Michael Smith
Private Matt Woollard
A BRITISH soldier who had part of his leg blown off by a landmine is preparing to return to Afghanistan to settle “unfinished business” with the Taliban.
Private Matt Woollard, 20, is expected to be the first British infantryman to return to the front line after being fitted with a prosthetic limb.
Woollard, a member of 1st Battalion, the Royal Anglian Regiment, lost his lower right leg after setting off an insurgent bomb while on patrol near Kajaki in May 2007. His heart stopped three times while he was receiving treatment.
“I want to get back and do what I was sent to Afghanistan to do in 2007 — take the fight to the Taliban,” Woollard told The Sunday Times.
The army expects him to pass fitness tests and he could return as early as next year.
His determination to rejoin the fight, which is backed by army chiefs, emerged as the Ministry of Defence named three paratroopers killed in a Taliban ambush last Thursday. The fiancée of one of the victims, Corporal Kevin Mulligan, 26, is pregnant. Lance-Corporal Dale Thomas Hopkins, 23, and Private Kyle Adams, 21, also died.
The mounting casualties come amid concern among senior officers that some of the mines and explosives used in the Taliban bombing campaign are coming from Iran. Their fears appeared to be backed by statements from Dennis Blair, America’s director of national intelligence, confirming that Iran is supplying Afghan insurgents with weaponry.
In a statement to the US Senate intelligence committee, obtained by the Secrecy News blog last week under freedom of information rules, Blair said Iran was covertly supplying weapons to the Taliban while publicly supporting the Afghan government.
“Shipments typically include small arms, mines, rocket-propelled grenades [RPGs], rockets, mortars and plastic explosives,” said Blair. He added: “Taliban commanders have publicly credited Iranian support for successful operations against coalition forces.”
British military intelligence sources were more cautious. “It is an undefined amount of explosives that has come in from Iran,” said one source. “But, yes, there is concern that some of the mines and explosives the Americans are talking about may have been used in the Taliban bombs.”
Meanwhile, the new head of the British Army, General Sir David Richards, provoked controversy by suggesting British troops could be in Afghanistan “for the next 30 to 40 years”. The suggestion was rejected by the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats, with Liam Fox, the shadow defence secretary, saying the idea was “unaffordable” and “a non-runner”.
Private Matt Woollard
A BRITISH soldier who had part of his leg blown off by a landmine is preparing to return to Afghanistan to settle “unfinished business” with the Taliban.
Private Matt Woollard, 20, is expected to be the first British infantryman to return to the front line after being fitted with a prosthetic limb.
Woollard, a member of 1st Battalion, the Royal Anglian Regiment, lost his lower right leg after setting off an insurgent bomb while on patrol near Kajaki in May 2007. His heart stopped three times while he was receiving treatment.
“I want to get back and do what I was sent to Afghanistan to do in 2007 — take the fight to the Taliban,” Woollard told The Sunday Times.
The army expects him to pass fitness tests and he could return as early as next year.
His determination to rejoin the fight, which is backed by army chiefs, emerged as the Ministry of Defence named three paratroopers killed in a Taliban ambush last Thursday. The fiancée of one of the victims, Corporal Kevin Mulligan, 26, is pregnant. Lance-Corporal Dale Thomas Hopkins, 23, and Private Kyle Adams, 21, also died.
The mounting casualties come amid concern among senior officers that some of the mines and explosives used in the Taliban bombing campaign are coming from Iran. Their fears appeared to be backed by statements from Dennis Blair, America’s director of national intelligence, confirming that Iran is supplying Afghan insurgents with weaponry.
In a statement to the US Senate intelligence committee, obtained by the Secrecy News blog last week under freedom of information rules, Blair said Iran was covertly supplying weapons to the Taliban while publicly supporting the Afghan government.
“Shipments typically include small arms, mines, rocket-propelled grenades [RPGs], rockets, mortars and plastic explosives,” said Blair. He added: “Taliban commanders have publicly credited Iranian support for successful operations against coalition forces.”
British military intelligence sources were more cautious. “It is an undefined amount of explosives that has come in from Iran,” said one source. “But, yes, there is concern that some of the mines and explosives the Americans are talking about may have been used in the Taliban bombs.”
Meanwhile, the new head of the British Army, General Sir David Richards, provoked controversy by suggesting British troops could be in Afghanistan “for the next 30 to 40 years”. The suggestion was rejected by the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats, with Liam Fox, the shadow defence secretary, saying the idea was “unaffordable” and “a non-runner”.
