[ Robin ] I'm from good old Germany and I'm here, in Rojava [ Syrian Kurdistan ], fighting ISIS
Can you hear that?
Oh, f*ck!
Germans didn’t have any problems coming back from Syria
But some things changed
And they were saying to me, “yeah, you’re on the terrorist list now”
What is actually a big problem are the drones with the grenades under it
[ GEO ] RAQQA, SYRIA 2017
And if you hear «bzzzz», you look up and you just run
[ Subtitle ] 'ISLAMIC STATE' VIDEO
[ Soldier ] What? What!
[ Title ] SNIPER IN THE SAND
[ Robin ] In here it’s fine, in here it’s fine
Should be gone
I'm here, in Rojava, fighting ISIS
I have 10 years of military experience
[ Subtitles ] ROBIN 31 YEARS OLD YPG VOLUNTEER FROM GERMANY
[ Robin ] I was trained as a professional sniper
I've been here for 3 months now
[ Subtitle ] ROBIN IS WITH THE INTERNATIONAL BRIGADE OF THE KURDISH PEOPLE'S PROTECTION UNITS (YPG), WHICH IS FIGHTING 'ISLAMIC STATE' IN THE TERRORIST GROUP'S CAPITAL, RAQQA
[ Robin ] Every time a terrorist attack happens,
all these people are out there, screaming, "ISIS is so bad,
someone needs to do something against them!”
And for me, it was like, “yeah, why don’t we do something against them?”
The whole command structure comes together in Raqqa
So if we liberate Raqqa, it’ s the main thing for stopping ISIS in general
[ Graphics ] IF WE LIBERATE RAQQA, IT’S THE MAIN THING FOR STOPPING ISIS IN GENERAL
[ Robin ] And at one point I found this book in Germany at a train station,
as if fate just placed it there for me
And it said something like, "this guy joined the YPG"
And I was like, “YPG”, OK, I have to Google that
They’re Kurds, they believe in women rights, in human rights
and they have a huge sacrifice,
they're losing so many people and making this, this…
sacrifice for the whole world
They have a Facebook page called «YPG International»
and I tried to apply, and it worked out
I didn’t tell my family, I didn't told my friends
The only one I told was my girlfriend
and she was like, “yeah, OK, if you go there, it's over”
And I said, “yeah, OK. I have to do this.”
Why?
I think sometimes in life you have to figure out what your purpose is
For me, there always was this big hole inside
And whatever I did, it was always there
And since I'm here, it's gone
[ Agit ] My grenade is also better than your grenade [ Dixwar ] Oh, your NATO grenade?
[ Subtitles ] YPG VOLUNTEERS FROM THE UK, US, AND SWEDEN
[ Agit ] No, this is the Russian. This is the new Russian
[ Shea ] You know what's a really good idea? Stop playing with the grenade
[ Robin ] Wait, wait!
[ AGIT ] Hold on, it's endorsed...
[ Robin ] No, no, do it again!
[ AGIT ] This grenade...
This…
good grenade
Bomba? Bash
[ Robin ] Germans didn’t have any problems coming back from Syria
But some things changed in the last few months
There even have been Germans sent to prison for 10 years
So, I asked some friends in the police
and they were saying to me, "yeah, you're on the terrorist list now"
[ Subtitles ] ‘YOU’RE ON THE TERRORIST LIST NOW’
[ Robin ] The whole world is watching,
terrorist attacks everywhere
and there are a few people who actually come here
and fight and the thought of punishing people when they go back home,
that makes me really pissed, actually
I will stay…
maybe for the next 10, 20 years, if I have to
[ ANASTASIA ] How did you feel about your job?
Being successful at your job, let’s put it that way
[ ROBIN ] Um, yeah
Normally...
I hate killing people. And I think it's a bad thing to do, but after all,
I've seen ISIS doing so many bad things to people, especially to women
that I was so happy when I had my first shot
Call for prayer and you hear the boom-boom-boom
hese are all suicide bombers
Oh!
[ Agit ] Is it ISIS? [ Robin ] Yes!
[ DIXWAR ] Oh, that was close!
[ ROBIN ] Yeah?
[ DIXWAR ] You might want to come over here
[ BRUSK ] Cekdar, 01829
[ Robin ] Oh, fuck!
[ ypg1 ] Comrades, we’ve got wounded!
[ ypg2 ] I have shards in my arm and leg [ ypg3 ] The armoured car was blown to pieces, so we walked
[ Agit ] Hold his head, hold his head
[ Robin ] I cried a few days ago
when I told my comrades that when I'm losing the legs,
just (give me) morphine,
and let me die
The day before that I saw someone on our team, actually,
both of his feet from the knees down
just got blown off
And I was like, OK,
I cannot live with this. I cannot live in a wheelchair
Some day in the future I want to have kids
Boy, girl, I don't care
And if I cannot go out with them,
like showing them nature and stuff,
no, there's no reason for me to live
[ GEO ] RAQQA, SYRIA 2017
[ Robin ] Hi! I’m good, how are you?
[ Subtitles ] ANASTASIA TROFIMOVA DIRECTOR, THE ROAD TO RAQQA
[ ANASTASIA ] I’m good! How've you been, where've you been?
Basically, we saw each other last time...
[ Robin ] It was 2017
[ ANASTASIA ] And then what happened with you?
[ Robin ] So, we formed a 4-man sniper team, the 223 Sniper Team
So, we could choose our own missions,
[ GEO ] BRAZIL, 2020
[ Robin ] the commanders were trusting us
I was with Jac Holmes, with Ardesh and with Jon
We became quite famous in the battle of Raqqa
[ Subtitles ] Robin's Raqqa footage
[ Robin ] And then yeah, a couple of weeks later
the war was over because ISIS released a couple of civilians
and in exchange they get free travel to Deir ez-Zor,
the last stronghold of ISIS
Which was quite surprising
And it was such a weird feeling,
walking the streets that you were fighting before
This is Raqqa. This is how it looks like
The stadium had like underneath a tunnel system
We’re walking down the Daesh tunnel. It’s going way down
[ Subtitles ] ROBIN'S RAQQA FOOTAGE
[ Robin ] This is amazing
You see shooting targets, you see blood, you see holding cells
So,
we were waiting for transportation back to the academy
to decide what we want to do. But unfortunately, Jac
decided to, because, you know, Jac loved to take these suicide vests
ust in case we need them and we needed them on
2 occasions and they saved our lives actually
[ ANASTASIA ] How?
[ Robin ] There was one event. It was very quiet in the afternoon
And all of a sudden, our translator
says, "there's a car coming,
is there a car supposed to come?" All of a sudden, this car explodes,
and ISIS starts a huge counter attack
We were on the 4th floor, and we were surrounded by maybe 60 ISIS fighters
[ Subtitles ] WE WERE SURROUNDED BY MAYBE 60 ISIS FIGHTERS
[ Robin ] So, I was on my last magazine… like this… pointing at the stairs,
and yeah, we’re probably gonna die now
And then all of a sudden, our translator came in and said,
"hey, heval, what about the suicide vests?"
Jac and I looked at each other and we were like,
"oh yeah, that's an amazing idea!”
Jac pulls the pin,
throws it down, comes back, just normally walking
and behind him, just huge explosion goes off
that almost blows my ears out
And all of a sudden, it was quiet. There was nobody left
Everything was red, a lot of shit you don't wanna see in your life
[ GEO ] 'VICTORY DAY', RAQQA
[ ypg ] Raqqa – finished!
Yes, exactly, just what I was about to say – Raqqa is done. What about you, Mr. Dixwar?
[ DIXWAR ] Allahu Akbar!
[ Robin ] No, no, no, no, no, there’s no Daesh anymore in Raqqa!
So, all of a sudden, the war was over
and Jac said, “hey, we have one suicide vest left, I'm gonna go dispose of it”
He just, he just placed it somewhere on...maybe on something sharp,
we have no idea, we have no clue, and it just exploded
And yeah
And Jac was dead immediately. That was the end of the 223 Sniper Team
We were all devastated, we were all really sad
And we said, “OK, let’s just go home. It doesn’t make sense without Jac.”
But, as you know, I have no home
because Germany wants to prosecute me and they did, in my absence, actually
So if I ever return to Europe or Germany, I will go to prison for 3 years
[ Subtitles ] if I ever return to Europe or Germany, I will go to prison for 3 years
[ Robin ] So, I don’t know where I wanna go, let me think about it for a couple of days,
but I had a friend in Brazil
they don't have extradition treaty with Germany,
especially not for something that Brazil don't consider a crime
I travelled to Brazil. It was pretty hard at the beginning, to be fair,
because of the finances, I couldn't work here, I was on a tourist visa
And yeah, now I'm back here, I'm happily married
And now my wife is coming
[ Robin ] This is Eline, this is my wife [ Eline ] Hi!
[ ANASTASIA ] Nice to meet you [ Eline ] Nice to meet you too
[ ANASTASIA ] Tell me now how you guys met?
[ Robin ] We met on Tinder
[ Eline ] I thought it was a lie
[ Robin ] Yes!
[ Eline ] He started to talk to me about the whole story...
[ Robin ] Yeah, the war in Syria. And she didn't believe me at first
[ Eline ] And I said, “why he's lying to me on the first date!”
[ Subtitles ] ‘Why is he lying to me on the first date?’
[ Robin ] And then I showed her "Road to Raqqa"
[ Eline ] For me it was really interesting because it's so far from my universe here,
in Brazil, we don't have this kind of (thing)...
I respect a lot his story and I was trying to understand the conflict itself
And what was his position and how I could
handle it with my moral values because it's important to me also
So, it’s something that some countries should be glad,
should be proud to have someone doing this service to them
[ Robin ] So, “Road to Raqqa” gave me the credibility here
[ Eline ] Yeah, we had 2 months dating and, in a relationship,
but really nice relationship, I think
[ Robin ] Yes [ Eline ] It's like
[ Eline ] I met my best friend in life. It was fast, I didn't expect that
[ Robin ] Actually, I didn't expect it myself
Germany tried to extradite me from Brazil two times
They tried. But Brazil said, Brazilian government said "no"
Because fighting with YPG is not considered to be a crime
Oh, big news, also there's going to be a movie,
a Hollywood movie about the 223 Sniper Team.
[ Subtitles ] THERE'S GOING TO BE A HOLLYWOOD MOVIE ABOUT THE 223 SNIPER TEAM
And at the end, it will say this message, “Robin still cannot return to Germany”
[ Eline ] We cannot go to Germany; we cannot meet everyone
and have our family together
[ ANASTASIA ] Are you guys going to try to appeal it?
[ Robin ] I will. We are about to get some government contracts
I started to work with the Brazilian special forces now,
teaching some of the stuff that I learned in Syria
and with that money we’re going to try again
to appeal with a really good lawyer