Our reporters get a hostile lesson in covering war

And a mountain of military gear there is. Beside the mask and NBC filter, there are rubberized boots, rubber gloves with separate liners, a vacuum-sealed charcoal-lined pullover and trousers, and a host of detection papers and decontamination powders.

Every step is critical to survival, and must be taken in the right order. Even in this English estate barn, I am having trouble getting it together. I try not to imagine how difficult this could be in real life. What if, for instance, Saddam Hussein was using chemical weapons in northern Iraq, as he has in the past.

Under those conditions, I would be wearing a cumbersome bullet-proof vest, and would be afraid that this suit – even if put on properly – would immediately turn into an oven. I think about how I traipsed into northern Iraq at the end of the 1991 Gulf War with just a gas mask, old flak jacket, and three pounds of black olives for food – in retrospect, blissfully ignorant of the actual risks.

Of course, not every conflict will involve the danger of nerve agents or mustard gas. So what else did we learn about protecting ourselves in hostile environments?

Nearly half the course was devoted to first-aid techniques for saving colleagues after a mine blast, a bullet hit, or a car accident. We learned how to focus first on breathing, then on "turning off the tap" of a major blood flow. We learned how to evacuate the wounded with makeshift stretchers and back carries, as well as how and when [rarely] to tie tourniquets. Earning the Boy Scout's First Aid merit badge was never like this.

But learning to prevent those scenarios was the top priority. We viewed footage of riots and civil disturbances, and saw how a crowd that welcomes journalists can transform in a second into a dangerous mob.

Hard-rubber shoe soles can defeat burning petrol bombs. Fire-retardant underwear and gloves – as used by race-car drivers – do the same things. Always wear natural fibers, which burn more slowly. Plastic and nylon jackets can melt onto your skin and keep burning. (The mannequin target of the Molotov-cocktail illustrated the lesson).

Always keep your eye on the escape route; use natural barriers such as lampposts and traffic dividers as protection during a police or riot advance.

But what about the more traditional risks of the front line, like flying objects? We were taken to a nearby British military firing range, where a host of barriers had been set up. Our instructors – all well-versed in the art of war, and sometimes heavily decorated with tattoos – wanted to show us that "protection" is a relative term.

Pistol rounds were fired into brick walls, which broke apart. Car doors barely slowed the bullets. High velocity rounds fired from an AK-47 cut straight through a foot-thick piece of timber.

Fear was used to focus our attention. "This is the target that best approximates what can happen to you," said instructor Al, pointing to two five-gallon plastic jugs full of water. Rifle rounds burst through and toppled them, spilling out water – to the gasps of journalists, who watched through binoculars. A single armor-piercing bullet burned through one quarter-inch steel plate.

But there was some hope, too. Another armor-piercing bullet was stopped by the same type of armor plate we all use in our heavy-duty bullet-proof vests – a piece of gear that I may never leave at home again.

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