But, Gen. Campbell said the bottom line was there was a lot of human error here.
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General John Campbell, the USA commander in Afghanistan, announced the suspensions while briefing reporters on the findings of two investigations into the 3 October airstrike in Kunduz. It said they found no evidence that key commanders, including the Afghans and the AC-130 gunship crew, had access to a “no strike” list of targets that were off-limits to attack.
“The medical facility was misidentified as a target by United States personnel who believed they were striking a different building several hundred meters away where there were reports of combatants”, Campbell claimed. “They executed from air and did not take appropriate measures to verify the facility was a military target”, he said, adding that “fatigue” and “high operational tempo contributed to this tragedy”.
Campbell did not give any names or specify how many people had been suspended, but said that the affected individuals would be subject to investigation under military justice or administrative discipline systems.
He renewed his group’s call for an independent global investigation, something the US has blocked by declining to consent.
The hospital’s location was known to the USA military, and officials from MSF (also known as Doctors Without Borders) repeatedly phoned US and Afghan military officials during the attack, trying desperately to stop the heavy fire.
Campbell acknowledged that MSF had informed USA operational headquarters in Afghanistan about the coordinates of the medical facility and the military saved it to a no airstrike list five days before the bombing.
The gunship was meant to target a government building thought to be taken over by the Taliban.
MSF released short biographies of 14 staff members who died in the attack, including doctors, nurses, cleaners and guards. In a statement, the group said, “The frightening catalog of errors outlined today illustrates gross negligence on the part of US forces and violations of the rules of war”.
Earnest said Obama told Liu that a U.S. investigation would “provide a transparent, thorough and objective accounting of the facts and circumstances of the incident”.
Brigadier General Wilson Shoffner, meanwhile, said: “The actions of air crew and special ops forces were inappropriate to the threats they faced”.
Ten minutes into the strike, Doctors Without Borders staff contacted U.S. forces to let them know they were under attack by an unknown aircraft. A second investigation conducted by the USA military looked into the issue of accountability.
“We are absolutely heartbroken over what has occurred here and we will do absolutely everything in our power to make sure that it does not happen again”.
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Doctors Without Borders has long raised the possibility that the hospital was targeted deliberately.
