“Meanwhile,” they explained, “each stovepiped command has its own intelligence (if you can call it that). Mistakes have proliferated. It’s no surprise that UNOSOM forces searching for Aideed or his henchmen have attacked innocent civilian compounds. But they’ve even hit UN facilities by mistake.”
Sleep didn’t come easy that night. The terrible cost of the war was beginning to sink in. Since the June 5 flare-up that precipitated the four months of war, 83 UNOSOM troops had been killed in action (26 of these Americans) and 302 wounded (170 Americans). But thousands of Somalis had lost their lives. I thought it was a gross exaggeration when Aideed’s people informed us that they had lost 10,000 killed — two-thirds of them women and children — but reports of relief workers at Somali hospitals and our own intelligence sources later confirmed that these numbers were not that far off. I simply could not believe the level of slaughter since the fighting began.
Each side had a different version of the June 5 clash:
The monthlong period after UNITAF turned over operations to UNOSOM saw a constant worsening of the never-friendly relationship between the UN and Aideed. Differences over the role of the factions in the political process (the UN wanted to marginalize them), Aideed’s radio station (the UN wanted to shut down its inflammatory broadcasts), the police and judiciary (the UN was not convinced Somalis could run either), and participation in political conferences (the idea, again, was to marginalize certain factions by inviting only UN- approved delegates) had created a tense and hostile environment that the slightest spark might set off. That spark came on June 5.
By early June, rumors were everywhere (the rumors were accurate) that UNOSOM intended to shut down Aideed’s radio station, Radio Mogadishu— located, as it happened, on the site of one of the AWSSs. UNOSOM, meanwhile, had a policy of no-notice, or short-notice, inspections of the AWSSs. Late in the day on the fourth of June, a Friday, the Moslem holy day, a bad moment to make demands, two UNOSOM officers appeared at Aideed’s headquarters to deliver notification that an inspection would take place the next morning. As luck would have it, the responsible officer was away, and the subordinate who took the message was not cooperative. “An inspection on such short notice is impossible,” he told them. “We need more time to prepare for it.”
The UNOSOM officers stood firm. “The inspecting force will arrive at the AWSS in the morning.”
The Aideed lieutenant grew more belligerent. “If they come, it will be war,” he replied.
Early the next morning, the inspectors arrived at the AWSS, accompanied by a force of Pakistani soldiers. Moments later, they were confronted by an angry mob. When the soldiers tried to enter the radio station, a scuffle broke out, and a Somali was shot and killed. Word of the fighting quickly spread, and angry mobs sprang up elsewhere in town. One of these swarmed a feeding station guarded by Pakistani troops, and a number of Pakistanis were killed or captured. Another large mob engaged the Pakistani force returning from the inspection site, and more soldiers were killed, wounded, or captured. At the end of the day, twenty-four Pakistanis were dead, fifty-seven were wounded, and six were missing.
At this point, the truth gets murky. Tempers flared. Reason got tossed aside. The big question: Did the mobs rise up spontaneously? Or, as UNOSOM claimed, did Aideed’s people plan the ambushes? Aideed’s faction — and most other Somalis — claimed that the attacks were spontaneous responses to a real threat to the radio station that was compounded by the killing of the Somali. (It’s very possible that the mobs had been urged on by Aideed’s leaders, though without advance planning.)
Aideed didn’t help matters the next day when in a radio address he praised the people who had risen up to fight the foreigners (further provocation and an admission of guilt in the eyes of UNOSOM). Yet, at the same time, he offered a surprisingly reasonable proposal for an impartial inquiry into the causes of the confrontation, followed, hopefully, by a peaceful resolution.
UNOSOM II would have none of that: Aideed and his lieutenants must be brought to justice; and Admiral Howe placed the $25,000 reward on Aideed’s head.
A series of battles followed. UNOSOM conducted air strikes; the Aideed forces executed ambushes. The fighting escalated until the U.S. sent in special operations forces to capture Aideed and his chief lieutenants. They conducted several operations, with mixed results, until the tragedy of October 3 brought Bob Oakley back to Somalia.
Meanwhile, Oakley and I kept in close touch with Ambassadors Lissane and Menharios, the Ethiopian and Eritrean liaisons who were our contacts with Aideed. We waited anxiously for word about the prisoners.
Word finally came that Aideed had agreed to release them. However, he would only release them directly to us, not to UNOSOM.
This was not a good idea.
Since Oakley knew a release to us would create further problems with UNOSOM, he worked out an arrangement to have the prisoners turned over to the Red Cross. To emphasize our noninvolvement and to minimize our media presence, he had us pull back to the airport. As soon as word came that the prisoners were released, we’d leave Somalia for a few days and return after the news flurry had calmed down. The moment that Durant and Shantali were released, we boarded our C-20 and headed for Asmara, Eritrea, Addis Ababa, and Cairo, for meetings with President Isaias of Eritrea, President Meles, and the Egyptian Foreign Minister. (The Egyptians had troops in Somalia; the refueling stop in Cairo was a good opportunity to connect to senior Egyptians.)
We returned to Washington on the sixteenth of October. Next day at the White House, we briefed the National Security Adviser, the Secretaries of State and Defense, and the ambassador to the UN, among others. Later, at the Pentagon, we briefed the new chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Shalikashvilli. Though Oakley presented both a superb description of the situation and a clear plan for our best possible way through the Somalia mess, I had a foreboding that the Washington leadership was looking to disengage from Somalia and write the country off. Despite my misgivings, we were given the go-ahead to pursue Oakley’s plans.
A few days later, we were off again to Somalia.
After another stop in Addis to see President Meles, we flew on to Mogadishu, arriving on the first of November for a planned visit of four days. Our primary purpose in Somalia was to put in place a revised plan we had worked up since our last visit. It called for reestablishing the Security Committee; reestablishing a viable police force; getting the cease-fire and disarmament agreements back in place; getting the factions back to the process of forming a transitional government; involving in the process other nations and political organizations in the region; scheduling another conference in Addis; establishing agreed-upon sectors and security zones in Mogadishu to prevent confrontations; and several other proposals designed to put the humanitarian, political, and security situations on track.
During an intense four days of negotiating, we met with the UNOSOM leadership, the other faction leaders, and various Somali groups seeking agreement on our proposals; and we successfully persuaded everyone involved to accept a renewal of our original mission.
Sticking points remained — chiefly, the question of the UN-held prisoners and the question of Aideed’s war crimes guilt.
Aideed had accused UNOSOM of abusing the prisoners they were holding on the island; and wanted their release. In fact, there were some health problems among the prisoners (who now included Osman Atto, my contact from the UNITAF days, who had been snatched up in a Special Operations roundup). Eventually Aideed got his wish, and they were released.
Since the question of Aideed’s personal guilt was still far from being settled, we decided to continue our policy of keeping distant from him. For the time being, we dealt only with his lieutenants.
When we left, we made the regular round of African stops (adding Kampala, Uganda), returned briefly to Washington, and were back in Somalia by mid-November — this time, for direct talks with Aideed. A new Security Council resolution (Resolution 885), accepting Aideed’s party as legitimate, had eased tensions with
