British Harrier jets have been fired upon by surface-to-air missiles while providing air support against the Taliban, a senior pilot said yesterday.
Squadron Leader Damien Killeen, aged 33, operational commander for the Kandahar Harrier detachment, said anti-coalition forces had American, Russian and Chinese systems at their disposal.
Although the Harriers are partly in Afghanistan to provide support to the US Opera-tion Enduring Freedom, 75 per cent of their time is focused on supporting International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) troops in Helmand.
The six GR7 jets in Kandahar, which can fly low level at 500mph, have supported some of the fiercest firefights including a three-day stand-off in Musa Qaleh.
They use a range of weapons from single shot rockets to airburst bombs and Paveway laser-guided bombs.
Anti-coalition militia have retaliated with little impact.
Sqn Ldr Killeen, from Bolton, said: "There have been engagements against aircraft, isolated engagements, whilst low flying - small arms, rocket-propelled grenades, small rockets - the standard acm arsenal.
"We haven't suffered any damage.
"There are man portable air defence systems (surface-toair missiles) in theatre, definitely, there are also triple-A systems, anti-aircraft artillery."
When asked if they had been used, he replied: "Yes. Without going into too much detail there are triple-A pieces known to be on the ground in Helmand."
Sqn Ldr Killeen said the number of such weapons in the province was small.
The pilot said they had had "robust" intelligence about the sort of weaponry they would face before deploying to Afghanistan.
