CRANFIELD UNIVERSITY DAREN BOWYER JUST WAR DOCTRINE

Administration reluctantly acceded instead to calls from the American commander of
UNOSOM for an increase in force levels, including deployment of a Delta Force special
operations unit. During a combined Delta Force/US Rangers operation intended to
capture Aideed, two Black Hawk helicopters were shot down by Somalis using surface-
to-air missiles. The ensuing rescue mission of the downed airmen left dead eighteen US
soldiers, a Malaysian and a Moroccan (and as noted above a much higher but
undetermined number of Somalis both innocent and not).
The result in Washington was a hardening of attitude of those in Congress already
opposed to the intervention and pressuring the Administration to withdraw. A bill
sponsored by Senator Robert Byrd, calling for a withdrawal of US troops by the
following January, was only narrowly defeated and the pressure was sufficient to lead
President Clinton to announce a full withdrawal by March. Furthermore, the incident
further hardened congressional attitudes against the UN and rendered vain any hope of
the US meeting its arrears to the Peacekeeping fund.
The following year a similar situation was to face Belgium with regard to its
peacekeepers in Rwanda. In April a tense peace dissolved into fierce fighting. Hutu
extremists turned first upon moderate Hutus including Prime Minister Agathe
Uwilingiyimana who was murdered along with ten Belgian soldiers from UNAMIR
who attempted to protect her. The Belgians were tortured before death and their bodies
subsequently mutilated, adding to the sense of outrage in Belgium. 70 Notwithstanding
the impassioned pleas from UN Secretary General Boutros-Ghali, the Belgian
government decided instantly on a complete withdrawal of their troops:
Belgium was inflicted with “the American Syndrome”: pull out at the first
encounter with serious trouble. I argued against a Belgian pull out, but if they
were determined to leave, I asked that they at least leave their heavy weapons
behind so that they could be used by the remaining UN troops, which otherwise
would be in a very weakened position. …But the Belgian troops took all their
arms with them as they went…. 71
The Belgian withdrawal, much as the Secretary General had feared and warned, led,
effectively, to the collapse of the mission:
Caution ruled. With the important exception of Ghana, governments ordered
their troops to protect themselves first of all, even if that meant standing by and
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