'I’m super proud of him': Defence Forces Company Sergeant to serve final tour with son

Sgt Nathan Clabby, who is at the start of a six-month tour, with his father, CS Martin Clabby, who is about to retire from the army after 42 years of service. Picture: Niall Carson/PA

Facing armed rebels in the dense forest in Liberia is one of Company Sergeant Martin Clabby’s enduring memories of army life weeks before he retires after his last tour of duty in Lebanon where he has been joined by his fellow peacekeeper son for the final days.

Company Sergeant Clabby, of the 6th Battalion in Athlone, Co Westmeath, served with the Defence Forces for 42 years and previously served with his son, Sergeant Nathan Clabby, twice in Lebanon.

CS Clabby is finishing a six-month tour with the 123rd Infantry Battalion while his son is beginning in the new rotation at Camp Shamrock United Nations Interim Force Lebanon (UNIFIL) base in southern Lebanon with the 124th Inf Bat.

CS Clabby has served on 13 overseas missions. During one of his nine tours in Lebanon, mortars, rocket-propelled grenades and machine gun fire rained down near Irish peacekeepers during a nine-hour standoff.

He said he has “loved” life in the Defence Forces which gave him the opportunity to travel the world.

“I've been to Africa twice, Liberia, Chad. I've been to Syria. I've been to Lebanon nine times. I've been to Kosovo.

“Liberia and Chad is where I really soldiered. I liked that.”  CS Clabby is Recce qualified, meaning he is specially trained to carry out reconnaissance and surveillance for the Defence Forces.

“In Liberia, I was the recce for the sergeant. And I did every patrol. I worked 10 kilometres ahead of the main company through the jungle of Liberia. I recce'd the area for the companies coming, following me through.

“It was scary. You'd be going through the jungle and then you'd see the rebels and their checkpoints. It was my job then to walk forward and try and chat to them.

“They would have rifles. So you had to tell them to sling their rifles, put it behind their back, that there was a full company of men coming behind and they mightn't take kindly to pointing their rifles at them.”  

A UN radio station in Liberia broadcast every day, warning the rebels that the UN was coming through.

The UN broadcasts told the rebels to “sling their arms”, CS Clabby said, and they complied.

Nine-hour standoff in Lebanon

But Lebanon, where he will serve his final days in the Defence Forces with his son, was CS Clabby’s most potentially lethal work experience.

Mortars were being fired from behind Camp Shamrock — where the father and son are now again based — during a nine-hour standoff in 1998.

Serving in the Battalion Mobile Reserve (BMR) at the time, he was called to the frontline.

“There was a standoff for up to nine hours. And there was a large RPG [rocket-propelled grenade] fired over our heads."

Machine gun fire also rained down near the Irish peacekeepers with missiles fired within metres of them.

CS Clabby said that he loved serving on every mission.

In a few weeks he will retire and return to civilian life as ‘Mr Clabby’.

I'm in the army since I was 17, so it's going to be a bit of a shock to me, trying to get used to civilian life.

He said that he is proud of his son, who also serves with the Sixth Battalion in Athlone.

Sgt Nathan Clabby, who recently arrived at the camp, said that that the situation is so active now in southern Lebanon that within hours of arrival he had to retreat to a bunker due to the conflict.

“I've been here before, so I'm kind of used to it now, but the first timers, I say, it would have been more of a shock to them.

“But we are trained and we're ready to go.” CS Clabby trusts his son’s abilities to cope in the conflict.

“I've already served twice with Nathan overseas. And I know he's capable, so I've no worries. I’m super proud of him.”