Inside Mogadishu

No Satellites Necessary

A postmortem of the Oct. 3 battle that left 18 U.S. Army Rangers dead and 75 wounded has revealed that General Mohammed Farrah Aidid's loyalists used an ancient method to warn their comrades of the Rangers' attack -- they beat wooden sticks on drums, only in this case the drums were empty 50-gal. oil barrels. Followers of Aidid positioned at the Mogadishu airport began drumming when they saw the Rangers' helicopters take off, and as the message was heard, it was carried through the town by the same means.