During the operation, two U.S. MH-60 Black Hawk helicopters were shot down by rocket-propelled grenades. Some of the soldiers were able to evacuate the wounded back to the compound, but others were trapped at the crash sites and cut off. An urban battle ensued that lasted throughout the night. Early the next morning, a joint task force was sent to rescue the trapped soldiers. This task force reached the first crash site and led the trapped soldiers out. The second crash site was overrun and pilot Mike Durant, the lone surviving American, was taken prisoner but later released.
Eighteen American soldiers died and 73 were wounded. Another American soldier, Delta op SFC Matt Rierson, was killed in a mortar attack two days later.
Americans were outraged at the televised images of Somali mobs dragging the mutilated bodies of US soldiers through the streets.
Congress and the media were looking to blame someone for the 18 American soldiers killed.
In the days immediately following the First Battle of Mogadishu, Major General William F. Garrison, commander of Task Force Ranger, sat down and wrote out a letter addressed to the House National Security Committee; it began, "Please show this to President Clinton and Defense Secretary Les Aspin."
Garrison wrote 13 brief, enumerated paragraphs. In those paragraphs he did something very few people in positions of leadership do nowadays. He took the blame.
The Garrison Letter
Secretary of Defense Aspin acknowledged that he had made a bad call when he turned down Task Force Ranger's requests for Bradley Fighting Vehicles and the AC-130 gunship, a propeller-driven aircraft that provides devastatingly accurate fire. He resigned his office two months later. He accepted responsibility.
Draft-Dodger Bill Clinton, Commander-in-Chief of the United States, who is ultimately responsible for America's Armed Forces, took no responsibility, accepted none of the blame.
(Note: pictured is Mike Durant's Super Six-Four helicopter)
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