Black Hawk Revisited

Reports and images of ongoing guerilla warfare in Baghdad and other Iraqi cities recall for some observers the events of October 3 and 4, 1993, in Mogadishu, Somalia. When Black Hawk Down, Ridley Scott's dark and earnest movie about those difficult days, was released to theaters in late 2001, the war against Iraq was still an idea rather than a daily reality. Now, as Columbia releases the film on gorgeous (if extras-less) Superbit DVD, this version of U.S. troops in crisis comes full, and frankly disturbing, circle. This even as CentCom reports, on 3 June, the blocking of "Somali terrorist" Hassan Abdullah Hersi al-Turki's "assets."

As is well known, the story of terrorism -- state-sponsored and not -- is increasingly intricate. Journalist and ex-marine Mark Bowden's book, Black Hawk Down: A Story of Modern War , gets at it from one specific angle -- that of the U.S. troops on the ground (and sometimes, in their Black Hawk helicopters). First published as a 1997 series for the Philadelphia Inquirer, it is a nearly moment-by-moment account of events in Somalia, as the U.S. undertook to take out designated warlords and terrorists. Culled from radio dispatches, survivor interviews (both U.S. and Somali), military records, and media reports, the book recounts the battle that erupted in Mogadishu when the U.S. Army Special Forces -- Rangers and Deltas (D-boys) -- staged an "extraction" of several lieutenants to warlord Mohamed Farrah Aidid, and were met with armed resistance.

Praised by military and civilian press (and since its publication in 1999, read by Special Forces trainees), the book illustrates well the absurdity and chaos of urban warfare: There's no ground to be won, no victory to be claimed, only survival to be scraped up against horrific odds, no matter what side you're on. You look out your fellows as best you can: For the U.S. Special Forces, this takes the form of a credo ("Leave no man behind"); for the Somalis, it has a more immediate and more lasting effect -- there is no "left behind," only ongoing hardship.

That the U.S. undertook the war against Iraq, which had to involve urban territories, without extensive preparation of troops for what was in store for them, precisely, has led to disasters. Once again, Bowden describes the costs of U.S. arrogance and delusion in "The Lessons of Abu Ghraib," in the July/August 2004 Atlantic Monthly. "In the end, though," he writes, "context and perspective cannot mask what is universal about the events at Abu Ghraib... Americans are not a superior race, and American soldiers are not morally superior to the soldiers of other nations. The best we can hope is that they are better trained and disciplined, and guided by policy that is morally sound. Sadly, this is not always the case."

His acute awareness of the many stakes in war, the many occasions for failure on small and large scales, makes Bowden's account of Mogadishu engaging for a variety of readers -- those who abhor war, those who see it as necessary, and those who see it as a rite of manhood. And in this context, it's striking that, as hard as Bowden worked to document what happened, as it was perceived by those who were there, he concludes by noting the troops' lingering sense of unreality, of "feeling weirdly out of place, as though they did not belong here, fighting feelings of disbelief, anger, and ill-defined betrayal."

Unsurprisingly, Scott's Black Hawk Down, produced by the indefatigable Jerry Bruckheimer, takes something of an opposite approach. An action movie dressed up like an art film, it is not about betrayal or anger, but heroism and patriotic fervor. Given that the film was completed well before September 11, the fact that its triumphant tone seems so completely suited to the current zeitgeist is not a little alarming.