welfare of Trevor his tortoise and how his dad was getting on with setting up the vivarium. I couldn’t help smiling as I read his ramblings. Maybe there was a little bit of guilt in there for leaving us with his pets to care for (but we had always done that) or it was all about stringing out that connection – for as long as he could stay awake to write it all down. It was funny and lovely and I just wanted to reach out and give him a massive hug.

Getting a letter like that said one thing to me: he needed cheering up. He was going to miss his sister Stephanie’s 21st birthday meal so I decided we would take a bluey and a pen with us and pass it around the table so every member of the family could add a message to Kenneth – as if he had been there with us. He loved it! In the best way we could we managed to get Kenneth at that table, and just imagining the food was enough for him. It was as if living on ration packs had caused him to hallucinate about his grandma’s Chinese chicken curry, mince and dumplings and his favourite roast dinners. If I could have sent him a doggy bag I would have done it that night. Instead I wrote: ‘We missed you, son,’ knowing that he was missing us too.