No U.S. troops involved in the August drone strike that killed innocent Kabul civilians and children will face disciplinary action, U.S. defense officials said Monday.
Officials said Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has approved recommendations on the disciplinary matter from the generals who lead U.S. Central Command and Special Operations Command, based on the findings of an independent Pentagon review released last month.
The review, done by Air Force Lt. Gen. Sami Said and endorsed by Austin in November, found there were breakdowns in communication and in the process of identifying and confirming the target of the bombing, which killed 10 civilians, including seven children.
However, he concluded that the strike — which came during the Biden administration’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan — was a tragic mistake and not caused by misconduct or negligence.
Austin asked Gen. Frank McKenzie, head of Central Command, and Gen. Richard Clark, head of Special Operations Command, to review Said’s conclusions and come back to him with recommendations.
The two commanders agreed with Said’s findings, and did not recommend any discipline, officials said, adding that Austin endorsed their decisions.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss decisions not yet made public.
Austin’s latest endorsement was first reported by The New York Times.
The Aug. 29 drone strike on a white Toyota Corolla sedan killed Zemerai Ahmadi and nine family members, including seven children. Ahmadi, 37, was a longtime employee of an American humanitarian organization.
During a news conference with Austin on Sept. 1, Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said, “At this point, we think that the procedures were correctly followed and it was a righteous strike.”
Milley also claimed that “at least one of those people that were killed was an ISIS facilitator.”
On September 1, General Milley called it a “righteous strike” despite evidence at the time that the strike killed civilians
He even claimed the strike killed an ISIS-K facilitator
Now U.S. Central Command says 10 civilians and 0 ISIS-K members were killed pic.twitter.com/CzYQ7ssrIL
— Jewish Deplorable (@TrumpJew2) September 17, 2021
The intelligence about the car and its potential threat came just days after an Islamic State suicide bomber killed 13 U.S. troops and 169 Afghans at a Kabul airport gate. The U.S. was working to evacuate thousands of Americans, Afghans and other allies in the wake of the collapse of the country’s government.
Said concluded that U.S. forces genuinely believed that the car they were following was an imminent threat and that they needed to strike it before it got closer to the airport.
He said better communication between those making the strike decision and other support personnel might have raised more doubts about the bombing but might not have prevented it.
Said made a number of recommendations, including that more be done to prevent what military officials call “confirmation bias” — the idea that troops making the strike decision were too quick to conclude that what they were seeing aligned with the intelligence and confirmed their conclusion to bomb what turned out to be the wrong car.
He also said the military should have personnel present with a strike team, and their job should be to actively question such conclusions.
Finally, Said recommended that the military improve its procedures to ensure that children and other innocent civilians are not present before launching a time-sensitive strike.
Officials said McKenzie and Clarke largely agreed with Said’s recommendations.
The U.S. is working to pay financial reparations to the relatives and surviving family members, and potentially get them out of Afghanistan, but nothing has been finalized.
Story cited here.
