The Sheila Variations

The Books: "Black Hawk Down: A Story Of Modern War" (Mark Bowden)

And here is my next excerpt of the day from my library.

I'm finished alphabetically with all of the books on the "history" shelves - at least with the ones I've read. Next I have a shelf where I keep hard-covers, which don't fit on the smaller higher shelves.

Next book on the shelf is Black Hawk Down, by Mark Bowden.

Hands down, one of the best nonfiction books I've ever read. From the first page to the last, I couldn't put it down. It's horrific - you are on the streets with those guys, you live their experience with them. It's not poetically written, it doesn't linger in any one place too long - and that's exactly right - because that's what those guys experienced. And yet - there's still enough time to get to know all of these people by name, just a couple of details here and there ... It's so vivid, so awful - I can't say enough good stuff about this book. I saw Mark Bowden on Book Notes, when the book first came out - and liked him so much. I loved his whole story - long-time reporter at The Philadelphia Inquirer - he wasn't an international dude, he wasn't a foreign correspondent - nothing like that. But the whole debacle in Somalia happened, and he thought: "That'll make a great book. I wonder what the ins and outs of that whole thing were." Then he waited for the book to come out. Because it HAD to be a book, right? Someone HAD to be on the story, right? Obviously it wouldn't be by HIM because - he didn't have that kind of journalistic experience - but it NEEDED to be a book, and he just assumed that "someone" out there would be "on it". Years went by and no book came out. Bowden then realized: All right. No one's writing the story of what happened in Somalia - for some bizarre reason - so ... I guess I'll do it. He had no access to the military - it was a challenge for him to get "in there" - but eventually, one connection led to another led to another - until he had the full cooperation of everyone involved. It's just an amazing accomplishment.

Fantastic book. A reading experience I'll never forget.

Here's an excerpt.

From Black Hawk Down, by Mark Bowden.

In short order, Howe and his Delta team were in front of the force. Howe saw bullets skipping off the dirt and skimming down the walls, chipping the concrete. He was way past worrying about staying in formation. The street was a kill zone. Survival meant moving like your hair was on fire. It was time to lead by example. The goal was to punch through to the downed helicopter, and every second mattered. If they failed to link up, then there would be two weak forces instead of a single strong one. Two perimeters to defend instead of one. So they moved quickly but also smartly. As Howe moved he thought about making every one of his shots count, and keeping his back to a wall at all times. There were in a 360-degree battlefield, so keeping a wall behind him meant one angle he couldn't be shot from. At each crossroads he and his team would pause, watch, and listen. Were bullets hitting walls? Bouncing off the streets? Were the shots going left to right or right to left? Every bit of experience and practical knowledge was useful now for staying alive. Were they machine-gun bullets or AKs? An AK only has twenty-five to thirty rounds in a magazine, so if you waited for the lull, Sammy would be reloading when you ran. The most important thing was to keep moving. One of the hardest things in the world to hit is a moving target.

He and his team had spent years training with each other, had fought together in Panama and other places, and moved with confidence and authority. Howe felt that they were the perfect soldiers for this situation. They'd learned to filter out the confusion, put up a mental curtain. The only information that came fully through was the most critical at that moment. Howe could ignore the pop of a rifle or the snap of a nearby round. It was usually just somebody shooting airballs. It would take chips flying from a wall near him to make him react. As they moved down the street it was one fluid process -- scan for threats, find a safe place to go next, shoot, move, scan for t hreats ... The key was to keep moving. With the volume of fire on these streets, to stop meant to die. The greatest danger was in getting pinned down.

The Rangers followed as well as they could, leapfrogging across the intersections. Stebbins and 60-gunner Private Brian Heard kept up with them, reassured just to be close to the D-boys. These guys knkew how to stay alive. Stebbins kept telling himself, This is dangerous, but we'll make it. It's okay. At the intersections he would take a knee and shoot while the man in front of him ran. Then the man behind him would tap his shoulder and he would take off, just closing his eyes and praying and running for all he was worth,

Sergeant Goodale, who had once bragged to his mother how eager he was for combat, felt terrified. He was waiting for his turn to sprint across a street when one of the D-boys tapped him on the shoulder. Goodale recognized him: it was the short stocky one, Earl, Sergeant First Class Earl Fillmore, a good guy. Fillmore must have seen how scared Goodale looked.

"You okay?" he asked.

"I'm okay."

Fillmore winked at him and said, "It's all right. We're coming out of this thing, man."

It calmed Goodale. He believed Fillmore.

By the time they were three blocks over, Howe's team was way out front. With them were Stebbins, Heard, Goodale, Perino, Corporal Jamie Smith, and a few other Rangers. They turned left onto Marehan Road, where the alley ended. The wide dirt road sloped uphill slightly and then downhill for several blocks, so when they made the turn they were just shy of the crest of a hill. Downhill to the south they could see Sammies running every which way. Over the crest of the hill to the north, Howe saw signal smoke from what must have been the crash. They were about two hundred yards away.

There was a blizzard of fire at that intersection. Automatic rifle fire and RPGs from all directions. Howe felt the force was in peril of getting stuck and cut to ribbons. He shouted back down the street to Captain Miller, "Follow me!" and plunged straight down the left side. Stebbins and several other Rangers followed. Perino, Goodale, Smith, and some others followed Hooten's Delta team across the street and started down the right wall. Immediately behind them was Sergeant First Class John Boswell's Delta team.

An RPG exploded on the wall near Howe and his men. Howe felt the wallop of pressure in his ears and chest and dropped to one knee. One of his men had been hit on the left side with a small piece of shrapnel. Howe abruptly kicked in the door to a one-room house on his left. He and his team had learned to move like they owned the world. Every house was their house. If they needed shelter, they kicked in a door. Anyone who threatened them would be killed. It was that simple. No one was inside. They caught their breath and reloaded their weapons. Running with all that gear was exhausting. The body armor was like wearing a wet suit. They were sweating profusely and breathing heavily. Howe drew his knife and cut away the back of his buddy's shirt to check the wound. There was a small hole in the man's back with about a two-inch swollen, bruised ring around it. There was almost no blood. The swelling had closed the hole.

"You're good to go," Howe told him, and they were out the door and moving again.

Posted by sheila