This is Jocko podcast number 465 with Echo Charles and me Jocko Willink. Good evening.

Good evening.

As we advanced, each one of us could see that all around us, the Somalis were coming.

Every second, resistance and enemy fire began to increase.

The cracks of Somali rifle fire were constant now, overhead and around us.

The Somalis were massing, and we could see the crowds still blocks away, but beginning to surge towards us.

Adid's militiamen aggressively moved through the alleys around us and along the walls firing and rapidly closing.

They were reinforced by men and boys from the neighborhoods joining in and carrying their

AK-47 rifles.

Rushing forward through the increasing fire, the assault force quickly covered two blocks,

then turned left.

We headed north toward the crash site, still a few hundred meters away and beyond our vision, but directly ahead.

As we turned the corner and began to move north, we became a wash in combat. Bullets zipped along the walls around us and cracked incessantly overhead.

Dust rose as Somali gunmen fired and ducked behind cover or were cut down by the Americans. Now as the firefight began to rage, there was no hesitation over the rules of engagement.

At the same time that we closed with the attacking Somalis our column remained

spread back toward the target building it bogged down to a stop when the fight erupted in earnest

all around us the Rangers and operators in the assault force were taking cover firing and

maneuvering against the numerous attacking Somalis,

streaming into the streets.

And that right there is an excerpt from a book called With My Shield,

an Army Ranger in Somalia,

written by retired Army Lieutenant Colonel James Lechner.

...