Battle Ready (2004)

by Tom - Nf - Commanders Clancy

  In a few days, it would be decided whether the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force (I MEF) or the Army's 18th Airborne Corps would lead the operation. Even though he was in the dark about the operation's actual nature, Zinni knew his EUCOM experiences in joint and humanitarian operations would come in very handy in the planning if I MEF got the call. He immediately went to his boss, Lieutenant General Chuck Krulak,56 to offer his services.

  Somewhat to Zinni's surprise, Krulak was enthusiastic. "Hey, listen," he said, "I don't want the operational force to look at Quantico as a drain. I want them to see us as an organization that's there for them. We look out for them; we support them. So if we've got expertise, I want to offer it up."

  Krulak called General Carl Mundy, who had replaced General Gray as commandant, and made the offer. General Mundy, in turn, called the commanding general of I MEF, Lieutenant General Bob Johnston. (Zinni had known Johnston for years, had served under him in Okinawa, and had great respect for him.)

  While these discussions were taking place, Zinni was on his way to Fort Leavenworth for a conference. When he arrived, he had a call from Krulak. "I MEF has been chosen for the mission," Krulak told him, "and General Johnston wants you to take part in it. Get back to Quantico as soon as you can, then call Bob Johnston for further instructions."

  "The best possible news!" Zinni thought. The news soon got better.

  Back at Quantico, he called Lieutenant General Johnston, still thinking that Johnston would want him primarily for the initial planning. What he heard then just about knocked him over: The commandant had recommended him for chief of staff of the Joint Task Force (JTF) that would be formed around the core of the I MEF staff.57 Since this meant he would be going to Somalia in a leading operational role, he was ecstatic.

  But it turned out that Johnston had a better idea. He wanted Zinni to be the director of operations. Even though the chief of staff was the senior position, he felt strongly that this operation was going to be so challenging and complicated that he wanted someone with Zinni's wealth of operational experience, both in combat and in humanitarian missions, to run it. The practicalities of integrating all the pieces of this mission meant that the chief of staff was going to have to back up the chief of operations (in planning and logistics and the like). Operations was where all the action was going to take place.

  To Zinni, this was great news. "I don't care about seniority," he told Johnston. "I want the operations job."

  The next day he packed his bags, went up to Washington, and joined the CENTCOM58 CINC, General Joe Hoar, for the flight to Hoar's headquarters in Tampa. There they linked up with General Johnston and got a briefing on the operation. Afterward, Zinni was to accompany Johnston back to his headquarters at Camp Pendleton, California, for a week of planning. They were to deploy to Somalia on December 10.

  The plane ride from Washington to Tampa proved to be invaluable. Zinni had known Joe Hoar from his first days in Vietnam (he had first met Hoar in the Rung Sat), and the two had remained friends ever since. Hoar was a savvy operator who had earned a tremendous reputation as the CENTCOM commander. For the duration of the three-hour flight, the two men went over the mission.

  Zinni had recommendations based on his recent experiences: techniques, tactics, and organizations (like UNHCR) they'd need to employ if they were dealing with refugees or displaced persons; using Civil Affairs to set up a Civil-Military Operations Center (CMOC) like the one created in Operation Provide Comfort to connect with the NGOs and the UN; using psychological operations (such as avoiding military terminology in order to better convey the humanitarian message).

  Hoar listened carefully to Zinni's ideas--most of them totally new to him: Refugees? The third world? NGOs? UN? . . . another universe! After he'd taken them in, he put his arm around Zinni--he's a large, bearish man--and said: "I'm glad I found you. You're the guy we need out there. This is going to be great."

  At CENTCOM headquarters, Hoar, Johnston, Zinni, and the staff went over the situation in Somalia and the planning so far.

  The Somali people occupy the actual "Horn" of Africa, and are the majorityin northern Kenya, Djibouti, and the now Ethiopian province of Ogaden. They are a clan-based society, with five major clans and numerous subclans, unified in language and ethnic identity, separate in customs, lineage, and history. Somalia became a nation in 1960, following a period as an Italian and British colonial possession and a post-World War Two UN mandate. A weak, fractious postmandate government lasted for nine years, but collapsed in 1969 when the first President was assassinated and a military dictator, Siad Barre, took over. Barre's rule began well enough for the country, though his early alliance with the Soviets did not sit well with the West. It paid many of his bills, however, and brought in modern weapons.

  The good times ended in 1977 when Barre attacked Ethiopia to regain Ogaden. This was a tragic miscalculation--not least because Ethiopia was itself a Soviet client state. The Soviets, forced to choose, tilted toward Ethiopia; and the disastrous war and defeat (in 1978) that followed pitched Somalia into a steep decline.

  Barre switched sides from the Soviets to the West, and a period of apparent progress followed--only to be eaten up by corruption, and by the increasing repression of clans other than Siad Barre's own Marehan. As the repression grew to violent assault and terror, the Siad Barre government rotted from within. The clans fought back, and the nation drifted into civil war. (The conflict started in 1988, but only became general in 1990.)

  Civil war devastated the country. It was a nation awash in Soviet and Western weapons. Most were ultimately used to kill Somalis. Hundreds of thousands of refugees left the country; hundreds of thousands more were killed in the fighting, or died of starvation and disease. By 1992, half the children born since 1987, and twenty-five percent of the country's children overall, had perished. Institutions of government had vanished. Factional feuding among clans only added to the misery.

  Millions were still at serious risk.

  Siad Barre was driven from power in 1990, but kept fighting in southern Somalia near the border with Kenya, in what was called "the Triangle of Death"--the area between the towns of Baidoa and Bardera, in the interior, and Kismayo, on the coast. Faction leaders controlling the various regions fell to fighting each other. The strongest of these was General Mohammed Farrah Aideed59 of the Hawiye clan . . . but there were many others.

  In January 1991, Mogadishu, the capital, was divided between Aideed and the businessman, politician, and local warlord Ali Mahdi Mohamed (previously allies against Siad Barre), after Ali Mahdi turned against Aideed. This was a not totally surprising turnaround. Both were members of the Hawiye clan (yet from different subclans: Aideed was a Habr Gidr and Ali Mahdi was an Abgal; significant differences in Somalia's fractious clan system), and both were also leaders of the same political faction, the United Somali Congress (USC)--but in Somalia, betrayal is the mother's milk of politics.

  That same month, the U.S. Embassy in Mogadishu was evacuated in a last-minute, dramatic rescue by Marine helicopters launched from amphibious ships participating in Operation Desert Shield.

  For several months, the two sides faced off against each other, Aideed in the southern parts of the city and Ali Mahdi in his base in the city's north. Aideed, who was the more experienced and effective military commander and had the benefit of better and heavier weapons (taken from Siad Barre's warehouses), held the stronger position; but fighting between the two warlords was only sporadic. Law and order completely broke down in the city; armed gangs roamed everywhere. No one could control them. Serious fighting finally broke out in September 1991 and raged for several months, leaving little of value intact in Mogadishu.

  In May 1992, Aideed finally defeated Barre, who escaped to Kenya, and later found exile in Nigeria. Aideed had proved to be a formidable commander, with powerful credentials to lead his country. He had--as he saw it--liberated Somalia from the dictator Siad Barre, a triumph that entitledhim to take Barre's place as the national leader.
Other faction leaders saw things very differently; and fighting continued. This worsened the famine and destruction throughout the southern part of the country, especially in the Triangle of Death. (The northern provinces, at the actual Horn of Africa, were relatively unaffected and in effect have operated as a more or less independent state.)

  In 1992, the UN started a humanitarian operation called UNOSOM (UN Operations Somalia), which proved to be powerless and ineffective--too weak to put down the violence . . . or even to provide security for the relief workers. Looting prevented most UN and NGO food and relief supplies from reaching the intended beneficiaries.

  In late August of that year, the U.S. also started a humanitarian operation, called "Provide Relief," that airlifted food and medical supplies from Kenya to remote sites in Somalia. Provide Relief aircraft flew nearly 2,500 missions and delivered more than 28,000 metric tons to airfields in southern Somalia. The operation saved lives, but an airlift could not carry nearly enough food and medicine to seriously ease the famine and disease.60

  By the fall of 1992, Somalia was a lawless, devastated land ruled by fifteen warlords with their militias and by roving gangs of armed bandits. These traveled around in "technicals," pickup trucks with crew-served weapons mounted on their beds. (They got their name from the relief agencies who had hired out the gangs for protection and charged it off to "technical assistance.") The relief agencies and NGOs were subject to extortion, pillage, threats, and even murder, sometimes by the very guards they hired.

  By November, the chaos and violence in Somalia had made some kind of international action inevitable. After much discussion within the Bush administration and the UN, it was decided that a large military force was needed (modeled after the recent Desert Shield/Desert Storm coalition against Iraq), consisting of at least two American divisions, supplemented by other U.S. and foreign forces. This force would operate with UN approval (under Chapter VII of the UN Charter, authorizing peace enforcementusing "all necessary means" including deadly force), but it would not be a UN-commanded operation. The operation was called "Restore Hope."

  The American concept for Restore Hope foresaw the quick establishment of security on the ground, allowing the relief agencies and NGOs to operate freely, followed by a rapid transition to a UN-led peacekeeping operation (though the U.S. expected to continue to supply logistics and support services and a quick reaction force). But there was to be no attempt to disarm the warlords or seriously alter the political landscape.

  However, the UN Secretary-General, Boutros Boutros-Ghali, had different expectations. In his view, Restore Hope's limited time frame and scope would not provide enough security, disarmament, or political change to allow the UN to take responsibility for nation building in Somalia. He wanted the U.S. to embark on a full-scale nationwide disarmament program before there could be any transition to UN peacekeepers.

  This ambiguity between the U.S. and the UN understanding of what had to be done came to haunt both the U.S. Restore Hope operation and its UN successor, which came to be called UNOSOM II.

  THE FORCE designed to bring initial order to Somalia's chaos was General Johnston's JTF:

  The Marine piece would consist of a Marine Air Ground Task Force, centering on the 1st Marine Division, with logistics and air components. The Army had designated the 10th Mountain Division as their part. The Navy was going to bring in maritime preposition ships and a carrier; and naval P-3 aircraft, flying out of Djibouti, would also be available. The Air Force brought in C-130s and a number of other aircraft to augment Marine Corps air. There were also special operations components.

  General Hoar was additionally looking at a coalition involvement that would include participation from African, Gulf region, and Western countries. (He called this "a 3-3-1 Strategy.") Because Somalia was both an African and an Islamic country, it was politically important for CENTCOM to be seen in Africa and in the Islamic world as encouraging their involvement. He also wanted one other Western force as a leavening factor; and the Canadians had already committed to sending a brigade. (Later, the numbers of other participating countries exploded. By the end of the operation, there were twenty-six of them.)

  Once the various pieces of the force had arrived in Somalia, they had to be fused together. The CENTCOM and I MEF staffs had already put in much work on that, as well as the more obvious issues of deployment, logistics support, and bases (General Hoar wanted to use regional bases in Kenya and Djibouti as support bases, for example). Sequencing in a large force into the Horn of Africa's slender infrastructure was not going to be easy.

  The biggest problem faced by the planners, however, was that they didn't yet understand exactly what had to be done once the forces were on the ground. This was an unusual mission, and few of them really understood its nature. Like General Hoar, they'd had no experience dealing with NGOs and the UN, much less bringing order to a failed third world nation . . . and saving lives there. Though shooting, killing, and destruction were seen as inevitable, this was in no way a typical combat mission. They were groping badly trying to comprehend it.

  Here Zinni brought his greatest contribution.

  After a day at CENTCOM headquarters, Zinni and the rest of the I MEF staff left for Camp Pendleton. By then, he had a basic understanding of the situation in Somalia and the mission they'd be mounting to deal with it. Yet, at the same time, the situation on the ground was breaking fast, and there was no clear picture of what was actually happening there or what had to be done.

  The following week was spent on round-the-clock frantic planning and coordination.

  Zinni, Johnston, and key members of their team took off on a C-141 for Somalia on the ninth of December. A Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU) had meanwhile been positioned off Mogadishu in amphibious ships and would land to secure the port, airfield, and U.S. Embassy that day. The command team's C-141 landed on the tenth.

  MOGADISHU

  Tony Zinni:

  A few hours out of the Mogadishu airport, we received a call that the French government had decided to participate in the operation and had dispatched a general to Mogadishu from Djibouti, where there was a French base; but the French government had insisted that their general be the first on the ground. Bob Johnston's reply was, "Bullshit"; and, as the coalition commander, he ordered the French to stand off as we landed. They complied.

  This little show of hauteur had nothing to do with the French military, who were superb troops (and often suffered for their government's arrogance). I knew from operations like Provide Comfort that they were worth their weight in gold on the ground and we welcomed their participation, despite the initial flap. They did not let us down.

  It was hot when we landed (Mogadishu is not far from the equator); and the airport was a wreck, with old Soviet MiGs and other wreckage trashed and in piles off to the side, but Marines from the MEU were already in positions to defend it. We were met by the MEU commander, Greg Newbold,61 who gave us a quick brief on the situation:

  During the night before the MEU's landing, he reported, he had sent in SEALs to recon; somebody had somehow got wind of it and reported this to the Western press who were hanging out in Mogadishu. They came running down to the beach with their klieg lights and cameras for a brilliant media welcome to the SEALs as they swam in. It was a very confused--and later very notorious--moment. (It further convinced me we needed to get a better handle on what was going on here.)

  Though Aideed had promised that the Marines would have no trouble during their landing (the airport and port were in southern Mogadishu--Aideed territory), Newbold took no chances.62 He immediately seized the port and air- field and put out security, pushing out looters and vagrants, then flew up to the abandoned U.S. Embassy compound and seized it.

  We came in right behind them, and we immediately began the inflow of forces. Troops would soon be flying into the airfield, marrying up with prepositioned equipment, now being off-loaded. Other units would quickly follow. The Canadian ships were on the way. We expected to s
pend our next days setting up the command post, receiving troops to rapidly begin operations, and coordinating with the other efforts on the ground.

  After the brief from Newbold, we moved to helicopters to fly the short distance to the U.S. Embassy compound. The sights from the helo as we flew over the city were overwhelming. The place was devastated . . . like Stalingrad after the battle. The people we could see seemed to be mostly combing through the ruins, searching for food or anything else of value.

  As we touched down at the embassy compound, the devastation became more immediate. The effects of the destruction and wanton looting of the buildings and grounds were everywhere. For now, the Marines had set up a hasty security perimeter around the compound, and were in the process of clearing out dead bodies and debris. A few refugees who had taken up residence were also being removed. The embassy itself was completely gutted. The rooms were blackened from fires and full of trash and human waste. Even the electrical wiring and granite floor tiles had been torn out; every window was broken. Though our troops were hard at work clearing the mess, we knew it would be a long, hard task to get this place ready for operations.

  We actually had other alternatives. The UN headquarters, for instance, was in a posh, intact housing compound; and one like it had been offered to Bob Johnston, but he had declined. It was our embassy--and a symbol of U.S. determination to reclaim its property.

  He also did not believe in special frills or comforts for the command element; we ate MREs like the troops and were the last to receive service facilities such as shower units.

  As I curled up the first night on the concrete floor of the room where I was sleeping, I wondered how this country could have fallen into such chaos and self-destruction. We faced a daunting task. The infrastructure was either destroyed or else practically unusable. It would take a major engineering effort to improve the roads, airfields, ports, and storage areas--not to mention electrical and water systems. The crude hospitals in Mogadishu were treating forty-five to fifty gunshot wounds on average per day; but these numbers sometimes reached one hundred fifty.