Six Weeks at Sea with the Royal Navy
By Captain Niall Archibald
On 16th February 2009 HMS Argyll, a Type 23 Royal Navy Frigate, sailed from Plymouth harbour with the unusual addition of fifteen soldiers from the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders, 5th Battalion The Royal Regiment of Scotland.
The Battalion and Ship enjoy a long-standing affiliation and have hosted exchanges from one to the other regularly over the years.
This was to be an attachment with a difference, however, as HMS Argyll was deploying on the first phase of TAURUS 09, a six month naval and amphibious deployment ranging from the Mediterranean through the Middle East and onto to Brunei and Singapore, as part of a large multi-national task group composed of British, Dutch, Belgian, American and Turkish ships and Marines.
Our party was to join the Task Group for six weeks of the first phase, the passage out to the Mediterranean from Britain and Exercise EGEMEN, an amphibious NATO exercise taking place at sea and ashore in Turkey. The 5 SCOTS party left Canterbury heavily laden with baggage, prepared, I felt, for any eventuality.
Our complete inexperience of life at sea in any respect compounded by little knowledge of what our role would be on the Ship and within the Task Group during the exercise phase ensured we left prepared to be correctly dressed on parade, in the field, at cocktail parties, at PT, at sea and of course ashore during the numerous eagerly anticipated visits to eastern Mediterranean ports.
We wanted to ensure that whatever opportunities might arise during the attachment we would be able to get fully involved and, if possible, exercise some of our skills as infanteers in the unfamiliar amphibious environment, all while of course enjoying what we perceived as essentially a state-funded cruise.
The passage around the Bay of Biscay can apparently often be a fairly unpleasant experience, especially so for those more used to terra firma beneath their feet. We, however, experienced nothing other than calm seas and sunny weather as we found our bearings aboard HMS Argyll and became used to life at sea during the ten day passage to Malta, our first stop.
During this period the Jocks were divided amongst the four main departments aboard a naval ship: Weapons Engineering, Marine Engineering, Warfare and everybody’s favourite, Logistics. So while some were variously employed scanning the horizon from the bridge as look-outs or assisting in the engine or weapons compartments, others were put to work in the galley making baguettes.
We also maintained what can only be described as a substantially aggressive fitness programme with the ship’s resident PTI, an energetic Royal Marine and inter-services boxer coincidentally from Glasgow. An instant bond was struck up between the Jocks and the PTI who clearly enjoyed having infanteers for a private PT session on the flight deck every day.
Upon arriving in Valletta Grand Harbour we felt fairly adjusted to life at sea and perhaps quite eager to stretch our legs a little. We owe a great debt of thanks to HMS Argyll’s Logistic Officer who felt our accommodation aboard was officially austere enough to justify a five star hotel in the party resort of St Juliens just north of Valletta, and so it was there that we spent the next four days whilst the Task Group assembled in the harbour in preparation for the build-up training for Exercise EGEMEN scheduled to take place on Cyprus.
After a few days ashore exploring Malta’s bars and clubs there was a general feeling that a few weeks at sea was perhaps exactly what was required.
During our time in Malta I had liaised with the Task Group Headquarters and had secured our attachment for the next phase of the deployment to HMS Bulwark, the flagship of the Task Group and primary platform for surface amphibious assaults. We left Valletta Grand Harbour behind amongst the new surroundings of Bulwark, an altogether different kind of ship to what we had become accustomed.
HMS Bulwark is designed to accommodate hundreds of Royal Marines and their kit and weapons as well as her own ship’s company and a large joint headquarters. As such she has wide corridors and stairwells to allow soldiers to move easily whilst wearing webbing and bergens, numerous bed spaces and some large open areas as well as the ability to flood the aft of the main hold to launch landing craft from.
This is wholly different to a frigate which is very compartmentalised and with no real flexibility for accommodating embarked soldiers in any number other than at perhaps Platoon minus strength.
The build-up to Exercise EGEMEN now began in earnest with a small exercise on Cyprus which allowed all elements of the Task Group to practice their drills and get used to the very complex stowage SOPs which are a necessity if landing craft, vehicles and aircraft are to be launched from naval platforms in the correct order for an assault on land.
This phase brought our second opportunity to set foot on land as we learned the basics of an amphibious assault and took part in section and platoon attacks on land. The Jocks were attached to Charlie Company of 40 Commando for this phase and were based on HMS Ocean, another large amphibious assault ship within the Task Group.
With the end of this short run-out for the units of the Task Group we moved back to HMS Bulwark and set sail for Turkey where the main exercise would take place.
We arrived in Marmaris at approximately the half-way point of the attachment and spent five days alongside what turned out to be another lively port.
The sailors, marines and Jocks all empathically embraced another opportunity to interact with one another and the locals while the Officers were unfortunately put to work on Bulwark within the Commander Land Forces Headquarters, the Department of the Joint Task Group Headquarters specifically responsible for planning and executing the land side of the operations with a skeleton staff composed of elements of 3 Commando Brigade.
As the deployment overlapped with the last few months of Op HERRICK 9 the majority of 3 Commando Brigade Headquarters was still deployed in Afghanistan. The Commander Land Forces staff was thus limited to three officers and four SNCOs who all naturally jumped at the chance to purloin two "spare" infantry officers in anticipation of a fairly hectic ten day exercise looming.
With the two officers within our party now fully employed we managed to secure employment also for the Jocks as enemy forces to fight against 40 Commando alongside the Turkish Marines ashore on Turkey. So we parted company as the Task Group set sail from Marmaris with the Jocks taken away by a Turkish Marine’s vehicle and me sincerely hoping that their lack of visas, demonstrable deficiency of the Turkish language and thirteen British weapons in the boot wouldn’t be a problem.
As it turned out it wasn’t and the Jocks reportedly spent a very happy ten days living in a tent somewhere on a Turkish training area intermittently conducting fighting patrols against an exasperated 40 Commando and otherwise having barbeques and bonding with their Turkish Marine hosts. Meanwhile the officers were locked in a windowless planning room trying desperately to gain some grasp of amphibious tactics, producing esoteric staff work and generally gritting teeth against incessant Pongo-baiting slurs from our Royal Marine companions.
ENDEX brought the return of the Jocks to HMS Bulwark, closely followed by the movement of our whole party by landing craft back to our home on HMS Argyll in preparation for passage to the post-exercise R and R location of Chania on Crete.
We arrived at Crete to sunny weather with the ship’s company in a relaxed mood with the serious working part of their involvement in the deployment now finished and the anticipation of time ashore in Crete and Majorca on the way home. Our party was again moved out to a hotel in town within a short walk of the bars where we spent two days relaxing before flying via Athens back to Britain.
The attachment brought a bit of adventure for all both at sea and ashore and overall was an unrivalled insight into what life is like in the Royal Navy. Several nautically-themed tattoos spread sporadically across the party will ensure that some will literally never forget the experience, and while the Battalion’s affiliations have been strengthened with HMS Argyll and the Royal Marines new relations have been made with the Turkish and Dutch Marines. The prospect of a return visit of some of HMS Argyll’s sailors and officers to the Battalion will hopefully be something that will come to fruition in the near future.
