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The National Post is running excerpts from Chris Wattie’s book Contact Charlie: The Canadian Army, the Taliban and the Battle that Saved Afghanistan. You can also check out the podcast with Wattie, who talks about the soldiers he knew who were killed in the fighting, and the impact it had on him.

Here’s a sample:

While Oz and Denine emptied their magazines at the enemy, the two men in the turret worked feverishly to get their big guns working, pounding at their mechanisms in a desperate attempt to clear them, but both were hopelessly jammed.

Denine fired steadily at the Taliban in front of him, only vaguely aware of his soldiers inside the LAV reloading magazines and handing ammunition up to him and Oz — the only ones in position to fire. The much-younger privates were laughing and cheering, which almost made the burly sergeant smile. “Pretty slick there, boys,” he said as a private in the crowded compartment at his feet calmly passed up a fresh magazine full of ammunition.

While bullets cracked past or thumped dully into the LAV’s armour, Denine tried to concentrate on the dim silhouettes and flashes of movement he could just make out through the dust and smoke. Shouting to be heard over the fire of his own rifle and the occasional roar of an RPG launch, Denine alternated giving orders to Oz with more swearing at the turret crew working on the broken weapons. “Get your ass goin’!” he shouted at Moores and Trowsdale. “Get your act in gear! Trowsdale, start making it happen!”

But the gunners’ heaving and hammering on the action of the 25-mm cannon was having no effect. Finally, the brawny sergeant decided he had to do something himself. “Enough of this.” Denine dropped an empty magazine at his feet, pulled a fully loaded one out of one of his pouches and slid it smoothly into the rifle.

“Oz, stop! Don’t shoot, I’m gonna hop up and get the pintle-mount [light machine gun] goin’ — we gotta get something goin’. Something more than two rifles, for fuck’s sake.”

Mounted on a post in front of the crew commander’s hatch, on the highest point of the turret, was a C9 light machine gun. It was a smaller and less powerful weapon than the LAV’s other main armaments, but Denine reasoned that it at least might be working. Looming like a linebacker in his armoured vest and helmet, he clambered out of the hatch and on to the top of the turret he had been using for cover. Denine was now the highest — and most visible — thing on the car. He sat on his backside and grabbed the machine gun’s stock, his legs sprawled in front of him on either side of the crew commander’s hatch. With bullets and RPGs whizzing past, he looked down between his legs to see Gerry Moores staring back up at him in disbelief from inside the turret.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4