It was late afternoon on Sunday, the time of day when the rising dust merges with the desert to mask visibility and the good people of Helmand are already behind closed doors. What little authority their government holds in Afghanistan’s most lawless province disappears entirely from sundown. The British operation mentoring and liaison team (OMLT — or Omelettes as they are jokingly known) was returning from training an Afghan army unit in Sangeen, a small town with a fearsome reputation that has switched back and forth under Taliban control.

After a day in heat so blistering that locals claim it can fry a fish upheld on a palm, the dust-coated soldiers from 7 Parachute Regiment were looking forward to getting back to base at Camp Bastion and their air-conditioned tents, perhaps even catching some World Cup action. But as the armoured Land Rovers bumped along the sandy track sending up thick grey clouds, they were heading straight into an ambush.

By the time they glimpsed the shadowy figures swathed in cloth and turbans rising from a gully clutching Kalashnikovs, they had already been hit by a rocket-propelled grenade and were under fire. The British fired back and radioed for help. Soon a quick reaction force was on its way from the camp and two Apache helicopter gunships equipped with Hellfire air-to-surface missiles and a 30mm cannon roared overhead.

But by then the OMLT vehicle had got bogged down in the sand and a six-hour gun battle ensued into the night, which left one man dead, Captain Jim Philippson, 29, from 7 Parachute Regiment. Two more British soldiers were seriously injured, one of whom lost an arm, before they could finally get away. Ten insurgents are believed to have died.

It was the third significant clash with insurgents since British troops took over the province last month, one of which involved 700 militants and went on for three days. There was another near-miss when a man rushed out of a house as a British convoy was passing and fired an RPG which went straight across a commander’s lap and out the other side.

The first death of a British soldier in Helmand has focused attention on what exactly the British troops are doing in this fierce bandit country where the only industry is growing opium poppies. It is a mission clouded in not just dust but confusion.

On announcing the deployment of 3,300 troops, John Reid, then defence secretary, said he hoped they would get out “without a shot being fired”, adding that they would be involved only in pre-emptive “deep strategic manoeuvres”. The MoD continues to insist that clashes with insurgents are a rarity.

Instead The Sunday Times has learnt that the British troops are averaging one enemy contact every three days, though many of these are minor. Helmand has already become known by the squaddies as the South Armagh of Afghanistan after the part of Northern Ireland most opposed to British presence. “A lot of us have been surprised at the level of attacks,” said one officer. “We expected a few rounds to be fired, not the full-on ambushes we have seen. They seen well-organised, well-armed and committed to the cause.”

The enemy are not just Taliban. There are also tribal leaders with a proud history of repelling outsiders and drug lords who fear the collapse of their income — Helmand provides a quarter of the world’s opium. The terrain could not be more hostile. “Think of the worst place you can think of and times that by 50,” said Sgt Ryan McIntosh, a US soldier based there. Camp Bastion is so remote that it was described by Brigadier Nick Pope as “just when you think you’ve gone beyond the edge of nowhere, it’s 20 minutes further, and that’s flying”.

“This mission is turning out to be far more dangerous than the public and backbenchers had been led to believe just a few weeks ago,” complained Liam Fox, the shadow defence secretary.

Have we been misled into a fourth war in Afghanistan, a country that in the 19th century was the graveyard of thousands of British troops?

WITH all the focus on Helmand, few seem to have realised that the whole military operation in Afghanistan will soon come under British hands.

Lieutenant-General David Richards, 54, jokingly refers to himself as “the biggest warlord in Afghanistan”. Last month, he became commander of the Kabul-based Allied Rapid Reaction Corps (ARRC), a Nato command structure which by autumn will control the entire foreign military presence in Afghanistan.

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