Tomáš Růta

"When we came into contact with the enemy, I didn't see the level of risk as high as when we were left alone on a street full of people. By some misunderstanding, we were left alone. The Afghans, who were supposed to be closing the street, let people in, and we needed to get some kilometres to another base. You're walking through a crowd of people in the town of Chiarikar, where it's really like a marketplace out of an American movie. And at that point there were reports of suicide bombers, so I guess that's where the fear was the greatest. But fortunately, nothing happened. Fortunately, we all came back safe."

"There are designated places that serve as cover. Whether they're shelters built outside, they're kind of upturned concrete Us, sandbagged, or concrete buildings, the lower floors, have served us like that, and we've lived in the upper floors. And whenever there was an attack, there was a really annoying sound that said, 'Incoming, incoming!' Alert! That's when you get down on the floor, you roll off the bed, or whatever you do, you smash yourself on the floor. And you wait for the first rocket to hit. And then you run for cover. Then there's a head count. Everyone was required to carry a phone and let their platoon leader know where they were. Because we were spread out - whether it was the gym, the mess hall, the store, somebody was in the rooms. We also had a system - if somebody went somewhere, they wrote on the board where they were, and you really needed to know where people were. Each squad leader was responsible for knowing where his people were just in case there was an incomings so that we could track them down if necessary."