A million dollars of technology against people with no shoes and 50 dollar rifles (Black Hawk Down - Mark Bowden)

Name: markw-d

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Product:	Black Hawk Down - Mark Bowden
Date:	21/12/01 (66 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Fast paced, Real, Unique

Disadvantages: None

I have always been intestested in military matters, and have been fascinated over the years at how disparity between forces can be overcome by strategy, guile, professionalism, ineptitude on the part of the powerful, or just plain luck.

It was Napoleon who said that the only quality he valued in his generals was luck.

The Americans have historically not had to rely much on luck, preffering instead to rely on high intensity training, superior arms, and the massive industrial capacity to produce those arms faster and cheaper and better than their opponents.

Vietnam was the wake up call that made them get their command and control procedures into place, to recognise that warfare was now going to take place on prime time television, and to keep the politicions out of the chain of command. They learned their lessons....or did they?

Fresh from Gulf War victory, in 1993 they went to Mogadishu, partly to keep the peace and partly to find the warlords who it now turns out were affiliated to Bin Laden and Al Queda.

Read Black Hawk Down and you read an account of incredible personal bravery on the part of the individual U.S servicemen. You also read an account of exceptional squad based soldiering, a million miles away from the images which we all now have of Vietnams disaffected and drug ridden conscripts. But you also read about how overwhelming technology was humbled by a bunch of uneducated fanatics with 30 year old weapons.

Having just returned from a similar part of Africa I can only now realise just how bad the situation was for those GI's.

The book is fast paced and leaves you breathless. You hear the shots, smell the decay of the city, feel the heat and discomfort.

You dont want to put the book down. Not because it is just a rivetting read and you want to find out what happens next, but because you actually feel part of the action and you need to keep going to get yourself out of trouble.


When a guy goes down with terrible wounds he is one of your squad, you feel angry, scared, and helpless all at the same time. The injuries are terrible but you dont react with horror until later...as you read it you start to think about how you save the mans life...don't let him go into shock....apply a trauma pack.....if its a chest wound don't give him morphine no matter how much he pleads...You shout out loud at the leaders of the vehicle convoys who keep taking wrong turns.... You really get involved with this book.

The old lessons come to the fore, political interference, fragemented command and control, and an underestimation of the barefooted ragtag band with old Kalshnikovs.

The worst of it I guess is my own small recollection of the events from the news at the time, which was a short item which showed naked dead U.S servicemen being dragged around the streets of mogadishu so that the "people" could mutilate them.

Thats why we see very little T.V footage of special ops anymore until after the victory.

A great book, a disturbing book, and as much a thriller as a work of reference.

Hollywood is now making the film. Lets hope that they do it justice.

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