“In October [3-4] 1993 al Qaeda-affiliated Afghan Arabs launched the Black Hawk helicopter attacks in Mogadishu [Somalia] in which eighteen US soldiers were killed, seventy-eight wounded and one captured and dragged through the streets. The US withdrew nearly all their troops from the region in March 1994 in a move bin Laden heralded as a ‘great victory.’ “
– Abdel Bari Atwan, The Secret History of al Qaeda, Page 166