Brits at Crossing Point One get historic medal
Cover of ZuluFor the soldiers stationed at Crossing Point One in the badlands of Afghanistan it was like something out of Zulu.There is much more.
Hardcore Taliban fighters launched wave after wave of suicidal onslaughts as they tried to get into the isolated British base in northern Nad'e Ali.
The combat was so fierce that soldiers were ordered to fix bayonets as the insurgents pushed to within just 30 metres of the tiny compound's mud walls.
Had the patrol base been over-run, it would have been a catastrophic defeat that could have threatened the UK mission in central Helmand.
Zulu, which starred Michael Caine and was released in 1964, tells the story of the Battle of Rorke's Drift in 1879, during the Anglo-Zulu War.
But at the end of six weeks of attacks, the soldiers of 5 Platoon, No 2 Company, 1st Battalion Grenadier Guards had killed at least 84 of the enemy while barely suffering an injury themselves.
The platoon commander, Lieutenant Craig Shephard, received the Military Cross for spurring his brave men to repel the insurgent attack for days on end.
Remarkably, the 25-year-old found himself at the forefront of the pitched battle only a year after leaving officer training at Sandhurst.
He earned himself the nickname 'Captain Kinetic' because he asked for so many Javelin missiles, a rocket used against enemy forces hiding in compounds.
In total, the guardsmen fired thousands of rounds to hold off sustained and intense Taliban attacks including a record 47 of the high-powered anti-tank missiles.
Lt Shephard, from Epsom, Surrey, received his medal - the third highest award for gallantry in the face of the enemy - in an investiture ceremony at Buckingham Palace.
He said: 'We knew that if they got into the compound and had overrun it, it would have been a major British defeat. There was absolutely no way the platoon was going to let that happen.
'We were sometimes firing five javelin missiles a day, and other companies were using two or three in a week. It was full on, four or five hours a day just going at it.
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The movie about the battle at Rorke's Drift is one of my favorites. Perhaps someday a similar movie can be made of this groups heroic actions including its leader "Captain Kinetic." He certainly made good use of the missiles in fighting off a determined enemy.
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