USA forces who launched a deadly air strike on an Afghan hospital run by Doctors Without Borders (MSF) had meant to attack a nearby Taliban-controlled compound, and the mistake was caused by human and technical error, according to United States forces commander.
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The airstrike in the northern city of Kunduz killed at least 30 civilians.
No USA military personnel were in visual range of the hospital when Afghan forces, claiming they were under fire, requested the airstrike, the report said. Gen. Wilson Shoffner. He declined to be more specific.
An Afghan special operations unit had asked for an airstrike on a government building being used by the Taliban. As a result, when the flight crew input the coordinates it had been given, the gunship’s computers inaccurately displayed an open field as the target, the report found.
Rep. Mac Thornberry, the Republican chairman of the House Armed Services Committee said he “will continue to oversee the investigation as it proceeds, and work closely with our forces in Afghanistan to ensure this tragedy is not repeated”, in a statement.
Believing they had earlier been targeted by a missile, the crew of the AC-130 pulled 8 miles away which “degraded the accuracy of certain targeting systems which contributed to the misidentification of the trauma center”, said Campbell. “The U.S forces directly involved in this incident did not know the target compound was the MSF trauma centre”.
The report obtained by the AP is known officially as a combined civilian casualty assessment, by an investigative team led by U.S. Army Brig.
“They executed from air and did not take appropriate measures to verify the facility was a military target”.
It remained unclear whether the USA military, even as it expressed remorse and wholly accepted blame, would be able to quickly mend its image in Afghanistan and elsewhere after the attack, which killed 30 people. (Najim Rahim via AP) In this Wednesday, October 14, 2015 photo, the charred remains of the Doctors Without Borders hospital is seen after being hit by a US airstrike in Kunduz, Afghanistan.
Some of the commanders involved in the strike have been relieved of their duties and now face possible of disciplinary action.
“Under the circumstances, the USA [special operations force ] commander lacked the authority to direct the aircrew to engage the facility” and was “unable to adequately distinguish” between the hospital and the intelligence building, Campbell said. By 2.20am, a caller from MSF reported the attack to Bagram air base.
In a communique released to the media, the organization’s general director, Christopher Stokes, commented after learning the results of the US investigation, which attributed the incident to human error in identifying the target of the military operation.
When an officer on the ground received a call from MSF indicating that the facility was under attack, it took 17 minutes for commanders to realize it was the AC-130 firing on the wrong target, the Pentagon says.
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Campbell acknowledged the hospital was on a no-strike list and that MSF had called during the attack to alert the U.S.-led forces.
