Was it a wasted war? Were the sacrifices worth it?

The Australian soldiers had trained and equipped more than 300,000 Afghans.

The news that the Taliban had reclaimed Afghanistan, and apparently with little resistance, was hard to accept – especially by Curtis McGrath, a young Australian who had joined the Australian Army at 18. For five years he’d travelled to many locations around the world, building structures, providing safe drinking water for communities, and making other contributions to many. It was rewarding, as he believed he was making a positive impact wherever he went.

The year was 2012. At 24, he was six months into his first deployment in Afghanistan – detecting and removing landmines, one of the most dangerous jobs in the world. His role was to “provide mobility to the Army and local communities, while denying the enemy access”.

He lost both legs when he stepped on an Improvised Explosive Device (IED), in a supposedly safe and newly-cleared area of a Taliban stronghold.

Was his time in Afghanistan worth this? Was any lasting good achieved? Curtis wrestled with the question.

He’d seen the terrors inflicted on the people by the cruelty of the Taliban, and he’d also seen the trauma of soldiers who returned to Australia, broken in body and often in spirit. Mates were dead; others had their lives destroyed from their catastrophic injuries. Curtis worried about the mental well-being of the 26,000 Australians who had served there, those who had offered themselves and their lives, knowing and accepting the worst possible outcomes.

Then he thought about the Afghan people he knew and cared about. He thought about the elderly Afghan man who’d walked from his village to their army checkpoint, in full view of the insurgents, telling the Aussies where the insurgents had planted landmines and IEDs. Such courage.

This memory is one of those moments forever etched in Curtis’s mind. It allowed the Australians to remove many landmines, making the country safer for its inhabitants. “I am sure that by doing this, we saved many lives,” he concluded.

He reflected that if he had not stepped on the landmine, it could well have been a school bus which might have driven over it – filled with young children. Better for him to lose his legs than for many children to lose their lives.

“Yes,” he reflected, “we made a difference. We went there and tried to make it a better place. And we did.” His thoughts are still with the people in Afghanistan, as well as with struggling veterans. But he does not regret his sacrifice. Knowing he has helped to make a difference is enough.

He described the unbelievable pain after the explosion in which his legs were blown off in graphic and realistic detail in his book “Blood, Sweat and Steel”, recalling how he had to instruct his mates about how to apply his tourniquets, how to set up an IV drip for him, how to give him morphine. He was the only First Aider in his Combat Engineer Unit. He knew he was mere minutes from bleeding to death, his blood gushing forth like geysers.

His emotions, distorted by his agony, swerved violently between longing for the pain to stop with the arrival of death, and the desire to live. Bizarrely, he wondered if his partner would be angry that they would have to cancel a promised future holiday in Bali. Pain makes one irrational.

Then reality hit with brute force. He wept – not, he said, because he was dying, but because he knew he would live. He would never live a normal life – he would have to live without his legs.

His last words to his mates before being taken to hospital were, “You’ll see me at the Paralympics!”

Curtis had nine surgeries in three different countries. Gradually over the next three years he overcame his horrendous injuries and learnt to walk on prosthetic legs. He built up his fitness and full body strength. He went back to swimming as part of his rehabilitation program, having enjoyed swimming before his military career, along with rugby and canoeing. He trained intensively and extensively from morning to night, pushing himself to the extreme. In his first experience in competitive sport for people with disabilities at the US Marine Games, Curtis won three gold medals.

He also took up canoeing again and became a world champion canoeist. He was inspirational to the Defence Forces, to all army veterans, and to all people with disabilities.

Curtis had a goal – selection for the Australian canoeing team at the 2016 Paralympic Games, just eighteen months away. He was hoping to enter a qualifying race to make the team when an item of news shattered his dreams. His canoe event was removed from the Paralympics and replaced by the kayak. Curtis was devastated; his dreams were shattered.

His trainer called him again. “Get down to the training area – you are going to compete in kayak events”. He had very little time to learn the quite different stroking and balancing techniques of kayaking. It seemed impossible. He drove himself, with steely determination, punishing his body from dawn to dusk. He did it. He learned a new sport in three weeks, stunning everyone by making the Australian team. He won the gold medal in his events in the 2016 Paralympic Games.

 Curtis continues to win medals in World (and Australian) Championships in canoeing, kayaking and swimming events. Too many awards to list, including ten gold medals among others at World Championships between 2014 and 2019, while breaking many world records along the way! At the 2020 Paralympic Games he also won gold medals in both kayak and canoe events.

Curtis wears a bracelet with the names of his mates who didn’t return home. Before each race he selects a name, dedicating that race to this fallen friend.

He captained the Australian team in the inaugural Invictus Games in 2014, participated till 2017 and became an Australian ambassador for these games in 2018. These games were initiated by Prince Harry, and designed to help wounded, ill and injured servicemen and women and veterans, with the goal of inspiring, rehabilitating, and healing them. Hope is offered. Lives are changed, perhaps none more dramatically than that of Curtis McGrath himself.

The Latin word “Invictus” means “unconquered”, perhaps a fitting word for those who have given so much for the sake of others. Curtis strives hard to share his belief that sport can bring healing, emotional and psychological, as well as physical.

He has accepted his disability, has come to terms with it, and encourages and helps others to do likewise. He has found peace about his role and purpose as a soldier in Afghanistan – and is a living testimony to the fact that life with a disability can still be filled with meaning and purpose.

What he has achieved within a few short years of suffering life-threatening horrific injuries, he strives to share with all, using his own story to inspire and motivate others who are suffering.

An overcomer, and a fine role-model. He continues to make a difference wherever he goes.