Word: mogadishu
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...Carlos Rodriguez the battle was a few seconds of terror, hours of agonized waiting. While his comrades stormed the building near the Olympic Hotel in Mogadishu to try to snatch Somali warlord Mohammed Farrah Aidid, Rodriguez and the rest of his squad swarmed down ropes from a helicopter and began a security patrol through a nearby street. "It was bright daylight; there were windows and doors all around us, and you can't watch all of them all the time," said Rodriguez. "All of a sudden the Somalis just opened up on us, small arms and grenades. There was shooting...
...there, though senior U.S. officials insist the Rangers missed him by only two minutes.) Helicopter troops nonetheless captured the hotel and environs and bagged more than 19 Aidid supporters. But as they tried to lead the prisoners away, the streets erupted with gunfire. Somali fighters from all over Mogadishu ran to join the action; in the Bakhara market near the hotel, they set up barricades of burning tires and anything else flammable to block the Rangers' retreat. Rescue helicopters could not land in the narrow streets; the only way out was by ground. From that point on, Ranger Major David...
...then, though, the Rangers had suffered a shocking toll: 14 dead, plus one who died four days later, and 77 wounded, including Rodriguez. Known to be taken prisoner: one. A mortar attack by Aidid's men on Ranger forces at the Mogadishu airport Wednesday night killed another American and wounded 12 more. The four-day death toll of at least 16 exceeded the 15 Americans killed in the previous 10 months of U.S. involvement in Somalia. The International Committee of the Red Cross estimated 200 Somalis had died in the battle, and hundreds of wounded piled into hospitals that...
...something very precise and limited and then get out," in the words of a senior aide to Eagleburger. Boutros- Ghali accepted but then "moved the goalposts," says the official, demanding that the Americans disarm Somali gangs, venture into the countryside and the north of the country, away from the Mogadishu area, and stay for an unlimited period. The tale heard in U.N. corridors is very different: it is of the Americans waffling over whether to disarm the Somalis and whether to move into the north or stay put, combined with demands to start getting out almost as soon as they...
...when we began pounding Mogadishu like just one more bloodthirsty warlord--that was immoral...