Deaths in Somalia Spark Flood of Opposition in U.S.

Dorothy Morris still remembers how she sometimes wept at the loss of American lives in the Vietnam War and how guilty she felt that she was too busy raising young children to join the anti-war protests of that era.

Now that Morris’ 21-year-old son, Steven, has been sent by the Army to serve in Somalia, she says she has decided to make amends.

Ever since she saw television pictures of a dead U.S. soldier being dragged through the streets of Mogadishu more than a week ago, Morris, 45, a nurse’s aide, has been collecting thousands of signatures on a petition designed to persuade President Clinton to withdraw U.S. forces from Somalia immediately.

As Morris sees it, she has joined the front lines of what is fast becoming a national groundswell of opposition to the continued commitment of U.S. troops in that impoverished African nation.

“People are really angry about this,” she said. “Many of them ask if they can sign the petition twice.”

From Maine to California, Americans like Morris have been horrified by the TV pictures of U.S. soldiers dying in Mogadishu, and many think the troops ought to come home sooner than the six-month deadline set by Clinton.

In Clarksdale, Miss., former Mayor John Mayo reacted to the TV pictures by organizing a vigil to honor the lost servicemen, as well as a petition drive. Likewise, in Colorado, Richard Campos, a Vietnam War veteran, responded by organizing vigils at the state Veterans Memorial in Denver.

QCI, a discount long-distance telephone company based in Tysons Corner, Va., offered Americans a free call to the White House to register their opinions during a 48-hour period. A spokesman predicted that it would generate at least 10,000 calls.

To be sure, the vast majority of Americans are not distributing petitions, holding vigils or placing calls to the White House. But the latest Gallup Poll shows that widespread unhappiness with the policy is sapping Clinton’s popularity across the country.

“Americans don’t know why we’re in Somalia, and even if they do know, they probably don’t view the crisis there as worth the loss of any more American lives,” Democratic political analyst Charles E. Cook said.

According to the Gallup Poll, 51% of Americans do not understand why U.S. troops are currently in Somalia and 37% want them home immediately, while only 21% support the President’s decision to keep them there for six more months.

The polling data, combined with a deluge of calls, letters, petitions and other hometown protests, have fueled the firestorm of criticism the President has heard from members of Congress. Both Morris and Mayo are being assisted by their representatives in Congress.

Grisly photographs of dead soldiers in Mogadishu served to galvanize public opinion and especially upset those Americans with relatives in the military or who know soldiers serving in Somalia.

Morris said that when she saw the pictures, she instantly feared her son was among the dead. Even after she was assured by her congressman, Rep. Martin T. Meehan (D-Mass.), that Steven was safe, she was still so upset that she felt compelled to launch her petition drive.

Many opponents acknowledge that they originally favored the U.S. mission in Somalia, largely because of the pictures they saw on television last year of the starving Somali children. But their support dwindled when the faces of the victims became those of U.S. soldiers.

“What we feel is clearly slanted by what we see,” said Donna L. Langlois, a Marine mother in Coral Springs, Fla. “We can now watch the war on TV on four channels in living color. That’s what makes me so angry, I guess.”

After seeing the pictures, Langlois, whose oldest son, Marc, 24, served in the Persian Gulf War, wrote to Clinton saying: “As a people, we cannot watch the lifeless body of one more of our nation’s most valuable resources--our youth--dragged through the streets of someone else’s country.”

If the President agrees to bring the troops home soon, said Laura Hamilton, 32, of Chicago, another critic of U.S. policy in Somalia, it will be a testament to the power of television. “Pictures brought us in; pictures brought us out,” she said.

Some Americans see the television pictures as evidence that the Somalis are simply not grateful for the food aid they received from the United States. “They are literally biting the hand that feeds them,” said Dawn Scofield, a bank clerk who has been helping to collect petition signatures in Lowell.

Like Morris, many opponents of U.S. policy in Somalia are haunted by memories of the Vietnam War.

“I remember Vietnam very well,” Morris said. “Emotionally, I couldn’t handle it; I’d watch the killing on TV and cry. When they brought the POWs home, I sat all my sons down on the couch and I got a big box of tissues and we watched them get off the plane and I cried my eyes out.”

Not surprisingly, therefore, many of those who are speaking out are Vietnam War veterans. Mayo, 47, spent 18 months as a platoon leader in Vietnam from 1966 to 1968, and Campos, 46, is Colorado coordinator for the Last Patrol, a group dedicated to keeping alive the memory of the prisoners of war and those listed as still missing in action.

“I saw Vietnam all over again,” said Mayo, recalling how he felt when he saw the TV pictures from Mogadishu. “It hit a hot button.”

The similarity that many of these people see between the Vietnam War and the situation in Somalia is the gradual escalation of hostilities. As Ron Miller, who heads the Veterans Leadership Program in Marietta, Ga., said: “A lot of people refer to it as the gradual response or creeping response, but what it really boils down to is, basically, that is what happened in Vietnam.”

Some Americans who have military backgrounds, such as Miller, are critical of the Defense Department’s decision to deny requests for additional armored vehicles and personnel in Somalia just before the recent killing began. U.S. policy-makers feared it would be viewed as an escalation of the conflict.

Miller said Pentagon officials broke “the cardinal rule in military tactics . . . never send a unit into action without having a reserve backup.”

The deaths in Somalia, combined with what some critics see as missteps by the Pentagon, have only served to reinforce the doubts that many Americans have about Clinton’s skill in foreign policy and his ability to lead the U.S. military, according to Cook.

“My guess is that the doubts about Clinton will live longer than the troops are in Somalia,” Cook said.

Lurking deep in the recesses of this debate is the old resentment toward Clinton among some Americans because he resisted the draft during the Vietnam War.

Derinda Pedigo, 47, a veteran who now works for Southern Bell in Miami and whose son and brother serve in the military, lashed out at Clinton in a letter to the editor of the Miami Herald: “It sickens me that our draft-dodging, baby boomer President has no military experience and thinks that sending in 200 more soldiers is going to make a difference.”

According to many political analysts, the adverse reaction of Americans to the Somali situation is typical of the isolationist view that often prevails in the United States during tough economic times.

Although Americans tell the pollsters they are still willing to risk lives in circumstances where vital U.S. interests are at stake, there seems to be less sentiment in favor of intervention in civil conflicts in far-off places.

In addition, Cook said, the reaction to the killings in Somalia has made it more difficult for Clinton if he wants to intervene in Bosnia or Haiti in the future. As he put it: “People are much less willing to give Clinton the benefit of the doubt now.”

Pedigo, whose brother was aboard the U.S. ship that was turned away at Haiti last week by an angry mob at the port, said he approved of Clinton’s decision to withdraw from Haiti.

Likewise, Langlois questioned whether the United States can settle the former Yugoslavia’s “1,000-year war.”

Generally, Americans seem disappointed that the end of the Cold War has brought no respite in U.S. military involvement around the world.

“The United States is turning into the United Nations,” complained William Gualt, 50, a Chicago electrician. “It’s the father of foreign policy for the rest of the countries: Somalia, Russia, Bosnia.”

Miller said the resurgence of ethnic rivalries in the post-Cold War era is forcing U.S. soldiers to undertake peacekeeping or humanitarian missions for which they were never trained.

Although the public was skeptical when U.S. troops intervened in the Persian Gulf two years ago, that conflict, in retrospect, seems to make more sense to Americans than continued intervention in the current trouble spots.

Charles Osevedo, a 27-year-old Chicago resident, said Somali warlord Mohammed Farah Aidid does not pose a threat to the world order as does Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and his arsenal of weapons.

“What can he (Aidid) do?” he asked. “Throw dirt on people?”

The President, in response to such criticism, has argued that the United States must remain steadfast in Somalia so it does not convince other international outlaws that U.S. policy can be swayed by killing American soldiers or taking them hostage.

But Morris said the United States already demonstrated in the Persian Gulf War that it can be tough on foreign aggressors.

“We know we’re a strong country,” she said. “We know we can do it. But the question we have to ask ourselves when we see men dying in Somalia is: Is it worth it?”

Times researchers Edith Stanley in Atlanta, Anna M. Virtue in Miami, Tracy Shryer in Chicago and Ann Rovin in Denver contributed to this story.