“The secretary does not approve or call for additional accountability measures,” Pentagon spokesman John Kirby told reporters at a Pentagon briefing in Washington on Monday.
Andrew Harnik / AP
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Andrew Harnik / AP
“The secretary does not approve or call for additional accountability measures,” Pentagon spokesman John Kirby told reporters at a Pentagon briefing in Washington on Monday.
Andrew Harnik / AP
The Pentagon has said it will not punish the military group behind the drone strike that erroneously aimed at hitting the masterminds of an attack on Kabul airport but instead killed 10 civilians, including seven children.
Defense Department spokesman John Kirby on Monday confirmed reports that Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin III had approved a series of recommendations following the investigation into the deadly incident. in August. Those do not include disciplinary action against military service members regarding what officials call “tragic mistake. “
“The secretary did not approve or call for additional accountability measures,” Kirby told reporters during a briefing.
“I don’t anticipate there will be personal liability issues related to the August 29 air strike,” he added.
Investigations led by General Kenneth F. McKenzie Jr., head of U.S. Central Command, and General Richard D. Clarke, head of Special Operations Command, have resulted in a series of recommendations on what to do. procedural changes and process improvements “need to be Kirby said. “But in this particular case,” he explained, “none of the cases was strong enough to hold personal responsibility” and no one was found out. criminally negligent conduct.
An investigation by the Air Force Inspector General, Lieutenant General Sami D. Said, found the fatal mistake was the result of “confirmation bias”. Military officials were searching for a white Toyota Corolla, and when such a vehicle turned up at a suspected Islamic State site, they believed it contained bombs. Instead, it was an aid worker loading his car with a computer on his lap. The Pentagon is working to provide condolence expenses and bring surviving family members to the US
How the strike went wrong
The counterterrorism strike in Afghanistan comes in the final days of a chaotic withdrawal of US and NATO troops from the country.
The Pentagon initially claimed the counterterrorism strike had killed a Muslim extremist who was plotting an imminent attack. Just days after 13 US service members were killed outside Kabul airport by a suicide bomber. At the time, officials said, intelligence indicated a white Toyota was carrying a car bomb. Officials checked the vehicle and its driver when he stopped at some suspicious spot near the airport, placing what looked like gas canisters in the vehicle. In total, they watched for about eight hours before striking it with a 20-pound Hellfire missile from a drone.
But, the man in the car is not a radical terrorist. He was Zemari Ahmadi, an aid worker with a group called Nutrition and Education International, who delivered water. The explosion of the car parked in the yard of a house, killed Ahmadi, along with 7 children and 2 other adults.
But before any of those details were revealed, General Mark Milley justified the bombing, saying “procedures were followed correctly and it was a legitimate attack. “
Pentagon admits mistake after news reports give a very different story
It was until New York Times The video was discovered challenging the Pentagon’s narrative that officials acknowledged the strike was a mistake.
“What we see here is a break in process and execution and procedural events. Not the result of negligence, not the result of misconduct, not the result of poor leadership,” Kirby said Monday.
Kirby added that the decision should not be construed as an indication that the department is “turning a blind eye”. “It’s just that you have to look at [the counterterrorism strike] in time and space. “
He added: “You have to look at this particular strike and not draw broader, broader conclusions about accountability and high standards of conduct based on this one outcome alone.”
