Vox Meditantis

26th October 2012

Another night at this godforsaken junction. Third rotation in as many weeks. Command calls it a strategic position – I call it a dust-bowl with a view of absolutely sod all. Roads run four ways from here, not that it matters. Most are mined to buggery anyway, and the ones that aren’t lead nowhere anyone in their right mind would want to go.

My knee’s gone again. Swollen up like a cricket ball, hot to the touch. The MO gave me brufen and told me to rest it. Rest it. Christ. As if there’s any such thing out here. We patrol, we stand guard, we patrol again. The body’s just a machine, isn’t it? Run it into the ground, patch it up with pills and tape, send it back out. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve wrapped this same bloody joint. The cartilage is probably dust by now.

Someone asked me yesterday – one of the lads from 2 Section, fresh out from Bastion – what I do to stay fit. What my favourite exercise is. I nearly laughed in his face. Favourite? There’s no favourite anything in this place. But I told him the truth: boxing. Used to love it, back home. The rhythm of it, the footwork, the clean simplicity of fists and movement. Out here, though? There’s no ring, no rules, no bell to save you. Just weight on your back and miles under your boots. Carrying seventy pounds of kit through this heat is the only exercise that matters, and I despise every step of it.

The stars are out tonight. Clearer than they’ve any right to be. You’d think something so vast would make you feel small, humble maybe. Instead I just feel angry. They sit up there, cold and untouchable, whilst we’re down here breaking ourselves apart over land that doesn’t want us. Beautiful, I suppose, if you’re the sort who finds comfort in that. I’m not.

This crossroads – it’s a nowhere place. Not quite one thing or another. Helmand stretches in every direction, each road promising more of the same: heat, suspicion, exhaustion. I wonder sometimes if we’ll ever leave, or if we’re meant to stay here forever, rotating through these same dust-choked intersections until our knees give out and our backs seize up entirely.

My hands won’t stop shaking. Could be the caffeine – I’ve had too many brews today, trying to stay sharp. Could be something else. The body keeps its own tally of things the mind tries to ignore.

Four months left on this tour. Four months of crossroads and star-filled skies and knees that won’t heal. The lads say the next rotation’s already being planned. Different junction, same bloody war.

Afghanistan War, late 2012: International Security Assistance Force operations focused on transitioning security to Afghan National Security Forces ahead of NATO’s 2014 withdrawal timeline, while British forces concentrated in Helmand faced persistent insurgent activity and heavy patrol burdens . The UK had surged troops to Helmand from 2006, establishing bases along key routes where IEDs, attrition, and morale strain were constant realities for infantry rotations . By October 2012, planning accelerated for drawdown and handover, even as casualty risks and joint operations with Afghan units continued . Subsequent years saw the formal end of UK combat operations in 2014, a NATO train‑advise mission, and the later collapse of Afghan government forces in 2021 .

Bob Lynn | © 2025 Vox Meditantis. All rights reserved.