Surviving BlackHawk Down

It’s on Netflix, watch it.

I will have to add that to my list to watch. That was one wild and crazy event.

This one gives a little different view. Alot of people died during that event.

Dutchboy wrote:

This one gives a little different view. Alot of people died during that event.

What view point is this one told from.

Both sides, soldiers and camerman on the ground.

Watched the trailer. Looks like it’s definitely worth a watch.

I binged and watched all three last night. That situation was a real messed up one. Some poor decisions got some good men killed that day. The sad part about wars is the number of innocent people who often get killed in the process. There sure was no love lost for the Americans over there. If you ask me it was just another place the US should have just stayed out of. We need to stop wasting Americans life while trying to be the world’s babysitter.

I watched 2 episodes last night and it was really worth watching. I will continue tonight, which is out of the ordinary for the lady and I.

fishthumper wrote:

I binged and watched all three last night. That situation was a real messed up one. Some poor decisions got some good men killed that day. The sad part about wars is the number of innocent people who often get killed in the process. There sure was no love lost for the Americans over there. If you ask me it was just another place the US should have just stayed out of. We need to stop wasting Americans life while trying to be the world’s babysitter.

I watched it all tonight and I can’t agree more with the last sentence .

Was a good show to see both sides .

I also wonder if any of the refugees here in the US still have animosity towards Americans because of it .

Terrible what those soldiers had to go through. What a mess the other side created. Let your people starve to death then start a war with those trying to help. Try to help or don’t help the US is the bad guy.

I just watched all of it. Pretty powerful stuff.

Just finished watching. Well worth seeing. This happened the year I graduated high school and remember following the news and thinking what the heck are we doing there. What a sad waste.

I haven’t taken the time to watch it yet but plan to.

I can say without hesitation that Bush Sr. was an idiot to let us get pulled further into Somalia. I wasn’t a big Clinton fan, but will give him props for getting us out of there AND revisiting the premise behind most of the United States’ foreign operations.

buckybadger wrote:

I can say without hesitation that Bush Sr. was an idiot to let us get pulled further into Somalia. I wasn’t a big Clinton fan, but will give him props for getting us out of there AND revisiting the premise behind most of the United States’ foreign operations.

Agree with your first statement, but we continued sticking our nose where it didn’t belong throughout the 90’s. Cruise missle strikes come to mind.

Joe Jarl wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>buckybadger wrote:</div>
I can say without hesitation that Bush Sr. was an idiot to let us get pulled further into Somalia. I wasn’t a big Clinton fan, but will give him props for getting us out of there AND revisiting the premise behind most of the United States’ foreign operations.

Agree with your first statement, but we continued sticking our nose where it didn’t belong throughout the 90’s. Cruise missle strikes come to mind.

Korea, Viet Nam, Granda, Solmolia we are the people who think we know what everybody wants or needs. We end up spending millions and losing many lives trying to force our will on many who don’t want it.

One episode in and it is very well made. I was 7 at time so I do not remember much about it besides what I seen in the movie.

Once again after watching this thanks again to any veteran who has served.

Maybe if the US had a policy that whoever instigates or orders our troops into these quagmires has to go lead the charge…. as in first in. That might put the brakes on some of these idiot ideas.

Jimmy Jones wrote:

Maybe if the US had a policy that whoever instigates or orders our troops into these quagmires has to go lead the charge…. as in first in. That might put the brakes on some of these idiot ideas.

That would require politicians to view their lives as equal to Joe Blow down the street. Not happening.

Dutchboy wrote:

we are the people who think we know what everybody wants or needs. We end up spending millions and losing many lives trying to force our will on many who don’t want it.

Why we think we have to solve everyone else’s problems is beyond me. Fighting has gone on in many of these areas for thousands of years and it will never end. I watched this show and its extremely frustrating that our troops could end up in a situation like that. Since this was early 90’s a lot has been learned since then and I dont think you will see this type of thing happen again. They use drone strikes. I just watched videos of some taliban or ISIS folks getting wiped out in broad daylight smuggling explosive devices. Not sure exactly when this happened, but it was recent. They have changed to doing this activity during the day since they know our troops have the advantage with night vision so our tactics changed to go along with it.

Watched all three episodes last night because I couldn’t stop. I was fairly young (7 or 8) when that all went down but I remember it happening. Wow… I agree with what’s already been said & I still don’t understand why need to police the world. I remember growing up in the 90’s and that was something we (USA) puffed our chest about. That needs to change and hopefully is on its way of changing.

I watched this recently. It took over a week to finish it, but I found it to be very well made and definitely a eye opener on some levels.

Bearcat89 wrote:

I watched this recently. It took over a week to finish it, but I found it to be very well made and definitely a eye opener on some levels.

The different viewpoints were pretty amazing. The one Somalia fighter sure seemed like a guy not to be trifled with. A few thousand of those guys fighting for their homes combined with what seemed like extremely poor planning by our military higher ups and it makes sense what happened.

It was a tragedy all around…too many people lost their lives and nothing changed.

Matt Moen wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Bearcat89 wrote:</div>
I watched this recently. It took over a week to finish it, but I found it to be very well made and definitely a eye opener on some levels.

The different viewpoints were pretty amazing. The one Somalia fighter sure seemed like a guy not to be trifled with. A few thousand of those guys fighting for their homes combined with what seemed like extremely poor planning by our military higher ups and it makes sense what happened.

It was a tragedy all around…too many people lost their lives and nothing changed.

I really liked that they gave the Somalians side of the story. Really makes you realize they are not the enemy some of us believed them to be. If that happened here I would hope our towns would ban together to fight who ever off as well.

I had some initial thoughts that I wish I would’ve put on this thread when I watched it a few weeks ago and I wish I would have.

One thing I do remember is agreeing with what one of the veterans said about getting off the plane in Somalia. In my own experiences of landing overseas, like the vet on the series said, you can only describe it as a whole different world. The facts are that you’re consumed by heat, but it’s so much more than that. It’s like a blow dryer that you just can’t get away from.

I strongly encourage anyone who hasn’t to watch the movie Blackhawk down, and for those that read, read the book as well, as well as any books written by Mike Durant, the pilot who was captured. In the movie, when the two Delta guys are killed and Durant’s position is overrun, he’s shown being hit in the face by a buttstock. Durant reveals in his book that he told people at the time it was a buttstock because he didn’t want to reveal the horrific truth so soon after what happened. But, as described in the Netflix documentary, he was actually struck by the ripped-off arm of another soldier from that scene. Truly horrific.

This two-ish day battle has so much to it that the Neftlix documentary honestly just scratches the surface. I was 17 on 9/11/2001, and I had always loved history and military stuff, so the Mogadishu battle was one of the most very recent combat engagements I could read about growing up. My senior year of high school I needed to fill a few class hours one semester and didn’t really have much to take so I had a general elective period where the teacher basically just said “come up with a project, anything” so I spent a quarter or semester researching the Mogadishu battle and wrote a 20-page paper on it. So many interesting details in that saga.

I’ve said many times before, the military in some ways is only as good and up-to-speed as its last war. When we went to war in Afghanistan/Iraq in the early 2000’s we had some Desert Storm experiences to go by but honestly a lot of gear, tactics, and medical training were still based on Vietnam. Then when you get into new wars everything accelerates very quickly and you get (or at least try to) caught up.

On that note, some of the shortcomings of the Blackhawk Down situation improved our preparedness in the early stages of the Iraq war. If you remember from the documentary or movie, when soldiers were gearing up things like water, food, and night-vision were mentioned and mostly dismissed because they figured their mission would only take them outside the wire a few hours. Fast-forward to Iraq in 2004 (for me and my unit) and it didn’t matter how long we expected to be out, we were bringing all of it, and people quite literally referenced Blackhawk Down as the reason.

Sorry I know I go on long posts on this stuff but I’ve gotta add one more thing: Since watching the movie and reading the book, the tale of Delta MSG Gary Gordon and SFC Randy Shughart has always moved me. Those are the guys that were providing cover fire as snipers from their aircraft after Durant’s chopper went down but they knew that crash scene would get overrun. They requested and were denied twice to insert on the ground to support any survivors. They kept requesting to be inserted and were finally granted permission and were basically told they’d be on their own, that further support couldn’t be risked. They were well aware of that and dropped in anyway because they knew American soldiers could be alive down there (I have chills as I’m typing this).

You’ve all seen the movie and the documentary…MSG Gordon and SFC Shughart were dropped into a hornet’s nest. The crash scene was being overrun from all sides by Somalis who were out for blood. They pulled Durant out of the chopper and tucked him away in a nearby building and fought off the Somalis as long as they could. They knew it was a suicide mission but did it anyway.

Both MSG Gordon and SFC Shughart were posthumously awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor. Maybe because of it’s recency or all the reading and viewing I’ve done on their saga, but to me it’s one of the very top MOH stories in our great American military history. I truly don’t mean to diminish those that have been killed or wounded in the way I’m about to describe…but I see what these Delta guys did as even greater than, say, jumping on a grenade or even running through enemy fire in some cases. These guys in Mogadishu were dropping into a nightmare. They figured they’d probably die, but it wouldn’t be over quick like jumping on a grenade. They’d have to scan for threats, fight them off, probably be wounded many times, reload, constantly react to movement coming from all directions, and eventually meet their fate. I believe some roads and schools have been named after these two but as I’ve mentioned on here before, names of our nation’s fallen should be mentioned periodically on the news, or on a billboard that just scrolls through those who have given their lives for our country.

That’s why I stand for and respect our flag.

Wow, Dan, thanks for sharing. It’s an amazing story and their sacrifice should never be forgotten.

Dan – All excellent points. This country owe Both MSG Gordon and SFC Shughart and their family’s more than they can ever pay. This saying “All gave some, some gave all’ is never so true than in this situation.

I really liked that they gave the Somalians side of the story. Really makes you realize they are not the enemy some of us believed them to be. If that happened here I would hope our towns would ban together to fight who ever off as well.
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I really liked that they gave the Somalians side of the story. Really makes you realize they are not the enemy some of us believed them to be. If that happened here I would hope our towns would ban together to fight who ever off as well.
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Well said. The part where the one woman talks about playing soccer with the boys and fighting with her brothers was a really interesting part for me. It shows you that there really aren’t too many differences between us. In that part of the documentary, you realize kids are kids in whatever part of the world you are in.

I was fortunate enough to travel all over the world for work. One thing that always stuck with me is wherever I went people were kind and always willing to help strangers. This documentary, in a weird way, solidified those thoughts for me.

When I was 16 I traveled to Russia and lived there for three months as an exchange program. One of the most interesting parts of this trip was going to all the WW2 battle sites and Museums. Also listening to the history of the war told from their point. Most of us only get to here it from the American point of view. As someone who enjoyed History this was very interesting. Living their gave me such a deep respect for our country.