SAS VS WEST SIDE BOYS...

25 years after raid to rescue Royal Irish Regiment soldiers, survivors return to Sierra Leone to unveil a memorial to one man who didn't make it home

- BY RICHARD ASHMORE

WITHIN seconds they were surrounded. Hundreds of men burst from the jungle on either side of the convoy of British Army Land Rovers. Behind them, a truck mounted with a heavy machine gun covered the only escape.

This was the moment things went horribly wrong for 11 soldiers of the Royal Irish Regiment who found themselves ambushed by militants in war-torn Sierra Leone.

The unit had been on a peacekeeping operation on August 25, 2000, when they turned down a track on their way to a remote village and came face-to-face with the notorious West Side Boys - infamous for lopping off the limbs of their enemies with machetes.

Now hordes of the furious rebels had encircled the soldiers and were trying to fight them for their weapons. Army training in an ambush is to “react instantly” recalls Ian Getty, then a 20-year-old Ranger serving his first overseas deployment. “One of my mates went to shoot, which is a pretty standard drill, but just at that moment, the Boss said ‘no’.

That call probably saved the lives of the 11 men and their local interpreter, Musa.

But their fate was now in the hands of one of the most feared and unpredictable insurgent groups in Africa. What unfolded over the next 17 days would change the course of history for the West African nation and send shockwaves which still resonate to this day.

MANIACS

It was codenamed Operation Barras and, earlier this year, a memorial was unveiled to Bombardier Bradley Tinnion, 28, mortally wounded while taking part in the rescue.

Back in 2000, the UK and UN were supporting and training the military of the former British colony of Sierra Leone.

Then Prime Minister Tony Blair had agreed to aid the Sierra Leonean government in a brutal civil war against fighters from the Revolutionary United Front, and a breakaway faction - known as the West Side Boys.