The Gift of Hope

By LARA MARLOWE BAIDOA

Under the blazing morning sun a hodgepodge of military vehicles falls into sloppy formation on the dunes near the Mogadishu airport. Somali children sneak through shell holes in a wall to beg for food and baksheesh. Marines shoot souvenir snapshots of each other as the convoy slowly takes shape.

Six days after the Marines arrived in the coastal capital of Mogadishu, they were finally going out into the countryside where starving Somalis and relief workers alike are eager for their help. The 700-person contingent was headed for Baidoa, a southern Somalian town where famine has hit especially hard; it is there, and in the remote villages beyond, that most of the U.S.'s humanitarian mission will be carried out. It is there too that the conflict between the narrowly conceived objective of safeguarding food convoys and the larger needs of rebuilding a shattered and lawless nation will be played out.

At noon the lead armored vehicle, with Old Glory waving, shifts into first gear, followed by 76 five-ton trucks, humvees and amphibious light armored vehicles. Belt-fed machine guns, mortars or antitank missile launchers are mounted on each vehicle. Every one of the 700 carries an automatic rifle. Marines pull on heavy desert-camouflage flak jackets and don steel helmets. Ammunition clips snap into place. The men of Team Tiger, the name given to the group of Marines going to Baidoa, are expecting trouble.

In his five-ton truck, Lance Corporal Greg Riles, 22, laughs off predictions of danger. "Scared? With all this?" he says, gesturing toward the olive-green steel vehicles surrounding him. "In a way, I'm sort of hoping for a little combat. All this time you train for this. You carry these weapons, and you want to use them."

The Baidoa expedition exemplifies the doctrine of invincible force espoused by Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Colin Powell. The weaponry en route to liberate Baidoa from the "technicals" -- pickup trucks mounted with machine guns -- may look excessive, but it is intended to ensure minimal resistance. "You have to use overwhelming force," says Lieut. Colonel Tom O'Leary, the commander of Team Tiger. "That's the only way you can go in smiling and waving."

The Marines are worrying more about showers and mail. They have not had either since landing. But missing Christmas is their biggest gripe. They joke about the number of shopping days left and dare one another to swim home. U.S.M.C., they say, stands for "You Suckers Missed Christmas."

A red plush stocking embroidered with the name Chris and stuffed with a toy Santa hangs inside Corporal Christopher Sotak's vehicle. The 23-year-old received it from his mother in the last mail shipment before Thanksgiving. On Dec. 25, "we'll get a bag with diced turkey and gravy," says First Sergeant Steven Fisher, 37, Sotak's crewmate. "Christmas will be when you get back home."

After 18 years in the corps, Fisher takes Somalia's discomforts in stride: humidity that soaks uniforms in sweat, swarms of flies, malaria-carrying mosquitoes undeterred by repellent, sun that blisters the skin. There are scorpions and cobras in the undergrowth, and the prevalent vegetation -- thorn trees covered with needle-sharp spines -- must be chopped down to make encampments.

The ruins thin out at the eastern end of Mogadishu, which the Marines refer to as "Mog," giving way to a surprisingly green plain where donkeys, cattle and camels graze. The Marines are entering territory they have not yet explored. Sitting on top of their vehicles, they point M-16s toward the thorn trees and foot-high shoots of corn on either side of the road. Hot exhaust fumes coat their faces in soot. Each time the convoy approaches a village, Somalis come out to cheer. "It's unbelievable," says Fisher. "You're expecting them to shoot at you, and they're all standing there clapping."

Corporal Sotak served in the Gulf War last year. "I wasn't too enthused about kicking sand for another month or two," he says. "But this is real different. We didn't have much contact with the people in Saudi. Here they're all around us. In Saudi we had a defined enemy. Here you don't know who you can trust. You don't know who's just trying to defend himself and who's robbing everybody."

Late in the afternoon the convoy turns onto a narrow dirt road. Men with assault rifles are poised in the ruined buildings; they too are Marines, transported by air to hold the landing strip at Bale Dogle two days earlier.

The cortege of armored vehicles parks in the undergrowth along the roadside. Nine hours will pass before Team Tiger begins the last leg of its 180-mile journey to Baidoa. Sotak waves to Marines passing by on the bed of a truck. "Those are the real grunts," he says. "When it rains, it's awful, and they can't take stuff like this with them." Sotak opens a St. Louis Cardinals bag holding his only sources of entertainment: a box with a chess set and a small electronic football simulation game.

Marine talk drifts back and forth. Sergeant Darrell Siler's face twitches when someone mentions the Oct. 23, 1983, truck-bomb attack in Lebanon that killed 241 U.S. servicemen. Had he not been on leave that day, Siler would probably have been killed with his buddies. "There's a lot of places in Mogadishu that remind me of Beirut," he says. His voice cracks. "I hope nothing like that ever happens here. Our rules of engagement are different. There we couldn't fire unless we were fired on, and we had to get permission first. Here we can use deadly force if we feel threatened. Maybe if we'd sent this kind of force to Lebanon, our guys wouldn't have got killed."

The sun sets, and the mosquitoes attack. The ends of cigarettes glow red in the dark. Disembodied voices tell jokes, complain about being away from home, discuss strategy and gossip about their comrades-in-arms.

"Have you heard those Air Force fly-boys are already building hot showers and a PX in Mog?"

"I hope they don't give those Army puppies from the 10th Mountain Division too much to do. I mean, sending Army puppies from cold mountains to the hottest, flattest place in the world."

"We get $150 a month danger pay in Somalia. Hell, you can drink that in one night."

"A vehicle crew gets to be closer than family. We read each other's mail. We share our food, we share our water, we share our problems."

"I know three guys in Mog who got written proposals of marriage from Somali women."

"I didn't join the Marine Corps to be a Boy Scout."

An hour after midnight, the convoy sets off again. There is good news from Baidoa: the gunmen have all fled or agreed to give up their weapons.

After a last, 40-minute stop, a voice comes over the walkie-talkie at dawn: "Tiger, this is Command. Let's get ready to rock 'n' roll."

The road rises to a small plateau on the outskirts of Baidoa. Clusters of cheering Somali men, women and children stand by the road. At the airport a hundred dejected Somali "security guards" stand waiting to receive the men of Task Force Hope. They have voluntarily turned their weapons over to the Marines, and their commander, Colonel Hassan Boutali, tells Lieut. Colonel O'Leary he welcomes the Americans and hopes there will be no more violence in Baidoa.