Ross Kemp on Afghanistan

By Ross Kemp (Penguin, RRP $28)

Ross Kemp on Afghanistan

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This highly readable account of life on the front line with the British forces in Afghanistan is a book for our times. In years gone by, many a soldier recorded the minutiae of his fighting day in a diary, some eventually published to great acclaim.

Now, to suit the age of celebrity, a former star of EastEnders, equipped with little more than a reporter's instinct and a TV camera crew, has slipped easily into the role.

And what a great job Kemp does, documenting for the first time the day-to-day reality faced by the British troops in the brutal conditions of Helmand Province, deep in the south of the war-ravaged country. Whether trying to locate and destroy the ever-elusive Taliban or dodging their deadly fire, the soldiers' lot is distinctly uncomfortable. Plagued by heat and flies, under-equipped and badly fed – the Americans and Canadians fare much better on both scores – the Brits acquit themselves well as they endure the constant threat of enemy snipers, mines and other deadly explosive devices.

Adding hugely to the not-so-open conflict is a conflict of another kind, the battle to win the confidence of ordinary civilians (a battle that may never be won), with each day bringing its own dilemmas. Should they destroy a village or burn a crop in which a handful of Taliban might be hiding?

Sticking to his self-imposed brief, Kemp records the reactions of officers and men before, during and after each operation. We also learn about the personal problems that beset soldiers and their families back home. Freed from the constraints of conventional war reporting, he is refreshingly honest about his own reactions to life and death on the battlefield and to the devastation caused by 21st-century warfare.

All up, a book that will have dad on the edge of his chair – or spluttering over his Weetbix – until the very last page.

- © Fairfax NZ News