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As we waited, the silence was broken by small arms fire. Then the thud of the T-55`s main gun. I could only imagine what was happening. It was possible that some units of the BIH were engaging the Serbs, but it seemed unlikely there would be enough of them to do anything anyway. Archer decided to report the contact to HQ. If NATO jets were available, they might be able to overfly the area and assess the situation. Archer called HQ with the satcom. ( even using the satcom, and can take time to get through, depending on the atmospherics). Archer was frantically adjusting the satcom and re-trying to make contact with HQ. The rest of us could only sit and wait, keeping watch incase the Serbs returned along the road. All the time we could hear a battle raging, and the frightening sound of the T-55. After about 10 minutes, the noise died down, with only isolated bursts of fire. Finally Archer reported the Serbs position to HQ. After he had finished, he called me to him (using a field signal to avoid making any noise). He then whispered that we were going to quickly push onto Gorazde and leave the Serbs. I didn’t say anything, I just nodded to him. But as I passes the message on to the rest of the patrol, I coundn`t help but wonder what had happened to the people in the village.
We knew the Serbs could return along the road at any time, so we had to cross as quickly as possible. We sent 1 scout around 50 m parallel to the road, hidden in the undergrowth, to watch down the road for Serbs. The rest of the patrol then crossed one at a time and took up defensive positions around 25 metres away from the road. Once everyone was across, our scout moved back down and crossed. We then waited and watched for around 10 minutes, incase we had been seen crossing the road. When Archer decided to was safe to continue, we moved out on to Gorazde. The next few hours were pretty uneventful. Patrolling, going to ground, watching and listening. With the GPS (global positioning system, navigation is pretty simple. All you have to do is follow your waypoints until you reach your destination.
My first look at Gorazde was somewhat disappointing. The intelligence reports I had read make the town sound like a fairly large modern town. Of course there would be war damage to the town, but strangely, I almost felt disappointed as I scanned the outskirts of the town through my binoculars.