![]() In October 1993, Boykin fought in the Battle of Mogadishu (1993), also referred to in as "Black Hawk Down". In April 1993, Boykin helped advise Attorney General Janet Reno regarding the stand-off at Waco, Texas, between the federal government and the Branch Davidians. They were taken by guys on the assault team." I've seen pictures of Escobar's body that you don't get from a long-range telescope lens. Bowden wrote that "within the special ops community.Pablo's death was regarded as a successful mission for Delta, and legend has it that its operators were in on the kill." Hersh quotes an anonymous retired army general as saying, "That's what those guys did. Hersh refers to Mark Bowden's book Killing Pablo, which alleged that the Pentagon believed Boykin intended to break the law and exceed his authority in the operation. Seymour Hersh later claimed in The New Yorker that there were suspicions within the Pentagon that Boykin's team was going to help assassinate Escobar with the support of U.S. In 1992 and early 1993, as a colonel, Boykin was in Colombia leading a mission to hunt for drug lord Pablo Escobar. From 1990 to 1991, Boykin attended the Army War College. invasion of Panama as part of the mission to apprehend Manuel Noriega and participated in Operation Acid Gambit. He was wounded by anti-aircraft fire during the Delta helicopter assault on Richmond Hill Prison. In October 1983, Boykin took part in Operation Urgent Fury, the invasion of the Caribbean island of Grenada. Boykin called it "the greatest disappointment of my professional career because we didn't bring home 53 Americans." Despite this, his "faith was strengthened" believing he had witnessed "a miracle": "Not one man who stood with us in the desert and pleaded for God to go with us was killed or even injured that night." In 1980, he was the Delta Force operations officer on the April 24–25 Iranian hostage rescue attempt. ![]() "Bucky" Burruss, who helped with Delta Force selection in early 1978, recalled that Boykin "had a bad knee and I thought he would never make it.I thought, I hate to see this guy busting his, I don't see how he can make it on this bad road wheel, but he surprised us." Burruss wrote at the time that "Jerry Boykin is a Christian gentleman of the highest order." Boykin believed God had a hand in things: "God led me into the Delta Force.And He said to me, 'This is where you ought to be.'" He would hold numerous leadership positions in the elite unit, including operations officer, troop commander, squadron commander, deputy commander and finally unit commander from July 1992 to July 1994. In 1978, at age 29, Boykin volunteered for and completed a specialized selection course for assignment to the 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment – Delta, or Delta Force. He graduated from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech) with a bachelor's degree in English in 1971.Īs a young officer, he served in the 2nd Armored Division at Fort Hood, Texas with the 101st Airborne Division in Vietnam, and as a company commander in the 24th Infantry Division ( Mechanized) at Fort Stewart, Georgia. He attended New Bern high school and was the captain of the football team. William Gerald "Jerry" Boykin was born on April 19, 1948, in Wilson, North Carolina. He is currently executive vice president at the Family Research Council. He is an author and visiting professor at Hampden–Sydney College, Virginia. During his 36-year career in the military he spent 13 years in the Delta Force and was involved in numerous high-profile missions, including the 1980 Iran hostage rescue attempt, the 1992 hunt for Pablo Escobar in Colombia, and the Black Hawk Down incident in Mogadishu, Somalia. ![]() William Gerald " Jerry" Boykin (born April 19, 1948) is a retired American lieutenant general who was the United States Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence under President George W. Executive Vice President: Family Research Council
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