Somalia on $5 a Day

“Stanton’s battalion was the first army unit in Somalia in 1992 and it did one hell of a job accomplishing a difficult mission where there wasn’t a template. I had the pleasure of tagging along with his unit and saw first-hand how its leaders dealt with and solved problems. . . . A first-rate book and a must read. All professional soldier-leaders should carry Stanton’s book in their rucksacks.”—DAVID H. HACKWORTH Author of About Face and Hazardous DutyA country torn by seemingly endless war, a people tormented and victimized by relentless banditry-—into this land of warlords came the soldiers of the army’s elite 10th Mountain Division. They were strangers in a strange land sent to restore hope to this cauldron of misery and despair. The Pentagon deemed it a hostile fire zone thereby earning each soldier a monthly bonus of $150— Somalia on $5.00 a day. Major Stanton and the infantrymen of Task Force 2-87 found themselves in unfamiliar surroundings, trying to accomplish a vague and constantly changing mission where knowing the good guys from the bad guys was nearly impossible. When the focus of Restore Hope changed from limited famine relief to nation building, the men found themselves in armed clashes with Somali warlords. In this exciting and often humorous memoir, Stanton relates the mounting frustrations experienced by the U.S. soldiers, futility that culminated in the infamous chaos on the streets of Mogadishu.