Photo Essay: The RAF in Afghanistan
Oct 2007, Vol. 152, No. 5
By Susan Schulman
In October 2004 the RUSI Journal published the first instalment of a major photographic project on the UK armed forces. For the past three years, the experiences of soldiers, sailors and airmen in training and on operations in today’s challenging security environment have been recorded through the eye of the acclaimed photographer Susan Schulman. After chronicling a 4 (UK) Armoured Brigade company’s six-month tour of Iraq in 2004/5 and HMS Liverpool’s deployment to West Africa and the South Atlantic in 2006, the final instalment of this project sees Susan Schulman with the RAF in
Afghanistan in the late Spring of 2007.
The bulk of her images focus on the RAF-led emergency medical teams, transported by Chinook helicopters to the front line to extract casualties – most of which were Afghan children during her time in theatre – and transfer them to FOB ROB (Forward Operating Base Robinson) in the Sangin district of Helmand or the UK’s high-tech field hospital at Camp Bastion. Also captured are the essential and dangerous aerial tasking jobs – including simply delivering the mail – that sustain forward bases during operations. The RAF Regiment, which provides force protection to UK air assets, is seen engaging ‘hearts and minds’ on a Cimic patrol near Kandahar. A few months later a Gunner and civilian Afghan interpreter with the Regiment would be killed by a Taliban mine in the same area.
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By Susan Schulman
In October 2004 the RUSI Journal published the first instalment of a major photographic project on the UK armed forces. For the past three years, the experiences of soldiers, sailors and airmen in training and on operations in today’s challenging security environment have been recorded through the eye of the acclaimed photographer Susan Schulman. After chronicling a 4 (UK) Armoured Brigade company’s six-month tour of Iraq in 2004/5 and HMS Liverpool’s deployment to West Africa and the South Atlantic in 2006, the final instalment of this project sees Susan Schulman with the RAF in
Afghanistan in the late Spring of 2007.
The bulk of her images focus on the RAF-led emergency medical teams, transported by Chinook helicopters to the front line to extract casualties – most of which were Afghan children during her time in theatre – and transfer them to FOB ROB (Forward Operating Base Robinson) in the Sangin district of Helmand or the UK’s high-tech field hospital at Camp Bastion. Also captured are the essential and dangerous aerial tasking jobs – including simply delivering the mail – that sustain forward bases during operations. The RAF Regiment, which provides force protection to UK air assets, is seen engaging ‘hearts and minds’ on a Cimic patrol near Kandahar. A few months later a Gunner and civilian Afghan interpreter with the Regiment would be killed by a Taliban mine in the same area.
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