Letter: War film omits key perspective

Monday, Feb. 11, 2002 | 8:37 a.m.

Mark Bowden, author of the best-selling book upon which the film "Black Hawk Down" was based, pointed out in a recent interview that the U.N.-commanded American attacks on Somali clan leader Aidid's supporters "had the effect of uniting the entire clan against the U.N. effort, and making all American forces targets. Here's another way of looking at it: Suppose helicopter forces from a foreign country began swooping into Dallas on a regular basis, apprehending local leaders and killing numbers of Texans on each raid. How long do you think it would be before every Texan with a weapon would be out in the streets to greet the raiding party?"

Bowden's book fleshes out this very important perspective, and presumably it could be found in the first draft of the movie's screenplay. The onscreen product, however, avoids such consideration altogether. The viewer is simply placed at a street level in a graphic, relentless recreation of the gun battle in which the enemy is an anti-UN guerilla force -- and the cavalry that comes to the rescue is led by tanks, and armored personnel carriers stamped with the United Nations' initials and operated by blue-helmeted "peacekeepers."

DOW WOERNER