Marine’s Killing Leaves Comrades Angry, Worried

Marine Pvt. Robert Lowery knelt in the dark of a sandbagged bunker here Wednesday night, gripping a machine gun and thinking how much more dangerous this city had become in the 24 hours since his best friend was killed by a Somali sniper.

“We came over here to help these people. This is a humanitarian mission. And now they’re taking shots at us,” said Lowery, 23, of Panama City, Fla. “It can’t help but make you angry.

“My friend and I got through the Gulf War, on the front lines,” Lowery added as he guarded the U.S. Embassy compound. “And now his life has been taken unnecessarily. I can’t help but feel he died in vain.”

The thousands of young American men and women who arrived here five weeks ago to escort food to starving Somalis knew their mission carried risks. But Wednesday, after the first two uniformed U.S. soldiers had been shot, one fatally, the risks seemed to soar.

Pfc. Domingo Arroyo, 21, of Elizabeth, N.J., was shot in the head and killed Tuesday night when Somali gunmen opened fire on an 11-person foot patrol through a Mogadishu neighborhood. In a fierce firefight, the Marines returned fire. Arroyo’s body was found later on the street.

Then, during a foot patrol Wednesday, another Somali sniper shot a Navy corpsman in the shoulder. The corpsman was listed in stable condition.

Arroyo was from the Marine unit based at Twenty-nine Palms, Calif. He and Lowery had enlisted at the same time almost four years ago, and both were looking forward to being discharged in March. Arroyo had hopes of going to college.

“He was someone you could talk with, an ideal friend,” Lowery remembered. “He would give anything to you. If he had it, you had it. He was just all-around good people.”

Military officials said the two casualties would not deter them from the recent decision to step up patrols through this capital of 1 million and begin restoring security by wholesale confiscation of weapons.

“We believe the procedures we’re following are proper, and we still intend to reduce the number of weapons in Mogadishu,” said Col. Michael W. Hagee, commanding officer of the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit in Somalia. Asked if the casualties indicated an orchestrated escalation of attacks on troops, he said: “I don’t think, based on a couple of incidents, that we can make any predictions about that.”

Hagee said the number of guns on the streets has dropped dramatically since the force, now numbering 23,000 Americans and 10,000 other troops, arrived in Somalia and began escorting food convoys.

“But, I’m not going to stand up here and tell you Mogadishu isn’t dangerous, because it is,” he added.

On Wednesday, Marines discovered 15 bunkers filled with “a great deal” of ammunition in northeastern Mogadishu, Hagee said. And a patrol investigating a suspected weapons cache in the city was confronted by an armed Somali, who was killed.

Many relief officials and Somalis worried that the killing of a Marine would increase tension in the city, embolden snipers and perhaps trigger a precipitous increase in attacks on soldiers.

“The word is likely to spread, and people will realize that a sniper can hit one of these soldiers,” said John Marks, a U.N. analyst with wide experience in Somalia. “It’s going to happen again, just because this society is going through such an intense period of upheaval.”

The mood among Marines and other troops in Somalia changed overnight Wednesday. Some had been shot at earlier, and at least a dozen armed Somalis have been killed by American troops, but many Americans now consider the environment more hostile than ever before. And they weren’t looking forward to their next venture into the city’s streets.

“It’s going to change a whole lot from this day forward,” said Cpl. Quanta Perry, 23, of Augusta, Ga., a close friend of Arroyo’s. “When I heard the news, I could have sat up here and shot every Somali I saw. Now I realize I have to control that. But I’m more aware.”

Added Lowery: “Before this happened, I had a big interest in the people here and the culture here. But I’m going to be a little more leery about my conversations with (Somalis) now. You never know which one of them wants to kill you.”

When Lowery and Perry learned of their friend’s death Wednesday morning, they could not believe it. The company sergeant was so worried about Perry’s state of mind that he briefly took the weapon from the corporal’s hands and suggested he take a walk. Instead, Perry leaned against a wall and sobbed.

Even now, as they watched the shadowy figures of Somalis walk past the embassy gate in the darkness, Lowery and Perry couldn’t hide their anger.

“I was just mad at the whole country,” Lowery said. “None of this should have happened. These bandits. . . .”

In the housing complex in Elizabeth where Arroyo spent his teen-age years, relatives said they worried about his safety in Somalia but supported him because he was doing what he wanted, the Associated Press reported.

“You always worry when you have somebody away,” said his cousin, Arcel Martinez. “He wanted to help others, to do good.”

Arroyo’s mother, Ramona Ortiz, was too distraught to speak. She was visited by Rep. Donald M. Payne (D-N.J.) and Mayor Christian Bollwage, who said flags would be flown at half-staff in the city of 110,000 residents 15 miles from New York City.

Family members said Arroyo was born in Caguas, Puerto Rico, and moved to Elizabeth several years ago. He graduated from Elizabeth High in 1989 and entered the Marines soon afterward.

At the Marine base at Twentynine Palms, Sgt. Joseph Kise said he could pay Arroyo “the ultimate Marine compliment. I would have put my life in his hands any time, anywhere. That’s just the type person he was.”

Times staff writer Mike Granberry, in Twentynine Palms, contributed to this story.