I watched Ross Kemp In Afghanistan partly because I was worried that my Sky One button might heal over if I didn't actually use it occasionally, but mostly because he was taking a six-month tour of duty to Helmand Province with the Royal Anglian Regiment, which is who my brother was with when he joined the Army in 1983, aged 16. (In fact, he was in the 2nd Battalion, The Poachers, and Ross is with the 1st Battalion, The Vikings, but it was enough of a connection to get me to tune in.) Like you, I've been led to believe that Ross Kemp is something of a joke - a former soap actor who's never been able to escape his "hard man" image, even when his wife, News Of The World editor Rebekah Wade, gave him a thick lip in 2005. But a) lest we forget, he was brilliant in EastEnders, and b) he really seems to be making a go of being a TV reporter. Yes, he's on Sky, and his series do still trade on his "hard man" image, but Ross Kemp On Gangs won a Bafta for factual programming. Anyway, I caught up with Ross, training for combat with the Vikings, and there really is something quite admirable about him.

His dad had served with the Royal Norfolk Regiment in Cyprus, so there was a reason for attaching himself to the Royal Anglians. Also, he didn't need to have his hair cut. Although he did "hard" things like fire an SA80 assault rifle in training, he admitted he was scared often enough as he prepared to fly out to Afghanistan, which, by all accounts, and to borrow a phrase from No Country For Old Men, remains "a colossal goatfuck". He's actually quite well spoken when he plays himself, with very good enunciation as a narrator. Sadly, Ross is afflicted with Jeremy Clarkson Syndrome, meaning he feels that to ... add impact ... to what he's ... saying ... he leaves ... large gaps ... between ... words. It's almost as if he's stretching his links out to fill an allotted time. Totally unnecessary but, I suspect, very Sky One. The actual meat of the documentary - which runs for some weeks - is substantial: up-close filming with the soldiers; revealing interviews with them (many of the older soldiers candidly talk of putting the job before thoughts of their families, which sounds harsh, but how else are you to engage "the enemy"?); amazing proximity to actual bullets and mortar fire, if the throw-forward clips are to be believed. I had to laugh at the one-minute history lesson the programme makers felt compelled to put in (Russian invade Afghanistan; Russians leave Afghanistan ten years later; Mujahideen armed by the Americans; Taliban kick Mujiahideen out; Osama bin Laden arrives; Twin Towers fall - now, back to the action), but this was there to justify continually talking about "the enemy".

I wouldn't last five minutes in training, let alone combat, but then I was born a conscientious objector (classic Woody Allen line: "In the event of war, I'm a hostage"). As such, I do admire these boys, and some of them are boys, for the sheer guts it takes to throw yourself, swearing and shouting, into a combat zone - and because my own brother did it, for a great number of years, I do not feel the knee-jerk dismissal of service people that I, as a pacifist with no answers, might normally. (Signing up to get killed? The idiots! They're just tools of the government, doing the dirty imperialist work of men in grey suits behind oak desks! Don't they have minds of their own?) I don't even have any patriotism. These soldiers seem to. They have many things I do not have. They'll probably even keep their jobs during a recession.

I like Ross Kemp, is what I've been putting off saying. I don't like war. And neither does he. In the name of entertainment, he was prepared to go and hide behind a wall in Helmand Province to prove it. I might watch the second episode.