I’m sure most of you have watched Black Hawk Down before. I’m sure most you liked it as well. I certainly did. One thing I didn’t like about the movie is that the director has forgotten to include a little important fact. Maybe it was done unintentionally or maybe it’s just Hollywood. What am I talking about? Well, they did not state in full in the movie of the Malaysian soldiers’ involvement in the rescue of the US Rangers.
Our Malaysian soldiers from the Rejimen Askar Melayu DiRaja did do a lot in the rescue mission. We lost one soldier in the conflict as a matter of fact.
The video below was done by the Malaysian Armed Forces. It’s a short 9-minute video about the Askar Melayu‘s role in the rescue mission. Do have a look. I’m sorry, the video is in Bahasa Melayu.
[googlevideo:http://video.google.com.au/videoplay?docid=-1040352013412783964&hl=en-AU]
An excerpt from Black Hawk Down’s entry in Wikipedia:
“…The Malaysian government criticized the movie for not giving recognition to the Malaysian soldiers involved in the rescue mission even though a Malaysian soldier died during the rescue attempt (although a request for assistance by MG Garrison from the Malaysians is presented in the movie). An American soldier wrote in a letter that he was grateful for the bravery and courage of the Malaysian soldiers, who helped prevent the deaths of 200 of his compatriots…”
