Black Hawk Down author visits Academy

  • Published
  • By David Edwards
  • Air Force Academy Public Affairs
U.S. AIR FORCE ACADEMY, Colo. --  The Air Force Academy cadets were feeling a bit more "hawkish" than normal last week - and with good reason.

Mark Bowden, the author of numerous books, most notably "Black Hawk Down," came to the Academy for a lecture Sept. 14 and face time with the cadets in their classes the following day.

The book title refers to an Army helicopter shot down by the forces of Somali warlord Mohammed Farrah Aidid during the Battle of Mogadishu in October 1993.

Bowden's book was published in 1999. He explained the long gap between the battle and book in his Arnold Hall lecture to the cadets.

He introduced his talk by saying that he wanted to "demystify what we journalists do and how we do it."At the time of the battle, Bowden was working as a sportswriter for the Philadelphia Inquirer.

"The truth is I'm about as thoroughgoing a civilian as you'll ever meet," Bowden said. "After 'Black Hawk Down,' people began mistaking me for an expert in military history, military tactics. I begin most stories I write in complete ignorance. The thrill of it is the research."

He said he was horrified by the pictures he had seen of the bodies of U.S. servicemen being dragged through the streets of the Somali capital. The graphic images prompted him to seek more information about how a humanitarian mission had devolved into a protracted firefight.

Although he knew little about the military or Somalia, Bowden knew that small military units forced to fight for their lives usually make for compelling stories. The problem was how to find the protagonists.

At first, he assumed that the military had already publicized the events of the Battle of Mogadishu. When that assumption proved false, he called the Pentagon seeking help. That turned out to be a dead end.

He nearly dropped the idea entirely after that. The impetus to renew the pursuit came when he was assigned to write a profile of President Bill Clinton in advance of the 1996 election. Bowden said he considered the assignment something of a "booby prize" because Clinton was the most written-about man in the world at the time.

But he needed an angle, and he said there was a lot of leftover ill will toward the administration over the mission in Somalia. So Bowden decided to track down the father of Army Cpl. Jamie Smith, one of the men who had died in Mogadishu.

One day following his meeting with the father, Bowden received an invitation to a memorial for Smith. He debated whether the long trip would be worth making and eventually decided to go. At the service, he met several of the men who had served with Smith. Bowden now had the sources he needed.

Nevertheless, he didn't know what to expect. Growing up in the Vietnam War era, he had observed that many Soldiers then were "knuckle draggers" who enlisted out of high school because soldiering was their only career opportunity. His newfound interview subjects presented a markedly different image.

"These were some of the brightest, most intelligent, most articulate people I had ever interviewed," he said. "It was almost as if they had been waiting to tell me their story."
What he gleaned from his interviews with the Rangers was incomplete because of security concerns.

So Bowden filled in the blanks by tracking down and interviewing former Soldiers. He found this tactic to be very successful

Yet even with this wealth of information, Bowden still had only one side of the story. He decided he needed to go to Somalia. When he called the State Department asking for advice, the person on the other end said, "don't go."

After finagling some help from the State Department, he did go. The paper put up the money for the trip, which brought Bowden to one of the most dangerous places on the planet.

His escorts into Somalia were heavily armed dealers of khat, a powerful stimulant that Somali fighters often use right before battle.

"Drug dealers are on the fringe of polite society everywhere, and there is no polite society in Somalia," Bowden said.

Despite a directive to leave issued by leaders of the most powerful clan, Bowden stayed and spent 10 terrifying days in Somalia. He said the Somalis refused to believe that he was a journalist because it was inconceivable to them that someone would risk so much to chase a story.

The gamble paid off, though. Bowden was enough of a curiosity in Mogadishu that Somalis routinely stopped by to tell him their memories of what they call the Day of the Rangers.

When Bowden returned, his efforts to obtain additional information were accommodated rather than thwarted. He even heard an audio transcript of the communication among the soldiers during the battle.

In the end, Bowden got plenty more than he needed to write "Black Hawk Down." If not for his persistence and his journalistic instincts, it might never have happened.

"Stories are how we remember as a culture," he said. "For me, it showed the tremendous power in our society an individual can have in shaping popular memory. The fact that these guys are finally getting the recognition they deserve makes me very proud."

"Black Hawk Down" was a New York Times best-seller, and it is a staple of the core curriculum here at the Academy.

One instructor who is especially fond of it is John Farley, assistant professor of communications for the Academy's English Department. The book is required reading in the 400-level composition and public speaking class Farley teaches, and he uses the documentary based on the book in his film production class.

Farley said the Black Hawk Down story "opens itself up to a lot of good conversations about leadership" by providing examples of both good and bad leadership.

"What I really like most about the book is that it includes multiple points of view," Farley said. "Bowden took the time to interview several Soldiers. It gives cadets a reality check: what it means to be in the military, what it means to serve your country."