The famous American movie "Black Hawk Down" is based on a real military operation by the US military on a peacekeeping mission in Somalia in 1993. In this operation, code-named "Goddess of Peace", the original simple capture operation eventually evolved into a fierce battle between the US army and the entire city of Mogadishu in Somalia, with 19 AMERICAN troops killed, 73 wounded, two Black Hawk helicopters shot down, 3 hit and seriously damaged, and the cost of the destruction of many Humvees, becoming the most serious military defeat after the Vietnam War.
(Black Hawk Down poster)
Civil war has been raging because of the long-standing warlord anarchy in Somalia. Education, economic and social systems have long since collapsed. In order to advance the peace process and provide humanitarian assistance, in 1992 the United Nations sent peacekeeping troops to Somalia. But in the view of Farah Aideed, the largest warlord on the ground, the intervention of the peacekeeping forces was armed intervention against him. So he not only refused a ceasefire, but blatantly snatched humanitarian aid from the peacekeepers to distribute to the population. Ambushes were also carried out against peacekeepers, resulting in the deaths of 24 Pakistani soldiers.
After this violent incident, the United Nations authorized the peacekeeping force to use all means to arrest Aideed, the mastermind behind the scenes. Since the U.S. military had been attacked by Aideide many times before, the United States volunteered to take on this task.
On October 3, 1993, the U.S. military received an internal report that Omar Shalang, as Aideed's treasurer, and Foreign Spokesman Monhami Hassan had both entered the Olympic Hotel in Mogadishu. According to past practice, Aided should have a meeting right inside the hotel.
At 3:32 p.m., Operation Goddess of Peace began. The U.S. military, with a strong lineup, dispatched a total of 19 helicopters, including 4 attack helicopters, 4 multi-purpose helicopters, and 6 Black Hawk helicopters. A total of 12 escort chariots were dispatched on the ground, including 7 armed Humvees, 2 carrying Humvees and 3 heavy trucks. The 160 soldiers involved in the capture were all Delta Special Forces and Rangers from U.S. military aces.
(Delta Special Forces)
According to the tactical deployment of the Us army, four Black Hawk helicopters parachuted four squads of Rangers into four blocks, guarding the four sides of the building and taking cover. Two squads of Delta Force, the plane descended to the rear door of the target, using smoke screens as cover, quickly rushed into the building to arrest. Since the area is not suitable for helicopter docking, after the capture is completed, the ground Hummer convoy will escort the people back to the barracks.
Still, the U.S. military underestimated Aidid's strength. As Aideed's "Fight for Homeland" broadcast rang out in the city, thousands of Somali militiamen suddenly appeared around the hotel building. Armed with rifles and heavy machine guns, mortars and rocket launchers, they quickly fought the Americans.
Although the U.S. Special Forces are known for their combat experience, the Delta Force and Rangers, who have only a hundred or so men, can only use bunkers such as corners to support themselves in the face of tens of thousands of oncoming bullets and shells. Even the two Black Hawk helicopters in charge of air support were hit by rockets and fell to the ground.
The fighting was so fierce that the capture, which had been planned for an hour, was met with fierce resistance from the entire Somali Mogadishu people. The American troops, who were caught in a bitter battle, were able to leave the city and return to the barracks after 15 hours of desperate and bloody battles.
Throughout the fighting, the Somali Mogadishu militia, killed and wounded more than a thousand people. Because Aidid had earlier promoted the peacekeeping forces as predatory devils, it provoked hatred among the local population against the US military. Most of those killed were ordinary Somali people who took part in the fighting.
(Somalia Operation)
After the battle, the captured Black Hawk helicopter captain Durham, along with the video footage of the people dragging and trampling on the bodies of the fallen American soldiers, was sent to the US cable network by Aideed, causing an uproar in the world. The world has unanimously condemned the U.S. military operations in Somalia. The German media even claimed that the United States was waging a dirty war in Somalia.
The people in the United States were even more in an uproar, and anti-war sentiment was rising day by day. Public opinion has unanimously and strongly attacked the US government's troops in Somalia. In the face of pressure from domestic and foreign public opinion, then-US President Clinton made a televised speech that determined the timing of the WITHDRAWAL of US troops from Somalia.
At the same time, the U.S. government also negotiated secretly with Aideed. Eventually, the U.S. military released the captured Aideed captives. Aideed returned the bodies of the American pilot Durham and two American soldiers. The United States no longer launches military operations against Aidid.
After the Somali "Goddess of Peace" operation, the Americans learned a lesson and began to deliberately evade the ground city confrontation. In the subsequent Operation Desert Fox in Iraq, the Kosovo War in 1999 and the Libyan War in 2011, the U.S. military used contactless airstrikes as the main tactic.
On October 6, 2018, the U.S. military carried out air strikes on targets of the Al-Shabaab militant group in southern Somalia, killing more than 60 extremists. The day before, October 5, the U.S. military had just held a commemoration of the 25th anniversary of Operation Peace.
(References: Black Hawk Down, Somali War)