All language subtitles for BBC.Killing.Escobar.1080p.HDTV.x265.AAC.MVGroup.org

HE GROANS

The pain I had was excruciating.

HE MOANS IN PAIN

Every time I breathed, it was pain.

GUNFIRE

I was very aware
we were in Pablo Escobar's area.

The nightmare scenario.

What happens
if Escobar's men get me?

But the main thing was the pain.

What was I going to do?

Think about your morale.

The Catholic prayers come out.

I said, "Give me the strength...

"to die with an element
of honour."

I lay there thinking...

.."How the fuck
did I get myself here?"

GUNFIRE

REPORTER: This was the work of
the Medellin drug cartel.

REPORTER SPEAKS IN SPANISH

A bomb has exploded in the capital
of Colombia, Bogota,

killing 35 people
and injuring around 200.

The explosion devastated
the headquarters

of the country's security police.

The main suspects are
Colombia's drug cartels.

But the most prominent cartel bosses
have escaped - one, Pablo Escobar,

just minutes, the police say,
before they raided his hiding place.

On Sunday, presidential elections
take place.

GUNFIRE

Three candidates have been
assassinated already.

The cause? The unending drugs war.

Central to the conflict
is Pablo Escobar,

leader of the Medellin cartel
and Colombia's most feared criminal.

Cocaine dealing transformed him
into one of the world's richest men.

When you look at Pablo Escobar

and the size and scope of
his organisation,

he's the largest cocaine
manufacturer and distributor ever,

in the history of the world,

responsible for as much as 80%
of the cocaine in the world.

Think of that - 80%.

Initially, there was an alliance
between the two cartels,

Medellin and Cali.

REPORTER: Gilberto Rodriguez
Orejuela,

Miguel Rodriguez Orejuela...

Cali Cartel controlled
cocaine distribution to New York.

Pablo Escobar controlled
the Miami area.

Then Cali started trying to
get into Miami,

Pablo was trying to get into
the New York markets.

The war started,

and it was so vicious
that the Cali Cartel tried to bomb

Pablo Escobar's building.

They placed a car bomb at the base
of that apartment

where Pablo Escobar's family
was based.

The bomb detonated.

Everybody was fine,
but the retribution

that Pablo Escobar took
on the cartel was vicious.

STREET MUSIC IN DISTANCE

I was invited to a meeting
with the Cali Cartel.

Gilberto Rodriguez told me,
in two minutes,

"The reason you're here is we have
a terrible enemy, Pablo Escobar.

"And either we get rid of him
or he gets rid of all our family."

What they wanted from me was
to put them in contact with some of

the ex-SAS forces that were retired
in England,

to which I had access.

1989, I received a telephone call
from Jorge Salcedo Cabrera.

And I said, "What is it?"

He said, "We want you to work for
some businessmen in Cali."

The mission was to eliminate
Pablo Escobar

from the Cali Cartel's lives,

kill Pablo Escobar.

And I knew just the person
for that role.

You don't get asked to assassinate
Pablo Escobar

unless you've got
the right experience.

GUNFIRE, SHOUTING

I went to Angola
because I wanted to get into action.

REPORTER: Angola, divided and
at war with itself, has collapsed.

For us, the Cubans or the Russians
have no right to kill Angolans.

We have to get aid from anyone who
will help us to defend ourselves.

There have been a total of
about 200 British mercenaries

involved in the war, who were paid
to fight against the MPLA,

the movement which won the civil war
and which now runs Angola.

We interviewed Peter McAleese,

commander of all the FNLA
mercenaries in northern Angola.

What I want is the public to hear
the other side of the operation,

see the good side
and see the bad side,

and to let them
judge for themselves.

I was young, I was fit,
I was aggressive.

Although I disliked communism,
it was never a personal thing to me.

It was just they supplied
most of the enemy at that time.

The communists' plan for Africa
was to go across the central belt,

and then start proceeding
north and south.

The West backed the FNLA and
the Eastern Bloc backed the MPLA.

I wouldn't have wished it on
my worst enemy. It was a nightmare.

The place was in a state
of breakdown.

And there was a lot of money
and arms changing hands.

Why shouldn't we fight
against communism,

whether it be for money
or for a cause we believe in?

I first met Dave Tomkins in Angola.

He'd never been a regular soldier.

But what I did notice about him -
he was extremely brave.

I've had a whole host of jobs
in the security business -

defence equipment -

and I was the guy who would get you
anything, anywhere.

Bombs, missiles, artillery rounds,

in the millions and millions
of dollars' worth,

to Iran, Iraq, the PLO.

You name it, I shipped it.

He liked to sport a large medallion
he had round his neck.

A bit suave, a bit debonair. He was
always well coiffured, you know?

My first impressions of Peter were
I was impressed with him.

I was impressed with the way
he handled himself, moved.

He wasn't flash.

We just gelled as soon as we met.

Dave said, "Are you interested
in a job in Colombia?"

And I accepted.
I could not resist the challenge.

Peter and I flew from London
to Cali.

We were met by Jorge Salcedo.

We called him George.

He also had a code name that
he liked to use called Ricardo.

How are you? Very well. Good to
see you again. Nice to see you.

Let me introduce you -
Peter McAleese.

Pleasure is mine.

I could tell that Jorge

was definitely somebody
within the system,

because he walked us straight
through customs, immigration,

and there was no holdup whatsoever.

I felt that the mission had been
sanctioned at the highest level.

At that time, I knew everybody.

I had no problems in getting them
through customs. It was immediate.

And that power came from
the Cali Cartel.

I had a video camera
and videoed everything.

They took us to the outskirts
of Cali,

to a private sports centre
that was owned by the cartel...

How was your flight? Top of
the range, thank you very much.

..and in a rest area there
by the pool, having lunch,

was the four Cali Cartel leaders.

And that's where
I had my negotiation.

We represent a group
of highly skilled soldiers,

the best in the world.

I charge per month, per person,
plus bonuses, plus expenses,

plus all found, everything.

Money was not an object for them.

They had billions.

Peter is our main trainer,
and he was with the SAS.

And then it just went a bit quiet
and it became a bit more intense.

It was almost like
it'd been orchestrated.

And one of them leaned over...

..and he said to me...

Can you kill Pablo Escobar?

The morals of killing Escobar -

I didn't have any conscience
about it.

How can you have morals

when the American government
has got $1 million on his head,

the Colombian government's
got quite a bit on his head?

REPORTER: Cien millones de pesos...

Pablo Escobar Gaviria, El Padrino...

The guy was a threat to
the government, the way of life

in Colombia, although he was kind
to a lot of people in Medellin.

But the fact is,

he upset the balance of power
within Colombia and he had to go.

Think about the heartaches
that he caused

by some of the people
that he killed.

REPORTER SPEAKS IN SPANISH

He put a bomb on
a commercial airliner...

..because he thought there was going
to be a presidential candidate

on that plane.

And the presidential candidate
wasn't even on there.

So 110 people died

because Pablo wanted to impose
his will on somebody else.

You can't really moralise
with someone like that.

I've never looked upon it as murder.

I've looked upon it as a target,
I've looked upon it as...

You know, you can say,
"Well, that's a copout."

It's not a copout.
It's genuinely how I feel.

"Thou shalt not kill"?
You're in the wrong business.

Because that's what it's about.

The actual act of killing someone,

when you're a professional soldier
and you're on a mission,

is part of what you have chosen
to do in your life.

I was a bit nervous the first time
I killed anybody.

I was in the SAS.
I was posted out to Aden in 1967.

That area is now called
southern Yemen.

We were in a camp called
Harbour Lane,

and it was constantly being mortared
and shot at by dissident rebels.

Our task was to go out and try
and get rid of these men.

We moved up to this area

where we thought there was
a group of shepherds there.

As I looked at them,
something clicked in my mind

and told me, "These guys are not
shepherds." It was pretty dark.

I spoke to one. He stood up...

GUNSHOT
..and he shot Dave Healy,

who was the troop sergeant.

And I immediately turned around
and I just blootered him.

I fired a round into his stomach.

He stood up and he straightened up,

and I put another five into his
chest, and he slid down a wall.

I felt, really, that
I'd proved myself as a soldier.

I felt proud that
I hadn't failed in battle.

In the eyes of some,
it may be morally wrong.

But then again,
that was the profession I chose.

The first night, it was cold.

And I found a can of beans
in my escape bag.

And I found some hexamine blocks,

which the British Army used
for cooking.

And when the can inflates again,
you know the food's cooked.

It was beautiful.
HE LAUGHS

There was a fear that Escobar
could send people to kill me.

On the hill there...

..lying on my own...

..I had some vivid dreams.

And this dream was Angola.

There was a guy bent over a bush,

and somebody had shot him
in the back of the head

and his brains had come out.

And he was just...
He was still holding the bush.

Man's inhumanity to man.

RADIO CHATTER

The Cali Cartel was very confident
that they could kill Escobar...

..when he had one of his
usual parties in his ranch.

So, the details were to be carried
by the British.

"We will target Hacienda Napoles.
We'll wait for him to come there,

"and you'll have to tell us
when he is.

"You'll have to put your spies
into action -

"the police and the military."
And they said, "Good idea."

I wanted to do a flight recce,

the reason being I wanted to know
what the ground looked like

because that was where we were
going to strike.

Hacienda Napoles was Pablo Escobar's
pride and joy. He loved that finca.

It was about 10,000 acres.

He had a zoo where he had
all the exotic animals of the world

in there. I remember the elephants,
the giraffes, the famous hippos.

A museum where
he had Al Capone's car in.

And he bought all kinds of things
relevant to gangsters.

He built an airstrip
where his drug trafficker friends

would come in to negotiate.

He had sicarios guarding that finca.

When we were in the air,
I looked down at Hacienda Napoles,

and then I realised that
it was a lot easier than I had

actually thought in the beginning,
because I could see the ground.

It was tailor-made for
a complete assault team.

I had to think about medevac -

should anybody be shot,
how do we get them out?

There was three little airfields
there that I was thinking about

how we could medevac from there.

We knew where the guards were.

We could see the guards on the gate
and in various places.

The main thing I was concentrating
on was the shape of the houses,

how the houses were laid out
and how the stables were laid out,

and the best place
to attack it from.

And above all, I looked for an area
where the assault team would land.

It was pleasing to the eye
of a military person.

And I said, "This one's a goer."

I felt excitement at the challenge,

excitement at doing something
that nobody else could achieve.

Everything in my military career
had led me to believe

that this was my day.

We needed a number of men,
preferably special force types,

who were capable and mentally
prepared to take on this mission.

"How many men are we going to use?"
We decided on 12.

We can only go for the top guys.

Billy, it's Peter...

Lots of experience, combat-proven,

and who had the big balls
to do this.

It's Dave, Dave Tomkins.

The selection process I had
for the men was based on the fact

that some of them
had served with me before.

Ned...

Others were recommended
by other people.

Yeah? I knew I could count on you.

And to be fair, none of them said
no. They just said, "We'll come."

Alex Lennox, how are you?

In the beginning,
Dave Tomkins called me.

Very well, my friend.
Been a long time.

Alex had been Parachute Regiment,
32 Battalion, South African Army.

Well, listen, I've got a very good
job opportunity for you.

I was excited.

Good money. Very good money.

I said, "Where is this?"

Colombia.

"I'm in."

Basically, come through Panama.
Do not come straight to Colombia.

You know the drill.

He looks like a Peruvian
mountain goat, doesn't he?

They came in via circuitous routes -
Germany, Argentina.

INDISTINCT DIALOGUE

It was security protocol.

Delivered personally, Dave.

We, with George,
met them at the airport.

And George, again, secured them all
through the passport

and immigration.

That's it, Jock. You look super!

Certainly straight out
of Miami Vice...

INDISTINCT DIALOGUE, LAUGHTER

By this time, George had acquired
an apartment -

very spacious, very palatial.

And everybody came there
and we settled them in.

Brilliant. Fabulous. Well furnished.

There was only one way into it,
and that was by elevator.

It had armed security.
They supplied us weapons.

So, we all had weapons, in case we
got a surprise visit from anybody.

Today is a nice day.
The sun is shining in Cali.

LAUGHTER

Here is a missionary who's donated
a few dollars to the poor.

And that could be me
because I'm fucked.

LAUGHTER

750.

D? This is a motorbike, mate.

You happy? Yeah, I've got
a motorbike now.

My ship's come in!
LAUGHTER

We were on $5,000 a month,
plus expenses, plus food.

But that was just a retainer.

I was on £1,000 a day.

The next morning, I got the guys
together, gave them a quick brief.

At this stage,
we still hadn't told them

that the target was Pablo Escobar.

We didn't feel they needed to know
at that time.

And I emphasised, "Do not do
any drinking whilst you're here."

SHOUTING AND LAUGHTER

The most beautiful women in Latin
America are in Cali.

It's just...
I mean, it's just unbelievable.

And we've got 12 of us.

It was beginning to seduce us.
It was, "Oh, everybody loves Cali!

"We love Cali!" And we did.

LAUGHTER

Guys spent a week or
so running around the clubs

and social life
and doing what guys do,

making a nuisance of themselves.

I went for a walk through Cali

and I passed by a pub that was
fairly open.

I went, "What the fuck?"

Ho!

Two of my team were there.

They were drunk.

What you doing?

Get up.

Anywhere else, it would
have been a funny situation,

but we could not afford to bring
attention to ourselves.

So I sent them back to the flat.

This is the riff-raff's bedroom.

The next day,
we stopped a week's wages off them.

$1,000 off you, $1,000 off you.

I said, "Also,

"you'll do exactly as I tell you."

So I went to the chemist and I got
some stuff called Antabuse.

And if you drink alcohol with it,
you start vomiting.

So I made them
take Antabuse tablets.

Cali's a small city, not used to
seeing a lot of foreigners.

And their presence was getting
very noticeable in the city.

So I decided it's time
to leave town.

We were 8,000 feet up.

It was cold.

Shivering cold.

I was thinking about survival

because I could have died.

And it gives you time to mull over
certain mistakes that you've made.

I was soul-searching.

I thought about a number of things.

My marriage wasn't going too well.

Everything went through my head,
you know, my childhood,

Mother, Father...

I just wished I'd been
a better husband

and a better father to my kids.

I was hurting a lot,

and I felt my head was going
to burst open.

I was trained

to kill

by the Army.

But the fighting instinct

came from No Mean City -

Glasgow.

I was brought up in Riddrie,

right next to Barlinnie prison.

My upbringing in Glasgow,

it was hard and tough.

But when you lived where I lived
with the people I lived with,

it's natural.

I never saw my father.

I just heard about him.

My dad was an extremely hard person.

He was feared by a lot of people.

He was quite a tough man.

Quite a hardy old man.

He'd get himself into some
scrapes and

I remember as a child seeing him,
you know, there was... a whole

gang attacked him and he had
about 46 stitches in his head.

He was always absent.

And I remember my mother said to me,
"Your dad's home."

And I remember distinctly
he had a uniform on.

I walked up to him
and I said, "Hey, mister,

"are you my daddy?"
Because I'd never seen him.

And if you look up here...

..on the top right-hand window
of Barlinnie prison,

my father used to be incarcerated
there.

And he'd put little things
in the window,

different colours,
to tell my mother,

you know, he either loved her,
he was depressed,

he was fairly happy,
things were going well.

Mammy would be upset,
you know, at times

because my father didn't know how
to sort of be with him.

That's the only way I can put it.

He never, ever told any of us
he loved us anyway, you know?

I'd seen my dad fighting
on quite a few occasions.

He got himself involved in a fight.

I was very young at the time,
and my father had been

dethroned as the local hard man

with a guy called John Dornes.

And old Miles,
who was my grandfather, said,

"We're not having this," you know?

"The family's been toppled."

So he put my father on a training
regime for the comeback fight.

They exchanged blows
and it was fairly heated.

They were really,
both really going for it.

It looked like something,
you know, out of a movie.

My father took a couple of smacks,
but he bested John Dornes,

and eventually dropped him.

And my father used to beat me.

He just hit me once

and all I saw was a load of stars.

He broke my nose.

It made me think

that I could never

let anybody beat me.

I'd prefer to leave it alone
if you could, you know?

I think Peter wanted him
to say to him, you know,

"I'm really proud of you."

But I don't think my father
could say that.

I don't think
he was able to say that.

It made me a fighter.

I found myself becoming
more and more aggressive

because I was moving up
the food chain of the hard men.

I was trying to find something that
I could channel my aggression into.

I had to get out of Glasgow

because Glasgow wasn't good for me.

The skinny one.

Very nice. I love them shorts, mate.

There is Don,
chewing a fucking orange, look.

My God, you're ugly close up.

He wants somebody to push him.

We needed a place to train
and we needed weapons.

Obviously, we can't go round
shooting in the streets.

And eventually, they moved us
to a place called Pennsylvania.

WHISTLE

That was a beautiful ranch
that the Cali Cartel had.

There's Dave and his daily exercise.

After a hard day of having
to relax...

Oh, we felt relaxed because you know
that there's money behind you.

100 acres of mountaintop retreat.

It had Chinese gardens,
a full-scale bowling alley,

swimming pools, sauna, weight room,

stables, horses,

quad bikes...

GROWLING

..guard dog perimeters,

guarded by his security
guards at the front gate...

Evidence!

..a cook - Martha,

servants,

it had an antenna for the television
bigger than my house, you know?

They could get a TV channel
anywhere.

You want to watch EastEnders?

It was out of this world.
It was truly palatial.

The most important thing about being
up there - there were no pubs.

You know, the drinkers suddenly
realised it wasn't on any more, and

the guys started taking it serious
then, and we started to train.

Go! Come on, boys!

Go on!

We needed to be fit. An unfit
soldier's a dangerous soldier.

And we had plenty of that,
but not enough fitness.

So that really challenged the guys.

Up! Go, go, go!

We'd do basic para PT,
natural fitness.

Ten push-ups there. Go, ten.

And we used to run around a running
track every morning at six o'clock.

Bloody thing.

We were told there was
weapons arriving

and to be ready for them.

The weapons were
obtained in the United States.

They were smuggled into the country.

And we're getting all excited.

We're psyched up to fuck,
waiting on these things coming.

And then it was smuggled
up in the back of a farmer's pick-up

truck that folded up
and had a false bottom in the bottom

and all the weapons were in there.

That's when the guys were like kids
let loose in a sweet shop.

Aha, fucking hell, here we go!

There was a couple of Interdynamics,
which is a small submachine gun.

We had M-16s, AR-15s...

Anti-tank rockets...

SPAS-12 shotguns,
machine pistols, Uzis...

29 there.

Zulu grenades,

66mm anti-tank LAWs rockets...

..60 kilos of C4 explosives,
anti-personnel mines,

whatever we wanted.

It was like fucking Christmas.

The whole thing has come together.

Everything that we needed to
assault, weapons-wise, was there.

Go!

Now the weapons have arrived,
it's become real, hasn't it?

And the training
went into full swing.

I could see the mentality
of the men switching.

They were starting to come together.

They were identifying
with their team leaders.

The team leaders identified with me.

They suddenly realised that they
were going to close with

the enemy and kill them.

Everything just seemed to be
slipping into place,

that you get with a unit
that's just started up.

And everybody became a part
of the little unit that we had.

The second day, I just lay there

shivering cold.

And I was going through things -
"Right, have I got food?

"The water's taken care of."

And I was planning in my mind

if help didn't come

how I could help myself

because I'd escape money on me.

And I formulated a plan
and I felt it would take me

something like eight days
to get better.

But did I have enough food to
sustain me for eight days?

Did I have enough warmth?

Did I have enough medical kit
to keep myself going,

to try and kill the pain?

I didn't.

The day I left the British Army,
I just went to one side

and I started crying.

It was the worst thing
I ever did in my life.

I drifted from job to job.

I just wasn't fitting in.

And I just felt lost.

And my aggression became worse.

My idea of a good Friday night -

you go in the pubs, get pissed,

and have a good fight.

It got to the stage in my life
where I felt that disputes

could be solved by violence.

Irene was a girl
I got involved with.

It developed into arguments.

And one day I hit her
a slap in the back of her head.

And before I knew where I was,
to use Glasgow terminology,

I was getting
huckled off by the police.

I was charged with assault...

..and I got myself locked up
in Gloucester prison.

I don't blame that lassie

for what happened.

I blame myself.

I'm extremely sorry.

If I could meet the judge...

..who sent me to prison,

I'd walk up
and shake his fucking hand.

SINGING

I was doing a lot of reflection.
Where was I going to go from here?

What experience I had from
the special forces, I wanted to

use it and test myself even
further than I'd gone.

Fortunately, there were plenty
of places to go

if you were seeking combat.

I was a mercenary in Angola.

GUNSHOTS

I was a mercenary
in the Rhodesian army.

I was a mercenary
in the South African Army.

EXPLOSIONS

In Rhodesia,

every time we went out, we'd some
form of contact with the enemy.

There was a thing called
a black book.

My name was in it.

It said, "A good, hard soldier."

And that's how I consider myself.

And the discipline that
we're talking about, cos we're going

to fight back, that is
the fucking difference.

Do you understand that?

Honestly, guys, there is
nobody can touch us.

Together, as a team, we can fucking
take on four times our number.

I assure you, we can do it.

Now, everybody in here's got
a bit of trigger time

under their belt, which
is more than the army's got.

Keep it together, keep it together

and realise that they cannot fucking
do us, and I mean it.

I am not creating
this in my own mind.

If we can't convince ourselves
that this is the case,

we'd be as well going home.

This is home.

Just had brunch, Roy and myself.
I had a tomato. Roy had a carrot.

Er, it's terrible here
and I'm doing it for the children.

Terry Tangney came to see me,

and he says, "My bottle's gone."

I'm shit-scared. Whatever it is that
you're doing, I'm fucking...

I just want to go home, mate.

They had no idea who the target was.

We didn't tell them
it was Pablo in case...

Well, for security reasons.
I'm out. I'm sorry, mate.

I said to myself,

"If his bottle's gone and we let him
go, who's going to do it next?"

I'll tell the boys that you have
problems at home with the wife

and you have to go home.

And the guys turned round and says,
"He's a fucking liar.

"His bottle's gone."

Thanks, mate. No worries.

The truth was he wasn't up to it,
and he wanted to get out.

And he was a security risk,
that's what he was.

And he should never have been let
home until it finished.

So, gentlemen, you're probably
wondering what you're doing here,

who the target is.

Some of you might have guessed it
right, some of you wrong.

In the end, we called them
together and said, "Right,

"you're speculating on who the
target is and what we're here for.

"Don't speculate any more.
This is the target.

"His name is..."

Pablo Escobar.

The head of the Medellin
drug cartel.

Great.

How are we going to do him?

At the last meeting I had with
the cartel bosses, Chepe Londono,

who was one of the four, came to me
and he said, "David...

"bring me back Escobar's head

"and I'll give you
a million dollars for it."

I said, "Yeah, all right."

I said to Dave, "I'll
cut his head off once he's dead,

"give you it in a basket,
and you can get the million dollars.

"I'll take 100 grand."

And it would have been proof that he

was dead if I'd brought him
his head, wouldn't it?

I had a look at the situation,
and I said to myself,

"I think it's time to do another
flight over the route

"into the target area."

There were 80 men on the premises.

We assumed there were 40 on duty
and 40 resting.

The ammunition they were carrying
was 60 rounds per man

and it was submachine guns,

which didn't have the range
of what we had.

Every one of the enemy,
there should be three men, four,

so we made up that number -
we made it up in ammunition.

The capacity of this ordnance
was enough to fucking kill...

..2,000, 3,000 guys.

GUNFIRE

Tactical-wise, we had the advantage.

They were onto a loser, not us,
because we had the firepower.

What I particularly liked
was taking something from an idea,

turning it into a plan
and implementing that plan.

The aim is to close with the enemy
and kill them.

If you fail to plan,
you plan to fail.

New evidence has emerged
that British mercenaries

are training gunmen for
the drug cartels in Colombia.

One mercenary has produced
a videotape

which he says shows former
British and Australian soldiers

at a secret Colombian training camp.

This man, Terry Tangney,
sold NBC the pictures...

Terry immediately got back
to Australia.

The first thing he did
was sell a story

on what was happening in Colombia.

He jeopardised the mission...

..he jeopardised the men
who were his comrades there,

but fortunately enough,
he didn't mention Pablo Escobar,

because, at that time,
he didn't know.

I don't know what British mercenary
activity there may be in Colombia,

though I've seen the rumours
like everybody else.

If there is any,
then I thoroughly deplore it.

Why would the CIA or FBI
or anything want to stop it

when he was a target
for the United States anyway?

When we heard about this plan,
of course we wanted him dead,

so any effort to kill Pablo Escobar

was of course welcomed.

We wanted it to happen.

Have you got it, Dave? Pardon?
Have you got it? Yeah.

I think they adopted
a suck it and see policy.

"They're disposable.
If they achieve it, fine,

"it's achieved an objective
that suits us all.

"If they don't achieve it,
we've lost nothing."

It was a need that they should
maintain secrecy in the area,

so one of the solutions
was to move the whole group

to the middle of the jungle.

I woke up.

Still no sign of any rescue.

The pain at this stage,
it hadn't subsided.

But I was learning to...

..live with it a bit more.

And I had some of the beans
that I had left.

I... just prepared myself...

..to lie in wait
until some form of help came.

The other reason I did that

was to try and get my body to...

..repair itself,
have an element of repair,

should I have to try and walk out.

HE EXCLAIMS

There was a fear that...

HE CRIES IN PAIN

..Escobar's guys could
come and get me.

I was very aware
of what could happen to me.

I had decided if they came,

I was going to take them with me.

They moved us to a place
they called La Guagua.

God knows what that means.
The Jaguar, or something.

The trip was quite an amazing trip.

We went via Dakota aircraft.

It really was phenomenal.

Give us a smile, sir.

LAUGHTER

I'd bring it home for you,
Billy, if I could.

But I'm not allowed.

The police won't let me.

The Colombian police
or the British police?

No, the British police.
The Colombian police won't mind!

This is the beach.

Finally, they took us
to the training area.

It was obviously
a cartel stopping ground,

moving cocaine, stuff like that.

The jungle accommodation
was just a long hut...

..and it held us all.

We set up camp and settled in there
to begin another phase of training.

Here's Dave with the M60.

There goes Alex.

It was just in the middle
of nowhere.

There it is. He's finally got it.

It wasn't guerrilla territory
that we knew of.

It had no beds, no bedding.

It was on the side of a river,

which meant there was no trouble
bathing and keeping yourself clean.

What a sight!
LAUGHTER

And we just got on with
the routine there.

The helicopters,
one was parked behind us,

two were over the other
side of the river.

I'm about to change
the colour of this

United States American chopper
that has made its way here.

It had landed all on its own

and we are going to respray it
nice Colombian police green.

Historically, Pablo gave orders
to his guys,

"Never fire on the military
or the police."

We had a tactical advantage.

Approach the house low level
and their spotters will have said,

"It's police and military," because
we've got the military colours

and we're in police logo - Policia
Nacional all over our helicopter.

We go into the grounds
without being fired upon

before somebody realises,
"Fuck me, it's not the army."

The shit would hit the fan then.

GUNFIRE

Six o'clock in the morning,
we get up, it was still dark,

we did tactical training.

There was nobody around
for many, many miles.

GUNFIRE

We could fire weapons...

LOUD EXPLOSION

..fire rockets...

..drop bombs,
and there was nobody to hear it.

CHEERING

When we were in the jungle,

we had to do some serious,
serious training,

just in case something went wrong
on the actual mission

and they had to make
their own way back.

They were getting fitter. Every day,
they were training together,

so we were getting that team spirit.

The $8 million men!

It takes a team to do the job

and the team gelled very,
very well for the operation.

We were out there practising
on a riverbed that we had,

which was roughly the same size
as the target.

The men had yellow patches sewn
onto the top of their balaclavas

so that I could identify
our own guys from the enemy.

We were given a very competent
Colombian pilot

who flew for the cartel
on numerous operations.

One was called Pablo
and the other one was called Tiger,

and Tiger had an awful lot
of police experience.

Tiger, he was a bit of a daredevil.

He would zoom around
through the river banks

and clip the tree tops.

He seemed to want to get
as close to them as possible.

We just covered everything,
from A to Z.

GUNFIRE

The morale was sky-high.

GUNFIRE

What I was trying to do in my mind
was give those men

the best chance they had
of leaving that target alive.

As we're going around,
the Fire group will land...

..at one end, while this one is
still laying fire to cover this.

Boys, I would prefer to keep one
on the ground all the time...

We'd get together,
we sat down at the table -

what we call a Chinese parliament.

The men had an awful lot of input

in that they were dealing
with their lives.

This team will then land
under the cover of these guys,

so there's no chance of hopefully
anybody shooting

because it'll be quite close...

Everybody felt they'd contributed.
We had put the final plan together.

The ground, the situation,
the mission, the execution,

the admin and the log.

And that was it.
After that, it's go.

When you talk about a mission,
you don't make it long-winded.

You just say,
ground, situation, mission.

Our mission is to kill
Pablo Escobar.

The operation will be carried out
in three phases.

One, the flight from the jungle
to the target.

GUNFIRE

All of a sudden,
helicopters come over,

start machine-gunning their place.

By the time I dropped 40 kilos
of explosive around the place,

they would have been shellshocked.

EXPLOSION AND GUNFIRE

One helicopter has got
the assault group in,

which are going to land first.

There would have been 12 guys
on the ground,

Peter Mac up there
with his Gimpy in the gunship

so we had some air cover.

They would fan out.

One group is the cover group.

Fire in the hole!

EXPLOSION

Stage two, the rest would start
clearing the premises,

working their way through.

GUNFIRE

Action on the target.

You engage the target and you put
enough rounds to put them down.

B-b-b-bang!

The assault team's aim was to
get into the house.

Women and children were off
the menu.

We had the area colour-coded.

White was the front.
Black was the back.

And we numbered it
one, two, three sections.

We knew which part of the house
he resided in,

which was in Black 1.

Clear!

Once the house clearance team
were in section one,

we'd direct our fire to section two,
ahead of them.

So we're clearing the way for them

to move through
the house to find Escobar.

GUNSHOT

Phase three was the ultimate target.

OVER RADIO: Target is down, target
is down.

We were taking Pablo's body
to the helicopter.

Right, if we'd hacked his head off
so we've only got a bit of him

to carry, because we were a bit
overcrowded on the choppers!

And eventually they'd have flown us
back to Cali

and hopefully we'd all live forever
and a day and gone home.

Hey! Do you want me
to make it jump? Not at me!

LAUGHTER

Everything was ready to go.

The men were ready to go, and it
seemed to turn into a waiting game.

And then a spanner
landed in the works.

A Sunday Times reporter by the name
of James Adams had picked up

on the actual mission and was
threatening to print a story on it.

He was an ex-spook
or a spook at the time.

He'd accessed flight information,
and the mere fact that he'd

got it shows that he wasn't
just your average journalist.

He contacted someone who knew Dave
and we agreed to meet him in Panama.

We've got a story.
A very good story.

And now I want you
to contribute your side.

At the time I was
the defence correspondent

of the London Sunday Times.

You don't have a story.
There is a story...

I was told by somebody
in the US intelligence community

that there were a group
of mercenaries planning to kill

Pablo Escobar and they were
led by this Brit called Dave Tomkins

and that was kind of it.

So the rest of it, from my
perspective, was all about bluff.

And we're ready to publish it.

And I said, "Well, if you print that
you will jeopardise some lives

"that are here now.
What are you doing now?" I said...

Mind your own fucking business.

Then the question was, "Well,
how are we going to deal with this?"

And Dave clearly wanted
the operation to go ahead.

Fair enough.

I didn't care whether he killed
Pablo Escobar or not.

So there was a bargain to be struck
between what he wanted

and what I wanted.

If you don't print
until we tell you to,

we will give you exclusive rights
to the whole story.

What we said,
"Let us do the operation."

And he could have the story
at the end of it.

The exclusive, I think
we can work with this.

And then I said to him,
"I have a good idea."

I will put you on the helicopter

and fly you into
the heart of the battle.

He declined.

I told the cartel
that we had a security breach

that could embarrass us.

They said, "Right, get him over here
and we'll kill him."

HE CHUCKLES

And I said, "No, that can't happen."

I knew nothing about that at all,

and I think Dave
is a wonderful human being.

HE LAUGHS

GUNFIRE

We video-telephoned the Cali Cartel.

We said to them, "We had better get
a move on with this operation,

"otherwise it's not
going to come off

"due to the world press getting onto
what is actually happening here.

"If Pablo knows we're coming,
we've got a problem."

INDISTINCT RADIO CHATTER

Os escucho fuerte y claro.

The radio burst into life.

The message came out of it
in Spanish -

"Pablo is there now, round
the swimming pool having a meeting.

"Go now."

He's there! Go, go!

Phoenixes are go. Phoenixes are go.

When we had him in position,
we said, "Let's go for it."

They were all there. Got their kit.
Boom, boom, boom. Checked mine.

I'm out, OK, good. Helicopters,
helicopters.

I was so psyched up.
People talk about fear.

Fear was out of the question
because we'd conquered it.

We'd been training for 11 weeks
to go and get this guy

and do the business on him.

The flight was nothing special.

I smoked a couple of cigarettes,

making sure I didn't set light
to the bombs.

We were flying low, about 200 feet,
and there was a reason for this.

The radar operators belonging
to the military were on the payroll

of the person that
we were about to take out.

I'm concerned for my safety.

I just want to do what we're trained
to do, get it over with,

get the money and go home.

On the helicopter,
Pete Donnelly looked at me,

shakes his head, as if to say,
"This is not good, Alex."

For the first time in my life
in that helicopter,

I prayed to a god
I never believed in,

never spoke to.

I said these things -

"If you're real, protect us."

As we were flying towards
the target,

I noticed there was heavy cloud
over the top of the Andes.

I said to myself, "Maybe the pilots
know what they're doing here.

"They'll lift above the cloud
and go over."

I saw each helicopter
quite regularly,

but there was a time
when we had to split.

We were heading
on for the refuelling.

It seems a bit choppy, mate.

I could see that we
were in some problems

that I couldn't see anything,
so I know the pilot couldn't see

anything either,
because we were in a cloud.

I didn't feel right about it.

I turned round to Dave
and the men in the back and I said,

"Dave, get yourself in
the crash position."

I just... It was instinct.

Get in the crash position!
Get in the crash position!

I turned myself back.
We hit the trees.

THEY SCREAM

And the helicopter turned over.

A blade came through
the cab of the helicopter.

We started bouncing through
the trees upside down.

I'm frightened out of my skin
and I want to go home.

CRASHING

HE GROANS AND COUGHS

HE SOBS

The pain I had was excruciating.

HE GROANS

Every time I breathed
there was pain.

I'm sitting there,
waiting to get out of the cloud,

and I wake up, like from a dream.

And I'm huddled in the corner of the
helicopter, which is on its side.

And nobody is in there bar me,
as far as I'm concerned.

I know I'm smothered in claret
and my head hurts like a bastard

and I wanted to put my hand up,
and all I pictured in my mind was

my hand was going to go in
this fucking hole into my brain.

So I didn't touch it.

And then it clicked - the bombs.

I don't know what damage
it's done to the timers.

When it goes up it would have took
half the mountain with it.

I found the satchel charges,
cut all the fuses off

of them so they couldn't go.

One of them, the time pencil
had broken, actually,

so I was very lucky.

And I fought my way through,
breaking branches,

anything to get out
of that helicopter.

I suppose it was sheer
survival panic.

And I thought, "Fucking right,
that's me out."

Don't worry, we're close.

Peter, are you all right?

Then I see Peter and the other two
staggering out of the woods.

And Peter was hurt.

Tranquilo. Relax. Dave, Dave, Dave.

I've taken morphine, and the veins,
the veins are cramped.

I said to Dave, "Pass me down
a drip. I can't move."

I just drank the drip, squeezed
it into my mouth and drank it.

Lads, find him something warm.

But there was no pilot.

Where's Tiger?

I got back in the aircraft...

Look at me. Look at me, Tiger.

..and I called his name, Tiger,

and he mumbled, "Mi pierna."

Which means "my leg".

He had been hit by what
I assume was the helicopter blade.

I run down his legs
and they were still on.

I'll get you some morphine, mate,
I'll get you some morphine.

I tried to get a drip in his arm
and his veins were flat,

I couldn't find a vein.

I went to this arm
and it was filleted

from the shoulder to his wrist,
as though a butcher had opened

it up to the bone,
and there was no blood.

He was mortally wounded.

You're all right, mate.

RADIO CHATTER

We have crashed, we have crashed.

Pilot dead. Need immediate evac.

We found out that they had crashed.

So that became an abort.

SCREAMING Fuck...

Good lad. Good lad.

Peter was in a bad way.

His hand was smashed, his ribs were
smashed, his legs were fucked,

and he couldn't do much.

In fact, I took some photographs of
him sort of collapsed on the deck.

Flaco had wounds and bits from
trees, I suppose, and glass.

Mario was fine.

I had my busted head, which turned
out to be a tiny little wound

that had just decided
to bleed a lot.

They won't be able to land.

When the helicopter located us,

it hovered about 60-80 feet above us

but this is rough, rugged,

trees and bushes everywhere,
nowhere to land.

Come on.

All right, all right.

Dave and I decided for them
to go down, try and get help,

and bring someone back to me

to get me out,

because I was smashed up
fairly badly.

Gotcha. Gotcha.

I'm going to get help, son,
all right?

OK, I'll be as quick as I can.

We wrapped him up, we got all
the medical packs, bandages,

and we packed it round him
so that he was able to stay warm,

cos it was cold up there.

And when they left,
I suddenly realised

I had broken a rule
of combat survival.

One man should have stayed with me.

But I just...

It never dawned on me at the time,
I just says, "I'll be OK."

Let's decide, what are
we going to do?

First thing was the concern
of Dave, helicopter, Peter,

and then the modus operandi
is survival

in the area of Pablo Escobar.

CHEERING FROM TV

You're trying to
push your way through,

it's thousands of years
of overgrown stuff.

Mario and Flaco pointed out to me
that there was a stream

flowing from the top
of the mountain,

so they went off to try
and find a way down below.

And it was getting dark -

five o'clock, six o'clock
in Colombia, it was pitch-black.

I had no sense of time,
my watch had broken.

I was judging the day
by the amount of light.

I crawled about,
I searched for food.

HE GROANS IN PAIN

And I lay there shivering and cold.

I was frozen to the bone,
and I could imagine Peter up

there, fucking 8,000 foot up,
dead body, can't move very well.

He's a friend,
a very, very good friend.

And I cared for him
like I'd care for my son.

I was never going to leave him.

You know, we would have moved
heaven and Earth to get him

down that mountain.

Dead or alive.

HE GROANS IN PAIN

That morning, after I'd spent
the night on the mountain

away from Peter,
I'd heard people coming up.

Everything in that Triunfo area is
controlled by Escobar anyway.

If Pablo would have caught me,
I would have had a terrible...

..long, drawn-out, painful death.

I heard people.

Thinking it's our guys,
I called out...

HE CALLS IN SPANISH

Senor. Senor.

Eventually we reached the bottom.

HE SCREAMS IN PAIN

It's day three. I woke up.

At this stage...

..the pain was so bad,
I started sort of hallucinating.

You know, and seeing things,

looking at some of the people
who I had associated with in life.

In the early days of my youth...

..and through to the middle
part of my life...

..I did carry an awful anger
within me.

There was a bit of guilt.

I felt a lot of the anger
may have come from my father.

HE BREATHES HEAVILY

Sorry, Dad.

I'm sorry, Dad.

I have an awful lot of regrets...

..and none of them...

..are in the soldiering side
of my life.

I regret it in the fact that
I had a woman who was a good wife.

She was very supportive of me.

She followed me along
through thick and thin.

And I took her loyalty...

..to the wire.

Sorry.

I wasn't a good father,
but I do love my kids.

I'm sorry.

Due to the way I was - my character,
my violence, my aggression -

I failed at these things.

A dirty, lowdown scumbag
of a man, eh.

I swear, God, I swear.

And being a Catholic...

I promise.
I promise, God, no more.

..I tried to make a deal with God.

And I said to myself, "God...

"get me out of this...

"and I will always be
a good boy afterwards."

RAGGED BREATHING

GUNSHOT

I heard a gunshot,
but it was in the far distance.

And then I heard voices.

And the voices started
coming closer.

And I said, "I've got to prepare
myself for the inevitable."

And I sat there with my weapon,
I said, "I'll let them

"get on top of me and I'll take
as many as I can with me."

At the same time,
I would be killing myself.

As they came closer
and closer and closer,

I could eventually see movement.

One man came so I shoved
the machine-gun into his stomach.

Tranquilo, amigo. Colonel Ricardo.

He went, "Amigo, amigo.
Colonel Ricardo."

Which was one of the
code words that we had.

I then knew that I was in
the hands of friendly forces.

HE SPEAKS SPANISH

And he says, "We're going to
take you down."

And I was still
in a state of bad repair.

I said, "How long will it take?"

He said, "Eight hours."

They chopped down a long, thin tree.

It was nothing to them, they just
seemed to do it naturally.

Lowered it down a re-entrant,

tied a rope round my shoulders,

and they slid me down this tree.

And we moved along,
and they did that all the time

down waterfalls, re-entrants.

I was in immense pain.

And we kept on and on and on.

"How far is it?"
"Four hours."

"How far is it?" "Four hours."

And the pain was just...

I felt it was killing me.

There was a mental pain there
and it was, right, you've done this

wrong, at this given time
you can't put any of it right.

You can only put it right
if you keep yourself alive,

get yourself out of here
and get back to the UK.

There was a dark side
to my character...

..but I found that an awful lot
of the anger started subsiding.

Everything seemed to come to me.

There was a clarity
that I've never known before.

I think it was starting to bring me
to terms with an element of reality.

I felt a sense of peacefulness.

And I got to the bottom,
where I had to stand up and walk.

And every step I took,

it was just pain
like I've never known in my life.

But I knew at least
I had been rescued

and I had a chance of staying alive,
so it perked up morale.

HELICOPTER

I flew into Cali.

I walked into the bathroom
and the mirror.

Every part of my body
was covered in bruises.

I had four broken ribs in the front,
four in the back,

and there was quite
a bit of internal bruising,

but not enough to kill me.

I lay in bed and thanked my higher
power that what happened to me,

I should have been dead,

and I was still alive.

Everybody is there to look after
the guy next to you.

Peter was the team leader, you know.

He was an important and integral
part of that operation.

He's fearless, he's brave,
he's loyal,

and people have a great deal
of respect for Peter.

He is the ultimate
special force soldier.

There was a disappointment.
We had failed.

You can look at it,
a mountain got in the way,

but the fact is
we hadn't achieved the mission.

And I knew
even within my heart and soul,

if we had got over that mountain,

there would have been
no Pablo Escobar.

My physical state now
is I am in constant pain.

I have got diabetes.

I have arthritis
in every joint in my body.

But...

..mentally, spiritually...

..I feel fantastic.

I stopped drinking
about seven years ago.

And then when I stopped drinking,

I found there was
an awful lot of space in my mind.

I feel that being a churchgoer
filled that space.

The aggression seemed to subside.

It got less and it got less
and it got less.

My brother Peter is a good man.

He's got a kind, warm
and generous heart.

Could be aggressive, but I think

he was hurt
with the way things were.

I'm proud of his achievements,

of how he's managing his life
even today

because of the problems
that he's had.

If anybody else has got anything
different to say about him,

that's their opinion.

But I know him

as my brother
and I know him as the man.

I love being loved.

And when I say that
I don't mean in a female sense,

I just mean with my friends,
my relatives

and, above all, my children.

If I hadn't have been through
all those things in life...

..the fights, the shortcomings
that I had, crashes in helicopters,

break-up of marriages,
if I hadn't have had them,

I couldn't have been
where I am today.

It's just like everything
had burned out,

there was nothing left except to...

..live a good, spiritual life.

What I can say is I learned
a lot on the side of the Andes.

It was the beginning
of me growing up.

And eventually I came to terms...

..with a guy called Peter McAleese.