Free online documentary:
http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/true-sto ... hawk-down/
The US lost a total of 18 men. Somali casualty estimates range from 315 to 3000.
Where's AW when you need him?
Grant,
The fatalities among the US forces would have been much higher if they didn't use Somali school kids as human shields. In addition, if the body count hit the 50s, the Americans would have carpet bombed Habar Gidir Mogadishu. The point of the battle was to show that the Habar Gidir were not going to get cowered into surrendering and being preyed upon by their enemies.
Thank goodness for the good Old Senator John McCain who called the Somali engagement a failure not in the American interest. The Clinton administration was consorting with the enemies of the Habar Gidir from the first day and were mislead into believing that Aidid and the Habar Gidir were easily going to be pushed out of Mogadishu and sidelined from Somali politics. Blame it on the likes of Professor Samatar of Rutgers University and his bogus claim of Aidid having only 500 drug addicted youth fighting for him, or Jesse Jackson who got duped by a man called Matukade, a close associated of Mohamed Abshir Haman another long term Agency asset in Somalia, etc.
The assassination of the Habar Gidir peacenicks in July 1993 by US helicopter gunships just as they gathered to discuss how to find a solution to the Habar Gidir-UN/US conflict escalated tensions and ensured Aidid becoming the undisputed/authoritarian leader of the Habar Gidir. If the US forces had not killed those men, an accommodation could have been reached preventing Oct 3. Aidid's opponents got killed that day and they represented some of the most brilliant and moderate factions in the HG. After that point, any HG who as much questioned Aidid was locked up by his kinsmen. He had complete control.
A good article that gives a different perspective of Aidid as written by two US academics who visited the General:
http://blog.dispatchesfromthevanishingworld.com/?p=2088
