The battle of Mogadishu(Question)?

[James]

Not really. The doctrine has been to use mainly forces with a small 'footprint'.

I am not an expert on the battle. I do know that our forces frequently went into situations in the past with very restrictive rules of engagement. I'm also curious to learn why you think mortars would have provided better fire support than a bunch of Little Birds armed with guns and rockets. Mortars would have required an observer on the ground in a very fluid situation. Those mortars would have required a security element. This for a raid that was to last no more than an hour?

[James]

The doctrine has been to use mainly forces with a small 'footprint'.

I'm curious about this doctrine too, especially as I served in the U.S. Military in the 1990s, and 90% of what I trained for was to fight either Iraq or North Korea.

[Piirka]

I am not an expert on the battle. I do know that our forces frequently went into situations in the past with very restrictive rules of engagement. I'm also curious to learn why you think mortars would have provided better fire support than a bunch of Little Birds armed with guns and rockets. Mortars would have required an observer on the ground in a very fluid situation. Those mortars would have required a security element. This for a raid that was to last no more than an hour?

Well, what I read about it, the assault force didn't have their m-203's and humvees didn't have any agl's for fear of increased civilian casualties. For the planners to put, say, naval gunfire and carrier air on call to a living city on an UN peace enforcement mission, would have been probably thought insane and the mission had not gotten any authorization (which would not have been bad in hindsight)...

[James]

Well, what I read about it,

I went to my basic training about a month after that battle. So, I wasn't there at all, I was just a 19 year old kid who was waiting to go to USMC boot camp. Since I wasn't there, I wouldn't think to tell someone how it was.

[Piirka]

I went to my basic training about a month after that battle. So, I wasn't there at all, I was just a 19 year old kid who was waiting to go to USMC boot camp. Since I wasn't there, I wouldn't think to tell someone how it was.

Hmm... Although I replied to your message, it wasn't in any way directed against anything you wrote. Just some musings on what I came across, while looking into the subject.

[The Dane]

The mortar's can provide firesupport when you need it fast.. and the crew doesn't have fly back to base for refuelling or rearming. And you don't need a mortarspotter to call in fire. Anyone with a map(and the knowless of where you are on that map) can call in fires.. but a mortarspotter would of course be nice to have(if the fire need adjustment).
Look how fast this crew fire their rounds in Fallujah..

Could have made a huge differens at Super 6-4's crashsite.. the two Delta snipers defending the helicopter might have been more lucky?

I know that US have used combined arms in urban enviroment back in the past. But that has mainly been after realising that the light forces holding the city needed heavy firepower support. A uparmoured Humwee with TOW misssiles can deliver a heavy punch.. But a gun that can deliver the same punch with a much higher fire rate is of course better. The US army was smart to create SBCT's.. Almost perfect for urban AOR's IMO.

[Laconian]

If you think of the operation as serving a high risk arrest warrant (which is what the mission really was) as opposed to a straight up combat raid, it answers some questions also. Additionally, I'm not sure IDF assets were even available. The US mission in Somalia was completely different than the later combat operations in Iraq. Complete different mission, complete different scope.

[Dominique]

I havn't read the book.. but just watched the movie again(which is supposed to be quite accurate).

There's one thing i'm wondering about.. where were the indirect fire(mortars especially) ?


Rapid firing 60 or 81mm could have made a huge differens in almost all the contacts. A ring of fire should have surrounded the downed Black Hawk's right from the start in such an enviroment untill back up on the scene arrived.. a 60mm can be used very close in on own forces and they are very precise.

Any toughts about that.. was it cause of the fear of collateral damage?(or lack of GPS/Maps for targeting) - In Fallujah the 60mm was used a lot, because it just took out the bad guys running around outside shooting, without doing damage to the interior and those(noncombattants) inside buildings.

We deployed batallions to Iraq without any mortars. We were depended on CAS and the British brigade's artillery, very stupid. That will never happen again.. our new 60mm and 120mm mortars have saved many Danish soldiers in Helmand. 'Every' dismounted patrol have at least one 60mm 'following' them today. Set up and ready to deliver fire very rapidly.. That's standard today in the Danish army.. and it works very well.

(I'm writing an article about indirect fire support in urban settings for a Danish magasin)

One of our training NCO's was a young Batt Boy with TF Ranger. I'll holler at him during our next drill and see what he says.

[Hellfish]

I'm curious about this doctrine too, especially as I served in the U.S. Military in the 1990s, and 90% of what I trained for was to fight either Iraq or North Korea.

In the Army, we were still training to fight a Soviet army that didn't exist. Nobody wanted to admit that we were training for a war that would never happen.

[Hellfish]

The mortar's can provide firesupport when you need it fast.. and the crew doesn't have fly back to base for refuelling or rearming. And you don't need a mortarspotter to call in fire. Anyone with a map(and the knowless of where you are on that map) can call in fires.. but a mortarspotter would of course be nice to have(if the fire need adjustment).
Look how fast this crew fire their rounds in Fallujah..

Could have made a huge differens at Super 6-4's crashsite.. the two Delta snipers defending the helicopter might have been more lucky?

I know that US have used combined arms in urban enviroment back in the past. But that has mainly been after realising that the light forces holding the city needed heavy firepower support. A uparmoured Humwee with TOW misssiles can deliver a heavy punch.. But a gun that can deliver the same punch with a much higher fire rate is of course better. The US army was smart to create SBCT's.. Almost perfect for urban AOR's IMO.

You're absolutely right, however, Mogadishu was/is not Fallujah. We had weeks, if not months, to prepare Fallujah ahead of time. We got out the vast majority of civilians, had spent time rehearsing the breaching, the advance, etc. This single raid on a single building in Mogadishu over ten years earlier can't be compared or contrasted in any meaningful way, in my opinion.

As for the snipers, I don't know that they would have been any more 'lucky' if they had mortars on call or not. I'm not even sure they knew where they were went they hit the ground, and to call in and adjust fire would have removed one of them from the trigger of their weapon for a good part of the battle, never mind the response time/TOT may not have made a difference.

There was a fire support plan. The gunships.

If you think of the operation as serving a high risk arrest warrant (which is what the mission really was) as opposed to a straight up combat raid, it answers some questions also. Additionally, I'm not sure IDF assets were even available. The US mission in Somalia was completely different than the later combat operations in Iraq. Complete different mission, complete different scope.

Exactly.

[maumau]

sorry i had to enquire this from you guys i am just an amature military enthusiast but i just want to ask this how effective will motar be in an urban setting when a guy is stopping your convoy by taking shots at you from second floor of a seventh storey building?

[James]

The mortar's can provide firesupport when you need it fast.. and the crew doesn't have fly back to base for refuelling or rearming. And you don't need a mortarspotter to call in fire. Anyone with a map(and the knowless of where you are on that map) can call in fires.. but a mortarspotter would of course be nice to have(if the fire need adjustment).

If the troops on the gun line can't see what they're shooting at, you really should have a spotter, especially in environments with a lot of civilians. You might recall too that navigation was somewhat difficult in Mogadishu, with troop leaders frequently taking directions from aviation.

Look how fast this crew fire their rounds in Fallujah..

That's awesome. I don't know why you keep referencing Fallujah, it had very little in common with the raid in Mogadishu.

Could have made a huge differens at Super 6-4's crashsite.. the two Delta snipers defending the helicopter might have been more lucky?

How? I think the only guys on the ground who knew exactly where that Crash site was was the crew and the two snipers. You can't provide effective fire support if you lack knowledge of the location of both friendly and enemy units. Because of the limited distance one can often see in an urban environment, a 40mm grenade launcher is, in my opinion, a preferable choice.

I know that US have used combined arms in urban enviroment back in the past. But that has mainly been after realising that the light forces holding the city needed heavy firepower support. A uparmoured Humwee with TOW misssiles can deliver a heavy punch.. But a gun that can deliver the same punch with a much higher fire rate is of course better. The US army was smart to create SBCT's.. Almost perfect for urban AOR's IMO.

Light forces holding the city? The U.S. Army made extensive use of combined arms assaults in both the Pacific and Europe during WWII. By combined, I mean air support including everything up to heavy bombers (more frequently ground attack fighters), extensive use of artillery, armor and infantry.

I don't understand the comparison between a TOW and a mortar, they were designed for two entirely different purposes.

[Ngati Tumatauenga]

Anyone with a map(and the knowless of where you are on that map) can call in fires..

TF Ranger couldn't guide a convoy to the second crash site even with several surveillance assets stacked overhead. Several reasons for that, but one of the main ones was there WAS NO ACCURATE MAPPING available.

Having spent 6 months patrolling them, I can tell you that the streets of Mogadishu aren't laid out in a nice neat western european manner.

but a mortarspotter would of course be nice to have(if the fire need adjustment).

You dont fire any indirect weapon without the means to adjust. That's just stupid.

Could have made a huge differens at Super 6-4's crashsite.. the two Delta snipers defending the helicopter might have been more lucky?

Coulda, woulda, shoulda. I find your lines of reasoning about what you think the situation should have been, based on your complete lack of knowledge and experience, and in particular equating Shugart and Gordon's fate to "luck" offensive.

I suggest you stay away from making definative, generalised and sweeping statements about situations, times and places that you weren't actually involved in.

[HOG0317]

Hmm Yeah.. That's of course right. Didn't think about that.. Thanks.

It's easy to point fingers and saying "You should have done this and that instead".. But when the first bird went down they should have haulted the air assault style and organized a robust armoured force with lots of mortars in support to get the guys out. Hmm..

Anyone got good info on airsupport during the assault on Fallujah??? Thanks.

I went to Falluja after the 2nd push. I attended an Air support / cas class prior. For the assault Air was stacked in several layers, in a complex fire support plan. It was massively coordinated! The powerpoints were impressive... Use of Mortars at unit level according to briefing by Snipers at camp pendleton stated that mortars worked closely with Snipers and FOs. alot of the Air was above the maximum ordinate of the rounds thus it was free fire for mortars as long as you didnt lay on the increments and kept range close.
In mogadishu there was not much armor avail to use ( fall 1994)... Hell When I was there we had 8 hummers 4 of which where armored and a Duece and a half!. The Aussie SAS in the airport had 2 m113 and some pick up trucks... The nigerians had some armored cars and actually lost several to ambush outside the city.. This was Post Blackhawk down, and Fall of 1994. Our platoon had a 60 mm mortar but, it was only for use in our final defensive plan for our post.

Cheers

[LineDoggie]

Some things that need considering when using mortars in Urban environments like Mogadishu. Bare with me as its been a few years since I normally would have known these things and I was Limited in My dealings with the 11C community.

A Light, Airborne or Ranger company only has 2 M224 60mm Mortars in inventory and a 6 man section manning them under a SSG..
Danger Close is 200M from the bursting sheaf(typically linear) and the sustained rate of fire is only 20 RPM
IIRC there is no 81mm section at Bn Level in the Ranger Bn of 1993 timeframe, so the Bn is lmiited to 6 M224 total

Positioning- Where to emplace them. Not on rooftops, not on concrete directly, not inside buildings due to overpressure and weakened/damaged roofs/floors
Building Masking- heights of buildings may mask ability to hit intended targets
Magnetic inteference with compasses and aiming circle
Ammunition load. the company section does not carry itself enough ammuntion for more than an initial fire mission in light scenarios. Those rounds would be cross loaded throughout the company and need collecting at the SBF before the Assault elements LD.
the 60mm rounds ability to pentrate building roofs Not sure how good it would be while trying to keep mobs at Bay in tiny crowded streets and away from the helo.

Definite need of an experienced FO with eyes on to adjust fires.