English: OBE for British soldier who helped lead UN peacekeeping mission.A mission in civil war-torn South Sudan that saw a British soldier helping to lead 12,500 international peacekeepers, make life and death decisions and escape abduction and interrogation has now seen him recognised for his‘personal courage’ with an OBE in the latest Operational Honours and Awards list, published today.Colonel Edward Dawes, from Plymouth, was Chief of Staff of the United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS), from April 2014 to April 2015‘making a demonstrable difference to UNMISS during a very testing and dangerous time’, according to his citation.Forty-five-year-old Colonel Dawes, of the Royal Artillery, was Acting Colonel when he deployed to South Sudan in April 2014 with three other British service personnel, joining the rest made up of soldiers from 77 other UN members. He arrived to find a mission struggling to respond to the outbreak of civil war, where savagery and sexual violence were a daily occurrence.On learning of his award Andover-based Colonel Dawes said:“It’s very humbling. I’m acutely aware that I was just part of a very large force of 12,500 people, and everyone was doing their best in South Sudan at that time. So, it is a little uncomfortable that the spotlight has chosen to alight on me. It’s humbling to be recognised and thanked so publically.”One of the key roles for the UN peacekeepers is to take protection out to the villages under threat. Also they care for internally displaced people that have nowhere else to go, looking after 120,000 people, mostly women and children, at their protection sites.“That was our daily work and responsibility. The conditions were frightful,” said Colonel Dawes. “It was the most difficult soldiering I have done in my 27 years.” Partly due to the rainy season lasting nine months. “Nothing else comes close and I’ve soldiered through Iraq, Afghanistan,Yugoslavia and other parts of Africa,” he said.“This was the biggest professional challenge I’ve ever had; the conditions that we were living in, the threats we faced daily and the difficulties we had just sustaining ourselves, even before we started to try to deliver against the mandate set by the Security Council.“I’m glad to be back, but there is a part of me that feels slightly guilty that I am, because of course those troops are still there and trying their best every day. It was a very long year, but the troops that are deployed there by their countries under the UN mandate do so willingly and they are putting up with enormous difficulties, largely without complaint. I think those conditions will be very testing, even for well-trained British troops. It will be enormously challenging.”Like an excerpt from a James Bond story, Six weeks into his tour Colonel Dawes was abducted at an illegal check-point:“dragged out of my vehicle, beaten and abducted, I was subjected to tactical questioning for some hours before I managed to escape to my vehicle. I managed to shake off the guard and jump into my vehicle and drive through the barrier.“It was quite something. After the beating I found myself on my knees with the muzzle of a gun in my mouth, and I could feel the broken teeth with my tongue. I remember thinking this is curious, and feeling really annoyed that this guy had broken my teeth and potentially ruined my smile. I wasn’t focussing on the fact that the back of my head might disappear. I count myself lucky that I got out of that.“But, through all of that I have to say that my year in South Sudan was perhaps the most profound experience of my life and I felt that what we were doing there was important. It had a very visceral sense of here and now. Who do we choose to protect today, and who is not going to make it through today and tonight? Those were the pitying decisions we wrestled with every day.”“In planning in a HQ you’re rarely there amongst the front line where it needs to be delivered, but in South Sudan the tragedy was so widespread that you touched it every day and it touched you.“There was never a day I spent in that year in the tumult and heat and exhaustion of central Africa, where I ever questioned why I was there and what we were doing. That answer was around us every day. It was difficult for us to deal with but it felt very rewarding.“I count myself as lucky to have had such an extraordinary experience in my army career and come back safe and spread the word of the good work of the UN in the South Sudan, which is struggling to do what has been asked of it.”His citation states:“He was much more than an HQ based COS, regularly patrolling with sector troops on the front lines, to understand their issues and ensure that standards were maintained. This example often steadied troops and raised morale by physically connecting the sectors with the HQ.”The announcement was made today (18 March 2016) with the release of the latest Operational Honours and Awards list, in respect of worldwide operations and non-operational events during the period 1 January to 30 September 2015.ENDSOfficer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE)ContactMelissa TerryFeatures Editormelissa.terry@mediaops.army.mod.uk01264 382331