Eyewitness Report by Thomas Di Tomasso

Thomas Di Tomasso, one of the Rangers involved in the battle of Mogadishu, has written an account of what happened.  He describes the crowds, which vastly outnumbered the trapped Rangers, as follows:

"There were combatants mixed in the crowds of non-combatants. Women and children were screaming and running at us from all directions. Some of them had weapons, and some did not. The weapons ranged from machine guns to small knives and machetes.

"Some men were standing near the corners of the buildings; they looked like they were non-combatants, just observing the action. Unknown to us, another man, hiding around the corner, would reload a weapon and hand it to the man that was in sight. The man at the corner would fire the weapon as fast as he could, hand it back to the loader, and just smile and wave his hands at us.

"Women would walk in front of the men, acting as humanshields. The man would fire his weapon from behind and under thearmpits of the woman as they both walked towards us. The soldiers did not know what to do at first. Some soldiers yelled across the streets at me, asking what to do.

"Small children had weapons. Sometimes, they were more of a threat because they had no fear..."

Credits

From Battle of the Black Sea, Bravo Company, 3rd Ranger Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment,  3-4 October 1993, by Thomas Di Tomasso.  U.S. Army Monograph,  IOAC 4-94. 

Courtesy, Donovan Research Library, Digitized Monograph Collections - U.S. Army Infantry web site.