Black Hawk Down: One hell of a movie

[Hydey]

Isn't that the one with Eric Bana in it ??????

[DanS]

Now that I think about it, it was one of the best urban fighting war movies made to date. Not too many of those... Really showed off the editing skills of the director.

[korn469]

it was also the #1 movie of the weekend finally overtaking LoTR

the two things they got perfectly right was the Huuuuaah! and the guy imitating the captain, i think every unit has at least one person if not more who do impressions of their superiors

[The Emperor Fabulous]

Go see Royal Tanenbaums...SUCH a good movie.

[faded glory]

I saw LOTR today.....so Im a few months behind the movie buzz

[Richard Bruns]

The history channel is running a documentary on the incident right now.

[faded glory]

Honestly, the best war movie I have ever wa gettysburg. It was so freakin real...all re-enactors. And a huge cast of hollywood stars (even ted turner played a anonymous confederate general, hard to spot him. But he's in there)


I will go see BH this weekend.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by DinoDoc


That was the only possible purpose it could be considering that we had absolutely no other reasonable excuse for being thier as it benefited us in no way what so ever.

Side questions for the military types:

1) If they had had everything they had requested originally for the raid, might the results have been substantively different?

The whole raid was a cluster**** from the political side. Taking Aidid would have been like kicking in a hornet's nest and getting the queen. Yeah, you got the result you wanted, but there's a billion pissed off hornets to deal with now, and soon enough, nature abhoring a vacuum and all that, there'll be another nest and another queen and another billion hornets.

2) At the end of the moviw it said that the general in charge of the raid (I forget his name), accepted full responsibility for its outcome. What disciplinary actions did he face for the debacle and in your opinion was he being scapegoated?

Les Aspin was the one who ****ed it up. (then) Major General Thomas Montgomery faced no disciplinary action (Clinton and those sacks of **** would have been skinned alive) and went on to an assignment in NATO at the O-9 level a few years later.

3) Exactly, how realistic was the film from a military perspective?

To the extent that a movie can be realistic (choking on dust, your ears ringing from close range autoweapons fire, the smell of blood and powdersmoke, and a number of less pleasant sensations can't be simulated), it was pretty fair. The difference between a movie and reality is also one of scope. Depending on your job, you see what's immediately around your assigned field of fire, your assigned objective, or maybe fragmentary views of what your squad or platoon sees.

The key AAR's are still classified, I assume.

--------------------------------------------------------------

Chegitz - so sorry, but you're full of ****. I'm surprised at you, too, because you had so much better of an opportunity to slam the US and you just frankly blew it.

A major part of the Somalia problem was directly created by the US during the cold war, when the US and USSR were playing games with banana countries whose location (and potential for basing rights) gave the USSR the possibility of seapower projection into US and allied SLOC's (Sea Lines Of Communication). This was back in the days when the Soviets had money, Sergei Gorshkov was still in charge of the Soviet Navy, and Gorshkov was convinced (and managed to convince his bosses until Gorbachev put him out to pasture as Inspector-General) that he could bring the Soviet Navy to something like strategic parity with the USN.

The Soviets picked all sorts of banana countries to play in, looking to take advantage of latent discontent with the corrupt and inept thugocracies in place. This is why the Soviet interest in Angola and Mozambique (cape of Good Hope), Libya, Ethiopia, Somalia and Yemen (look at a map), Nicaragua and Grenada, etc. In each case, the Soviets looked for a country with significant access to major SLOCs, unstable or unpopular governments, and nascent opposition/guerilla movements happy for a little help and encouragement. The Soviets felt it was a no lose strategy, they'd have popular support locally, more deniability, less cost, and the US would get entangled in more expensive propping up of unpopular governments and would not be able to commit enough resources to keep everything in our camp.

After Haile Selassie was deposed and then murdered in 1974-75, the Soviets gained more and more influence in Ethiopia, so US attention shifted to Somalia, and both the US (CIA direct and covered through USAID contractors) and Soviets (KGB direct and through their foreign aid apparatus) started arming the hell out of rival factions in Somalia. The US intent was to counterbalance and neutralize any Soviet naval or air benefit in Ethiopia, and to intimidate the Ethiopians and tie them up in Eritrea. The Soviets were looking for a covert way of consolidating influence over the horn of Africa, without getting into a direct confrontation with the US. So both sides fought through proxies, in Somalia and Eritrea, and when Gorbachev came around and talked glasnost and perestroika, both the US and USSR started focusing on bilateral issues and Europe, and drastically diminished support for the proxies we'd both armed literally all over the world.

That is why you have former leftist guerillas and right-wing death squads teamed up as criminal gangs in El Salvador, rampant brigandage in Somalia by the gangs of "technicals", ongoing SOS in Angola, etc. When we left, we left behind the guns, but cut off the ongoing funding, so they all had to find other ways of making a living.

The humanitarian mission going back in had no overriding interest in oil or other resources - Somalia is a ****hole, pure and simple, and there's not near enough there to be worth the bother. The problem was with the initial deployment of UNOSOM I, the initial humanitarian mission, which was opposed by Mohammad Farah Aidid for a number of reasons, including the simple one that Aidid was using the Somali famine and the threatened starvation of half the country's population as simply another weapon in his war for control of Mogadishu.

The initial observers provided under UNOSOM I for the Mogadishu ceasefire didn't include any Americans. When that force was beefed up by 3000 men divided into four operating zones, the security force for Mogadishu was a Pakistani battalion, which was fired on by both sides, because Aidid didn't want the UN controlling either the air or sea port, and Mahdi (the other main warlord in Mogadishu) wanted the UN to assume total control of the port to deny it to Aidid.

By the time the US got significantly involved through UNITAF, the rest of the UN peacekeeping and humanitarian elements had been getting shot at, mortared, shelled, robbed, hijacked, and generally having their asses handed to them for over seven months.

UNOSOM II came along five months after UNITAF, and by then, Clinton was President, with his stellar team of Anthony Lake as National Security Advisor, and Les Aspin as SecDef. Up through the formation of UNOSOM II, the Bush and Clinton administrations had been following the UN lead, which was typically impotent and ineffective, but not disastrous like the subsequent US action.

Prior to the US deciding to take on Aidid, over 100 non-US military personnel under UN command were killed providing a security role for humanitarian relief. Those forces were killed by the leaders and second generation fighters of the forces primarily armed and trained by the US and USSR some 15 years earlier.

The decision to take on Aidid came solely from within the Clinton administration, and cluster**** on wheels that the Clinton administration was regarding military issues, they decided to do it when most of the US combatant forces in Somalia had already been withdrawn, and then refused to recommit serious forces after US popularity for the Somalia mission was dropping.

Clinton and Aspin tried to have it both ways - withdrawing troops and fighting without support and thinking they could "win" and taking on Aidid directly, while thinking they didn't want to "be provocative" and piss anybody off. Nothing but pure equivocation on the civilian side of the chain of command, and an unwillingness to make the hard decision to either stay in and do the job right, or to get out entirely and abandon the humanitarian mission.

[Sikander]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara

More likely, Bush did it for two reasons. One, to legitimize future American interventions by doing this humanitarian intervention. Two, to give Clinton a Christmas present.

Well, the reason Bush intervened in Somalia was that Clinton was beating him up about intervening for Kuwait, but not for merely humanitarian concerns in Somalia. (Where there are only humanitarian concerns). Bush went in with two full divisions, and food started flowing forthwith.

Clinton sowed the wind, and reaped the whirlwind. (Still reap around here eh Mr. Death?) Clinton tried to nation build with insufficient force, and the U.S. got stung. To be fair, his choices were pull out and let Somalia go back to what it was when he *****ed about it during the campaign, or to hope against hope (and reason) that he could form a functional state where there has been little history of such a thing.

From a military standpoint, the mission just kept getting worse. U.S. forces were continually cut, and the mission continually expanded. Clinton was caught having turned down a request for a tank battalion (and some artillery) in case something like the actual incident occurred. The tanks would have been very useful, as they aren't particularly vulnerable to RPG and small arms fire, and could have spearheaded the ground forces which were trying to make their way into the maelstrom to rescue the pockets of U.S. survivors.

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat
Taking Aidid would have been like kicking in a hornet's nest and getting the queen.

Well, I do agree with your political assessment of the situation. I was merely asking that if the requests for AC 130 gunships, tanks, etc. had been approved when they had been originally requested would it have made any substantive differenc in the way the events of that horrible day played out.

Yeah, you got the result you wanted, but there's a billion pissed off hornets to deal with now, and soon enough, nature abhoring a vacuum and all that, there'll be another nest and another queen and another billion hornets.

I think that they were hoping that the new "queen" was slightly less of schizo than Aidid had been.

I sense that this is a little sore spot for you.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
Well, I do agree with your political assessment of the situation. I was merely asking that if the requests for AC 130 gunships, tanks, etc. had been approved when they had been originally requested would it have made any substantive differenc in the way the events of that horrible day played out.

We would have hosed a bunch more of their asses, but didn't have sufficient combat forces remaining in the area to secure the airfields, ports, etc., for any long term result - we would have had to rebuild. As far as that day goes, you'd have to have the support right there waiting for **** to hit the fan, and loitering Spectres doing racetrack patterns out of shoulder-fired SAM range really don't help you maintain the desired level of surprise when you decide to fastrope in on someone.

I think that they were hoping that the new "queen" was slightly less of schizo than Aidid had been.

Aidid wasn't that schizo. He never wanted us there, he never wanted the UN there, we were direct obstacles to his goals. The problem is he negotiated and agreed to a ceasefire and some "cooperation" when we had the firepower to motivate him to do so. When we withdrew that firepower, we stupidly thought we still had a deal with him. It wasn't us, it was our firepower he made the deal with, so when the major forces packed up and left, he figured he could go back to business as usual. The trouble with silly-assed mother (or intern) ****ers in Washington is they don't understand the worldview of the Aidids of the world.

I sense that this is a little sore spot for you.

More than a little.

[David Floyd]

I'll just say that we should never, ever have been in Somalia. Loved the movie, but hate the fact that we were there to start with.

[Lonestar]

Lonestar edujamacates the masses

Once upon a time in Somalia, there was a civil war/coup d'etat, and the existing government was ousted by a group of clans. These clans are lead by different "warlords". Mohammed Farah Aidid's clan was the strongest of these. Aidid had actually been a part of Mohammed Siad Barre's goverment. The U.S. Marines lead a UN sponsored peace-keeping mission intent on relieving the famine in Somalia.
After some time in Somalia, trying to help out, the Marines left and were replaced by a more international mission, including Pakistani, Indian, Turkish and other soldiers. On June 5, 1993 Somalis attacked, massacred and then brutalized the remains of 24 Pakistani soldiers. Blame was assigned to Aidid, whose own son was a member of the Marines that had been there earlier. Many Somalis, particularly those of Aidid's clan (which comprised a sizeable portion of the population) believed that UN Secretary General Boutros Boutros Ghali, an Egyptian and former ally of Barre's, was out to get Aidid in order to restore Barre to power.

The US commander, Major General Garrison adopted the tactic of lightning strikes to capture or cripple members of Aidid's clan that were wanted in connection with this massacre. He had at his disposal a number of Rangers and Special Ops force to effect this. They also put in place a policy of continual flybys. The reason for this was to keep Aidid's forces off guard, so they never knew when a raid was coming. Many of these were low level fly-bys of powerful helicopters, which ripped the roofs from dwelling and sometimes hurt and even killed civlians. (At least one baby was ripped from it's mothers arms by a helicopter downdraft, according to Somali witnesses). Things were exacerbated by certain Somali practices, such as using their own women and children as human shields during conflicts. The Somalis also apparently have a tendency to gravitate to excitement (eg, a firefight) so there were an unknown number of civilian casulties.

At one point a raid on one of Aidids compounds, mainly by helicopter rocket fire killed and wounded many Somalis. The US government put the death toll at about 20 Somali adult males. The Somalis claimed a much higher death toll (in the 100s?) with many of these woman and childen (it was a housing compound which was attacked). The UN put the death toll at about 55 with over 200 others injured.

In September a US helicopter was shot out of the sky and the bodies were dragged through the streets. This naturally enraged the Rangers and Special Ops guys, who were "only there to help". A week or two later an aborted daytime raid that netted a couple of top Aidid aides occured, which resulted in 17 US dead, scores others wound, and an unknown but presumed very, very large number of Somalis killed or wounded. This fight took place in a densely populated city with poor infrastructure. The Rangers and Delta force guys were defending themselves and doing their jobs. Some of the Somalis were Aidid's clansmen, others were sympathisers, some were people who were tired of being terrified by the American helicopters and some were just bystanders in the wrong place at the wrong time. By all accounts it was an incredibly fierce battle with a lot of bloodshed on both sides.

Shortly after this the US withdrew it's troops in response to negative press. (I believe the UN troops also withdrew at the same time) Aidid remained as the most powerful of the warlords until his death in 1996. His son, Hussein Aidid, a former Marine and ex-US citizen has assumed his father's mantle as the de facto leader of Mogedeshiu. Many Somalis see the Aidid's as heroes who bloodied the bully's nose and made him run.

[DanS]

"His son, Hussein Aidid, a former Marine and ex-US citizen has assumed his father's mantle as the de facto leader of Mogedeshiu."

Amazing. I didn't know that and don't know what to make of it now.

Re the Somali habit of moving toward the action, I think a majority were/are on skat (hallucinagenic laced tobacco-like leaf, IIRC), so they were totally whatcked out of their minds.

Man, what a fvcked up place.

[DinoDoc]

Blackhack Down Trivia

Which one of the members of the special forces portrayed in the movie has been "partially fictionalized" and what was the reason for that decision?

First one to get the correct answer, gets a cookie.