Blackhawk Down.

Not sure if this has been discussed already but I thought I would post my thoughts on it.

Just saw it today. WOW – what a mess of a mission! Great film, brilliant direction by Ridley Scott of course. Top production again by Bruckheimer, to be expected.

Quick comments

The SNA were armed to the F&%#ing teeth, RPGs all over the place, mortars and even a 105mm Recoiless gun, and .50 cals on just about every car and truck in the city. Sh#t!!

The troops on the ground definitely did not get all the air support they needed, but the fear of losing another chopper was very much prevalent in the minds of the commanders.

The night time rescue/extraction was well done in the film, plenty of Pakistanis and lots of (reluctant – but the Malays were mentioned) armour. The roof tops around crash site II were running wild with SNA at night, and the AH-6Js did well to kill plenty with gun and rocket runs, BUT a couple of fully night equipped and capable AH-1s or even AH-64s would have had a field day around that site around the clock.

The air suppport in the form of mini-gun armed MH-60s and 2.75in rocket and mini-gun armed AH-6Js was adequate initially, but there just was not enough of them deployed in hit-and-run attacks. The running attacks would have prevented RPG fire from been effective, but the mini-guns ran dry so fast. More AH-6Js should have been deployed in air support roles after the first MH-60 went down.

They had on site airborne C2 and comms seemed for the most part to be effective and intact. More air support would have helped indeed.

Dropping the Delta snipers on crash site II was a bad call. Ok, they went in to check for survivors but had no way out. Stupid waste of life, as they were simply over-whelmed by too many militia.

I am surprised that the main truck-in-tow captive convoy even got out in the end, they copped a HAMMERING to say the least.

All up top flick, very realistic, very gory, and yes plenty of blood, my rather squeemish girlfriend didn’t find it too appealing though.:(

I enjoyed it.:)

I give it 8.5/10.

Regards, Glenn.

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