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Posted on 10/03/2003 12:00:05 AM PDT by SAMWolf
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 are acknowledged, affirmed and commemorated.
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| Our Mission: The FReeper Foxhole is dedicated to Veterans of our Nation's military forces and to others who are affected in their relationships with Veterans. In the FReeper Foxhole, Veterans or their family members should feel free to address their specific circumstances or whatever issues concern them in an atmosphere of peace, understanding, brotherhood and support. The FReeper Foxhole hopes to share with it's readers an open forum where we can learn about and discuss military history, military news and other topics of concern or interest to our readers be they Veteran's, Current Duty or anyone interested in what we have to offer. If the Foxhole makes someone appreciate, even a little, what others have sacrificed for us, then it has accomplished one of it's missions. We hope the Foxhole in some small way helps us to remember and honor those who came before us.
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Mogadishu, Somalia In 1993, the Rangers were once again called into harm's way in support of the United Nation's efforts to establish order in the African nation of Somalia. On 6 June, the U.N. Security Council...with U.S. sponsorship and approval...passed Resolution 837, calling for the apprehension "for prosecution, trial, and punishment" of those responsible for the ambush and death of twenty-four Pakistani U.N. peacekeepers and to use "all necessary measures" to install United Nations authority "throughout Somalia." It was determined that 'War Lord' Mohamed Farrah Aidid and his SNA were responsible for the ambush and a plan was developed to bring about his capture.  On June 17, an arrest order was issued by the United Nations and, as a result, Aidid went into hiding deep within Mogadishu. Efforts by U.N. units in country failed to capture him. U.N ambassador to Somalia, U.S. Admiral (Retired) Jonathan Howe, eventually requested 1st Special Operational Detachment-Delta...the premier three-squadron U.S. counter terrorism unit known as Delta Force to the public...to assist in Aidid's capture. President Clinton eventually approved the request to send in the specialized unit. The U.S. deployed Task Force Ranger, a 450-man force composed of approximately sixty men from the one-hundred-and-fifty-man Squadron C of 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta; B Company (Reinforced), 3rd Ranger Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment from; and support helicopters from the Army's 1st Battalion, 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (SOAR)...the world's finest night fliers known as the "Night Stalkers."  Mohamed Farrah Aidid Task Force Rangers' advance party arrived in Somalia on 26 August. The task force set up base on the shore of the Indian Ocean at the Mogadishu Airport on the far southern end of the city. The operation was to be conducted in three phases: Phase I, lasting until 30 August, was to get set up; Phase II, lasting until 7 September, would focus exclusively on locating and capturing Aidid; and Phase III...in the event Phase II failed, the focus would shift to Aidid's command structure with the intent of forcing the warlord to take a more active and open role with his forces. In spite of a number of handicaps, Task Force Ranger attempted to seize and to maintain the initiative by planning and launching a number of raids that proved to be unsuccessful. On 7 September, the force moved to Phase III and expanded its target list to include six of Aidid's top lieutenants and staff. Despite some Ranger success, Aidid continued his defiance even as the task force attempted to track him down with additional ambushes and killings of U.N. forces.  The seventh and final mission of Task Force Ranger commenced at approximately 1300 on 3 October when a Somali agent passed word that a number of Aidid's lieutenants, including two of the six on the expanded target list...Muhammed Hassan Awale and Omar Salad Elmi...would be meeting later that afternoon. The mark was in the vicinity of the Olympic Hotel...a white, five-story building that served as a landmark since it was one of the few large buildings left intact in the city. HawlwadigRoad, intersected by narrow dirt alleys, ran in front of the hotel and was one of the few paved roads in the city. Across Hawlwadig, one block north, was...what would turn out to be...the ultimate target house, a two-sectioned building with two stories in the front, three stories in the rear, and a flat roof on both. L-shaped, the structure had a small courtyard enclosed by a high stonewall.  Just three blocks to the west of the hotel was the Bakara Market...the most heavily armed region of Mogadishu. This area was known by soldiers as "the Black Sea" and was referred to as real "Indian country." The assault force was formidable and consisted of seventy-five Rangers and forty Delta soldiers onboard an air armada of sixteen helicopters. The Delta and Ranger assault force would be inserted by four MH-6 and six MH-60 Black Hawks with four AH-6J Little Birds providing close air support. In that the target area was too confining and too dangerous to land helicopters to extract the prisoners..."precious packages"...and assault force, a fifty-two-man Ranger ground element...including some Delta operatives and Navy SEALs from SEAL Team Six...was to deploy from the airport in a twelve-vehicle convoy on a three-mile journey in direct support of the operation.  Michael Durant's helicopter heading out over Mogadishu on Oct. 3, 1993. Mike Goodale rode on this one. The helicopters lifted off at 1532 after a thirty-seven minute delay. Taking a circuitous flight from their staging base just three miles away from the objective and moving low and fast over the ocean's breakers, the aircraft made a dash over the city, with the MH-6s carrying four Deltas, two to a side, on their external benches. Rapidly landing on Hawlwadig Road in a billowing swirl of rust-orange dust that created some significant visibility problems, a group of six helicopters, composed of four MH-6 Little Birds and two Black Hawks, inserted forty Delta soldiers on the road in front of the building. Simultaneously, sixty Rangers were inserted into the objective by 'fast-rope' to establish a security perimeter between the four corners of the target's city block. The mission's "precious cargo," twenty-four prisoners, including the two primary men they had sought, had been quickly captured and the Ranger twelve-vehicle ground convoy was called at the twenty-minute mark to make its way to their location from their hold position approximately 200 meters from the objective. As the ground convoy picked up the prisoners in front of the building, enemy fire began to gain in intensity. A convoy of three vehicles was dispatched with an injured Ranger to make its way back to the airfield. The three vehicles came under such heavy fire that they barely made it.  The situation grew progressively worse at the objective around 1610 when the first Rocket Propelled Grenades...RPGs...were fired at circling helicopters. Finally, at 1620, the strategy paid off with a hit on the tail rotor of the lead assault Black Hawk, "Super 61" that brought it crashing down on the roof of a house located within a walled compound. The Black Hawk fell to earth on its left side, its top wedged against the remains of a wall in a narrow alley, its nose to the ground. Within, the pilot lay dead, the five others aboard lay injured. Having rehearsed the possibility of an aircraft going down, the task force quickly implemented three contingency plans: provide cover with a nearby CSAR Black Hawk, Super 68, deploy the main body of Task Force Ranger from the objective to the crash site, and alert the Quick Reaction Force from the 10th Mountain Division to deploy from its location at the Somali National University to the Mogadishu Airport, from where it could launch to support CSAR missions.  On the ground at the objective, the Rangers on the perimeter began to move to the location of the downed Black Hawk with the Delta operatives doing the same soon after the transfer of the prisoners to the ground convoy. At the crash site, survivors were attempting to establish a defense while a Little Bird courageously set down in a nearby alley called Freedom Road to extract two survivors. The first group of Rangers arrived at the crash site after completing a terrifying run of over three blocks with bullets boring down the alleys from every direction. Eight minutes after Super 61 going down, the CSAR Black Hawk, carrying fifteen members of a highly trained combat search-and-rescue unit was hovering over and fast-roping down to Freedom Road. Hit by an RPG and trailing a thin gray haze of smoke, the mortally wounded CSAR bird barely made its way back to the airfield three miles away where it crash landed.  The pilots and crew of Super 64. As the remainder of the Rangers and Delta made their way to the Super 61 crash site, it was discovered that the remains of the pilot were trapped in his seat. The real problem became how to get the body out, for there appeared no easy way to reclaim it. Abandoning their aviation comrade was not an option for the Rangers or Delta as arriving groups expanded and fortified a security perimeter around the downed helicopter. It did not take long for the situation to dramatically worsen when an RPG claimed that second victim less than twenty minutes after the first. Overhead, Super 64 had been directed to take Super 61's orbital spot over the target area when it, too, took an RPG round to the tail. Within minutes, the rotor failed and the aircraft plummeted impacting on top of a frail shack.
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Hours earlier, the air commander had rejected the requests of his four MH-6 Little Bird copilots that they be inserted on the ground to defend the survivors of Super 64. Two additional requests to be inserted from Delta snipers Master Sergeant Gary Gordon and Sergeant First Class Randy Shughart were also denied. Finally, a third request by these two NCOs was approved after it was learned that a reaction force convoy, upon which the command's hopes had rested, had been forced to turn back.
But Gordon and Shughart also knew that the four wounded men below would have no chance of survival without additional support. At a later ceremony, Master Sergeant Gordon's widow, Carmen, spoke of why she believed her husband did what he did. "Gary went back to save his fellow soldiers, not to die there. Gary was one hundred percent Ranger. He lived the Rangers' creed every day. He knew that he had a chance. He and Shughart wouldn't ever have gone out there trying to be heroes."
The swirling debris, noise, and confusion of combat disoriented the two snipers. Crouched in the open field, Shughart motioned to Goffena their confusion as to which direction to move. The pilot brought his aircraft back down, leaned out the window, and pointed the way to Super 64 as one of his crew chiefs tossed a smoke grenade in the direction of Durant's bird. The last sight of the two intrepid soldiers as Super 62 lifted off to hover overhead with covering fires was of both men signaling a thumbs up as they began to fight their way under intense small arms fire through a dense maze of shanties and shacks to the downed Black Hawk.
inquirer.philly.com
www.globalsecurity.org
www.somf.org
www.specialoperations.com
www.theunionleader.com
allafrica.com
www-cgsc.army.mil
www.ciriello.com
news.bbc.co.uk
www.eccentricamerica.net
www.qmmuseum.lee.army.mil
The Battle of Mogadishu is known today in Somalia as Ma-alinti Rangers, or the Day of the Rangers. It pitted the world's most sophisticated military power against a mob of civilians and Somalian irregulars. It was the biggest single firefight involving American soldiers since the Vietnam War.  Theirs is a story of well-laid plans gone awry, of tragic blunders, of skillful soldiering, heroism, and occasional cowardice. The portrait reveals a military force that underestimated its enemy. The assault was launched into the most dangerous part of Mogadishu in daylight, even though the Ranger and Delta forces were trained and equipped primarily to work in darkness - where their night-vision devices can afford a decisive advantage. Commanders who thought it unlikely that Somalis could shoot down helicopters saw five shot down (three limped back to base before crash-landing). Ground rescue convoys were blocked for hours by barricades and ambushes - leaving at least five U.S. soldiers to die awaiting rescue, including two Delta sergeants who were posthumously awarded Medals of Honor.  The American soldiers were so confident of a quick victory that they neglected to take night-vision devices and water, both sorely needed later. Carefully defined rules of engagement, calling for soldiers to fire only on Somalis who aimed weapons at them, were quickly discarded in the heat of the fight. Most soldiers interviewed said that through most of the fight they fired on crowds and eventually at anyone and anything they saw.  Somalis drag a Ranger's body through the streets of Mogadishu Animosity between the elite Delta units and the Ranger infantry forces effectively created two separate ground-force commanders, who for at least part of the battle were no longer speaking to each other. Delta commandos took accidental fire on several occasions from the younger Rangers. Poor coordination between commanders in the air and a ground convoy sent vehicles meandering through a maelstrom of fire, resulting in the deaths of five soldiers and one Somalian prisoner.  Official U.S. estimates of Somalian casualties at the time numbered 350 dead and 500 injured. Somalian clan leaders made claims of more than 1,000 deaths. The United Nations placed the number of dead at ``between 300 to 500.'' Doctors and intellectuals in Mogadishu not aligned with the feuding clans say that 500 dead is probably accurate. The Task Force Ranger commander, Maj. Gen. William F. Garrison, testifying before the Senate, said that if his men had put any more ammunition into the city ``we would have sunk it.''  Most of the Rangers who fought were only a few years out of high school. These young men were shocked to find themselves bleeding on the dirt streets of an obscure African capital for a cause so unessential that President Clinton called off their mission the day after the fight.  In strictly military terms, Mogadishu was a success. The targets of that day's raid - two obscure clan leaders named Omar Salad and Mohamed Hassan Awale - were apprehended. But the awful price of those arrests came as a shock to a young president, who felt as misled as John F. Kennedy after the Bay of Pigs. It led to the resignation of Defense Secretary Les Aspin and destroyed the career of Gen. Garrison, who in a handwritten letter to Clinton accepted full responsibility. It aborted a hopeful and unprecedented United Nations effort to salvage an impoverished and hungry nation lost in anarchy and civil war. Mark Bowden, November 16, 1997 |
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the Soldiers of the Clouds
 SGT Lorenzo Ruiz B co 3/75th Rangers  SGT Casey Joyce, B co 3/75th Rangers  SPC James Cavaco B co 3/75th Rangers  PFC Richard Kowalewski B co 3/75th Rangers  CPL James Smith B co 3/75th Rangers  SGT Dominick Pilla B co 3/75th Rangers  MSG Gary Gordon MOH Recipient  SFC Randy Shughart MOH Recipient  MSG Timothy Martin  SFC Matthew Rierson  SFC Earl Fillmore  CWO Cliff Wolcott Pilot of Super 61  CWO Raymond Frank Copilot of Super 64  CWO Donovan Briley Copilot Super 61  SSG William Cleveland Crew Chief Super 64  SSG Thomas Field Crew chief on Super 64  SSG Daniel Busch Super 61  PFC James Martin 10th Mountain  SGT Cornell Houston 10th Mountain 18 soldiers lost their lives in the largest firefight since the Vietnam War, and a 19th soldier was also shot and killed the next morning after the main battle. Besides these men who died, there were 73 men wounded. 30 of them were Rangers One third of Bravo Company 3/75th Ranger Regt. had been wounded or killed.
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