Page 506 - The History of the Royal Army Veterinary Corps 1962–2021

THE HISTORY OF THE ROYAL ARMY VETERINARY CORPS 1962 – 2021
Op HERRICK 11
Veterinary Support to Veterinary Civic Action Programmes (VETCAPs): TMWDSU was able to support several Op IMPACTs with TF444 in Camp JUNO where a veterinary walk-in clinic was provided alongside the other medical services. Positive feedback came from TF44452, prompted a further development – a requirement to build the Afghan ‘face’ onto this activity.
Initial meetings with the CIMIC (Civil Military Co-operation) and Provincial Reconstruction Teams demonstrated a requirement to further these activities and reconstruct the Afghan Veterinary Services. The Theatre Capability Review had identified the requirement for an additional Veterinary Officer (VO) to participate while not affecting the veterinary support offered by the Role 2 Veterinary Hospital.
One third of Afghanistan’s pre-war exports were agriculture based. The role of the VO in supporting the agriculture reconstruction and development program, as well as influencing the Afghan people through supporting them and mentoring the Afghanistan Veterinary Association, was all in its infancy during this time.
Chiron Calling, winter/spring 2010, carried an article profiling the work of Captain Miles Malone who gained the appropriate nom de guerre, the ‘Herriot of Helmand’:
Army Veterinary Officer runs Pioneering clinic in Helmand.53
Under the watchful eye of Kalashnikov armed Afghan Army guards, perched on top of four-wheel drive Ranger vehicles as security lookouts, a British Army Veterinary Officer and his mousta- chioed Sergeant Major survey the distant desert horizon for signs of movement. Both carry pistols at their waists. This is Helmand Province and Taliban country: unpredictable and dangerous.
“Here come the first customers of the day,” announces Captain Miles Malone as a herd of livestock accompanied by human figures appears, still several kilometres away on the bronzed desolate moonscape stretching ahead. The soldiers busy themselves preparing drugs for the arrival of the livestock. Today for the third time in as many months, they are doing something that was, until recently, unheard of in this remote corner of the world – running a veterinary clinic.
Meanwhile, a turbaned, wizened Afghan farmer moves slowly across the sandscape on his motor scooter. Riding pillion are his three young sons, grasping their
father’s billowing dish-dash and each other as the vehicle bounces over an uneven dirt track. Another slightly older boy walks alongside, unhurriedly herding a flock of a hundred or so sheep towards the make-shift wire pen of the vet camp clinic.
Miles, dubbed the ’Herriot of Helmand’ by fellow soldiers, is a cheery 28 year old Captain from Suffolk, in the Royal Army Veterinary Corps, a member of 102 Theatre Military Working Dogs Support Unit, normally based in Sennelager, Germany. He is currently halfway through a seven month deployment to Afghanistan based at the British Forces’ main hub – Camp Bastion.
Miles’ main role here is to provide preventative healthcare and emergency care to the working dogs used to search out IED components and suspicious objects or to guard and provide protection to the many camps where troops are based. But he has also become the dynamic force behind a new project set up to improve the standard of living for local Afghans.
His veterinary clinic, held once a month, invites farmers from the small villages dotted to the northwest of Camp Bastion – away from the Green Zone where the majority of fighting has occurred – to bring their livestock for a free check-up and dose of preventative healthcare.
In this remote corner of Helmand, local, semi-nomadic families eke a living out of the desolate landscape by growing a few crops – usually poppy with its readymade market to the Taleban – and farming livestock. The goats, sheep, cows and donkeys are prized and valuable possessions, so much so that the womenfolk make colourful beaded necklaces to adorn the cattle’s necks.
“Animal livestock forms the lifeblood of these local communities. By improving the health of the herd, we can in turn have a positive impact on the health, wealth and general wellbeing of the population,” said Miles.
“If we reduce the disease state of the animals, the knock-on effect will be improved meat and milk production. This not only increases the value of the animals at market, but it increases the amount of protein in the locals’ diet. If the meat doesn’t contain worms or diseases which can be transmitted to humans, so the health of the local population also improves.
Giving assistance to the Afghan population also serves a useful purpose for British forces in the area:
“By helping the locals with a project like this, we build up good relations with them and they repay us with information about the surrounding area and local Taliban activity.” Sergeant Major Greg Reeve, 39, from Upavon in Wiltshire explained: “The economy of Helmand is 70% agricultural, 20% livestock and 10% other. If an Afghan man owns an animal, it will be more prized to him than any other possession, apart from his sons. Everything in Afghanistan has a price, but you cannot
52 Part of the Special Forces Support Group.
53 ‘Army Officer runs Pioneering Veterinary Clinic in Helmand’; the article was published on the Defence Internet and Chiron Calling Winter 2009/Spring 2010.
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