Photograph of Ben Roberts-Smith SAS patrol as war crime allegations swirled

A never-before seen photograph of Ben Roberts-Smith’s SAS patrol captures the final days before war crime allegations tore apart the brotherhood forged.

Winning the Victoria Cross for gallantry marked Ben Roberts-Smith out to his colleagues in the Special Air Service as a tall poppy who needed to be brought down, the court has heard time and time again.

Now a striking image has emerged that shows what was lost when the elite band of brothers was broken apart by alleged war crimes.

“For all the good [the VC] has brought me and enabled me to do, it is unfortunately the case, in my instance particularly, that it has also brought me a lot of misfortune and pain,” Mr Roberts-Smith said in his evidence last year.

“It put a target on my back.”

Mr Roberts-Smith was awarded the top military honour after silencing Taliban machine guns at the Battle of Tizak in 2010.

A never-before-seen photo of Person 11, Ben Roberts-Smith, Person 56 and Person 4 in October 2012.

Two years later, a photographer snapped an image of the SAS living legend and his patrol at the Australian base in Tarin Kowt, Afghanistan.

The towering Mr Roberts-Smith is pictured standing shoulder to shoulder with three more SAS soldiers, who can only be identified by codenames, as Apache attack helicopters wheel through the blue sky.

Standing on the left is a soldier codenamed Person 11.

Ten years after the image was taken, Person 11 would find himself accused of war crimes alongside Mr Roberts-Smith and vowing in court that the truth would clear their names.

On the right of the picture are their accusers, Person 4 and Person 56 - two soldiers who would go on to claim they were implicated or heard about war crimes.

Nine alleges Mr Roberts-Smith was involved in ordering one of those soldiers, Person 4, to execute an unarmed prisoner in 2009.

Person 4 refused to testify about the mission citing grounds of self incrimination - Mr Roberts-Smith denied it ever happened.

A year later Person 4 stormed the Tizak machine guns alongside Mr Roberts-Smith but, for years, was overlooked for any accolades, he told the court.

As Mr Roberts-Smith basked in national adoration, the court heard, Person 4 felt forgotten and became bitter.

Mr Roberts-Smith alone at court in May this year, a decade after the photo at Tarin Kowt. Picture: Gaye Gerard

Just one month before the photograph was snapped, Nine claims, Mr Roberts-Smith’s patrol carried out a war crime so brutal that an inconsolable Person 4 began speaking out.

The SAS were hunting a traitorous Taliban spy in the village of Darwan, in September 2012.

Nine claims Mr Roberts-Smith kicked a detained shepherd off a steep drop and into the dry creek that runs past the Afghan village.

Person 4 testified that he helped drag the bloodied Afghan across the creek before Person 11 executed the injured man in front of Mr Roberts-Smith.

Mr Roberts-Smith and Person 11 both deny Person 4’s allegations and the fallout has been intensely personal.

An Australian Special Operations Task Group soldier observing the valley during the Shah Wali Kot Offensive. Picture: Department of Defence

The court heard Person 4 was best man at Person 11’s wedding but since the war crime allegations they no longer speak.

Both Person 4 and Person 11 have told the court they suffer being both accuser and accused - both wrestle with mental demons.

“I pity him, I feel for him,” Person 11 said of his former best mate.

“He was a great friend, a great man and he struggles.”

The fourth soldier in the photograph, Person 56, was also at Darwan and said he wasn’t around the compound where the alleged killing took place.

He told the court he heard chatter through the SAS, following the mission, about the cliff kick.

Person 56, too, is accused of war crimes.

The court heard Person 56 was accused of executing a prisoner alongside Mr Roberts-Smith, in the town of Fasil, just days after the patrol was photographed together.

Person 56 did not testify about the allegations against him citing self-incrimination and Mr Roberts-Smith denies any execution took place.

By the time the 2012 deployment finished rumours were running rampant through the brotherhood about cliff kicks and stolen glory.

Mr Roberts-Smith received his Victoria Cross on 23 January 2011, and has sinced claimed in court it put a target on his back. Picture: Department of Defence

One soldier, Person 18, denounced the regiment as a “country wives club” but said Person 4 was clearly troubled by what he had seen at Darwan.

Person 18 told the court Person 4 broke down in tears in an SAS bar recounting the mission and, a few months later, wept retelling the story again to senior soldiers.

Some of his commanders, known as Persons 6 and 7, were highly critical of Mr Roberts-Smith and had run a series of allegations up the chain of the command, the court has heard.

The soldiers went to a Regimental Sergeant Major.

Mr Roberts-Smith’s accusers say the top brass weren’t interested or capable of dealing with allegations against their star soldier.

The Regimental Sergeant Major, himself, told the court no war crimes were raised and the disgruntled soldiers simply wanted Mr Roberts-Smith stripped of his VC.

Years later the army began investigating the allegations, calling many of the soldiers to testify before the Inspector General of the Australian Defence Force.

The regiment was already carving itself up between accuser and accused when Mr Roberts-Smith’s critics, including Person 7, decided to speak to the media.

Person 18 denounced the regiment as a “country wives club” in court.

Person 7 said it was to let Australia know about the harrowing war crime allegations - but the publicity further divided the conflicted and highly secretive regiment.

“I still don’t agree with the fact BRS is here, under extreme duress, for killing bad dudes we went over there to kill,” one soldier told the court.

The tension between speaking up and staying loyal bubbled into raw anger in the final weeks of the mammoth defamation trial in the Federal Court.

One accused soldier was grilled by Nine’s barrister after liking memes that denounced whistleblowers, journalists and lawyers involved in the case.

Another former soldier, not connected to the case, revealed the names and photographs of the SAS witnesses accused of war crimes.

An ABC investigative journalist weighed in with a quip about intelligence.

Mr Roberts-Smith in Afghanistan in June 2010.

A highly decorated former soldier was volcanic in his response, calling the journalist a “shitbag”.

The Chief of the Army, in late 2020, disbanded the troubled SAS squadron saying the Brereton war crime inquiry uncovered a “nexus of alleged serious criminal activities” in the elite unit.

No one has been charged with war crimes though the investigation into the allegations continues.

For now it will be up to Justice Anthony Besanko to decide what motivates the former soldiers and former mates who have stepped into his court.

Many have been asked if they “resent Mr Roberts-Smith because of his VC?”

“I loved him as a brother,” Person 4 replied.

“Of course I don‘t hate him.”