I met Colonel Mike Dallas, commanding officer of the 2nd Brigade HQS of the 10th Mountain Division on my first morning at the base. Small, wiry and fit, he had a pair of eyes that missed nothing. ‘Intimidating’ was how Dave Coates described him.

Mike Dallas was the ultimate soldiers’ soldier and it showed. He tolerated no laxity, not when you’re that far from home. If an officer couldn’t do what was expected of him, he was out on the next flight.

Colonel Dallas was one of the first of the American field commanders to arrive in Somalia and had been instrumental in putting together this expeditionary force while the unit was still at Fort Drum, home base in upstate New York. After I left, he returned to the Horn for a second tour, and again, was one of the last to leave.

We exchanged letters afterwards, when he’d been transferred to the Pentagon. A few years later I spotted him in a CNN newscast leading a unit on its way to Haiti. His eagle will have been replaced by a star by now, or who knows, perhaps even two. A healthy cut above the average senior military officer that we writers are likely to meet in present-day US military postings, Mike Dallas perfectly fits the stereotype of an American commander in foreign parts.

It was interesting that journalists who covered the Gulf War were expecting cigar-waving, loud-mouthed, leather jacketed smart-asses in uniform when they first set foot in that military theatre, especially among aviators. Then, when there was a lull in the fighting, the generals decided that it might possibly be in everybody’s interest to introduce some of the young combatants to the scribblers. Most journalists who had never had any kind of contact with military people before – except in the movies – were astonished.

Instead of a bunch of gung-ho war heroes, they discovered a body of quiet, efficient and, more often than not, self-effacing airmen. The majority had just returned from sorties over Iraq and had seen a lot of action. Quite a few had been seriously shot at, yet there were very few in their ranks who took themselves too seriously. Rather, most declared, it was a job that needed to be done. More to the point, commented several, what was happening just then in Iraq was the culmination of all their training and frankly, they enjoyed doing it. Not a word was said about the extraordinary measure of dedication that made the whole thing work.

They still chewed their gum, liked root beer with a float, enjoyed Sunday football, spoke to their families back home almost every day and some would even admit to being extremely nervous whenever the situation over the battlefield became awkward. When asked about this operation or that, or what they thought might have transpired behind enemy lines, there emerged a very balanced and well-educated crowd of young men and women who were not only professional in their approach to what they did, but actually enjoyed the challenge.

Moreover, there wasn’t one among them who did not have a thorough grasp of the situation, not only on the battlefield, but also in the world around them.

What also came to light was that the majority were university graduates, quite often a good deal better educated (and better-informed) than the journos who were throwing cynical questions about. Some of the hacks in our pack were so churlish that it made some of the older professionals cringe.

There were several developments that surprised us all while working with American forces in Somalia. One was the decision by the US Congress to pull out most of their troops halfway through the campaign.

From an initial deployment of 28,000 soldiers in the Horn of Africa, the American in-country command was finally left with just 6,000, a large proportion of whom were not combatants. Also, they were very much on their own because, with some notable exceptions, the support they got from the majority of UN contingents was lukewarm. One observer called it a strategic coitus interruptus.

Perhaps it was inevitable that Somalia should revert to anarchy even before the last American chopper had pulled out.

What is not generally accepted about the American effort in Somalia is that while Washington had men on the ground in this vast north-east African state, it was they and not the rest of the multinational force who ran the show. The Americans took a while to get their act together, but after that everything became proactive. For a start, US forces played a vital role in separating the factions and if any of the warlords stepped out of line, he took a beating.

UH-60 Blackhawk assault helicopters regularly hit rebel positions in Afghoi, Jilib, Belet Uen and Marka. The recalcitrants were dealing with hard men armed with some serious weapons. History, one of the unit commanders told me, had long since proved that the only response to such people was strong and sustained action.

The bloody battle that eventually ended Washington’s role at the vanguard in Somalia was the ‘Black Hawk Down’ incident that resulted in the loss of 18 American soldiers – several of them Special Forces as well as some air crew – all of whom were involved in trying to capture one of Somalia’s most notorious warlords.

By some accounts, the Americans were lured into an ambush that appears to have been planned a long while ahead, which also gives the lie to reports that Somali rebel leaders were incapable of planning. Suddenly, from nowhere, up popped hundreds of Soviet-supplied RPG-7s. While they weren’t used to best effect, it was numbers that counted in the end: thousands of irregular Somali fighters ranged in full tilt against a squad of young Americans who did what was necessary when the chips were down.

The weapons used by the Somalis against the American troops – in particular, the RPG-7s – had been smuggled into Somalia by forces hostile to the United States in the months prior to that fateful day. We have to accept that it required considerable effort because much of this activity took place under the noses of the occupying force.

Within days of that event – which involved some American soldiers being dragged naked through the streets of Mogadishu – the Pentagon had made its decision: it was time for the troops to come home. Once the American force had been reduced, there was no possibility that the UN could control developments as effectively as before. As a consequence, the international community was faced with another UN fiasco.

For those of us involved on the periphery of conflict in Somalia, and who experienced combat in other parts, regarded the country as arguably more dangerous than the majority of the minor wars of the 1990s. The uncompromising and brutal nature of the Somali way of life ensured as much.

At a conservative count, conflict within this East African society has so far cost about half a million lives. There are some aid organizations who maintain that you could probably double that tally. In truth, nobody can be certain of the real figure because there wasn’t anybody keeping tabs.