Today in Manhunting History -- December 2, 1993: Aideed Flies, Escobar Dies

Following the Battle of the Black Sea made famous by the book and movie Black Hawk Down, President Bill Clinton convened an emergency policy review with the vice president, key cabinet members, and senior civilian and military staff. The next day, Clinton announced a new policy in which the United States would increase its military presence in Somalia by over 5,000 troops until March 31, when all U.S. troops would be withdrawn. He personally ordered CENTCOM Commander General Joseph Hoar to halt any further action by U.S. forces against Aideed. The United Nations Security Council subsequently adopted Resolution 885, which suspended the call for Aideed’s arrest and established an international commission to investigate June 5 attacks that precipitated the hunt for the Somali warlord. Aideed seemed content to wait for the Americans to leave, and refrained from any large-scale violence against the bolstered forces. Simultaneously, the White House began referring to him as “a clan leader with a substantial constituency in Somalia.”

The ultimate symbol of Aideed’s rehabilitation was his flight to peace talks in Ethiopia in early December. He refused to travel on a UN plane, but accepted an offer to use an American transport. On December 2, 1993, Marines escorted the warlord to the plane in full view of U.S. troops at the Mogadishu airport. The spectacle caused “anger and disappointment throughout the ranks,” and the morale of U.S. forces plummeted.

Muhammed Farah Aideed, target of the failed 1993 strategic manhunt.


Halfway around the world, another target of a U.S. strategic manhunt was not faring as well.

In September 1989, at the request of the Colombian government, the Bush administration deployed a top-secret Army intelligence unit, Centra Spike, which specialized in locating individuals. Their target was the man listed by Forbes magazine as the seventh richest man in the world – Pablo Escobar, the vicious kingpin of the Medellin Cartel. From January 1990 to July 1991, the intelligence produced by Centra Spike led to significant blows to Escobar’s cocaine empire, but always barely missed out on capturing him due to the corruption or incompetence of the pursuing Colombian forces.

In July 1992, following Escobar’s escape from La Catederal prison, elements of the Delta Force under Colonel Jerry Boykin were deployed to assist the Colombian police’s “Search Bloc.” U.S. and Colombian forces unsuccessfully pursued Escobar for the next 16 months despite access to an array of technical assets that dwarfed anything used in previous strategic manhunts: airborne triangulation sensors; microwave imagery platforms; Air Force RC-135s, U-2s, and SR-71s; and Navy P-3 spy planes. On December 2, 1993, in a middle-class neighborhood in Medellin, the son of the Search Bloc’s commander spied Escobar through the window of a row house after a failed raid in a nearby location. A firefight with Escobar and his bodyguard, Alvaro de Jesús Agudelo ensued. As Escobar and Agudelo The two fugitives attempted to escape by running across the roofs of adjoining houses to reach a back street, but both were shot and killed by Colombian National Police.

Colombian Police posing with the body of Medellin Cartel kingpin Pablo Escobar, killed as a result of a U.S. strategic manhunt from 1989-1993.