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A recent investigative report by New York Times journalist Azmat Khan exposes the fallacies of the U.S. Government and Pentagon regarding the accuracy of airstrikes conducted in Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan since 2014. The Pentagon’s “Civilian Casualty Files” (CCF) reveals alleged civilian harm in 1,311 airstrikes in Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan and an absence of an accountability system when airstrikes hit the wrong target. Instead, the Pentagon fostered a system of impunity.
This treasure trove of confidential documents indicates that the Pentagon conducted U.S. air wars in the Middle East with “deeply flawed intelligence” resulting in thousands of civilian deaths, including many children. Furthermore, U.S. Government and Pentagon assurances of transparency and accountability were mainly hollow.
The New York Times in its two-part investigative series stated, “Not a single record provided includes a finding of wrongdoing or disciplinary action,” and its investigation disclosed that the number of civilian deaths had been “drastically undercounted,” by at least several hundred.
For example, a U.S. Special Forces bombing on July 16, 2016, of three alleged Islamic State staging areas in Northern Syria initially reported the deaths of 85 “fighters” but instead the dead were 120 farmers and other villagers.
The targeting failures of the U.S. Military are due to poor or inadequate surveillance footage which the U.S. Government and Pentagon will dismiss as “mistakes”. But this offers little or no solace to the families of the innocent victims. And thus, these “mistakes” are war crimes that the international community must probe, and those responsible prosecuted.
The airstrikes and drone campaigns were ramped up under the Obama administration. Then U.S. President Obama claimed that the use of drones represented “the most precise air campaign in history,” ensuring minimum civilian deaths.
However, the reality was the opposite as the New York Times reported that U.S. forces executed more than 50,000 airstrikes in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria, with much less than the marketed accuracy. Imagine, Obama is a Nobel Peace Prize recipient, for what? Intensifying the wars in the Middle East and Afghanistan and killing more civilians?
The revelations from these Pentagon documents also vindicate the principled stance of Prime Minister Imran Khan opposing drone strikes as the collateral damage of civilian casualties led to more anger and resentment towards Western forces and the facilitating local governments. Moreover, this anger often than not resulted in the creation of non-state actors and terrorists that received support and sympathy from the local population.
If the U.S. Government and Pentagon claim that they learn lessons from these “mistakes” then why are they hiding the regular harm to civilians produced by U.S. drone wars from the public? This shows that they are trying to bury their heads in the sand refusing to contemplate the uselessness of the military-industrial complex.
The “Civilian Casualties Files,” just like the “Afghanistan Papers” preceding it, is so far more evidence that the U.S. Government or at minimum, the Pentagon, recognized the costs and failures of these wars but decided the collateral damage was tolerable and continued with bombing as usual.
The use of airstrikes particularly drones are ripe for abuse and the Civilian Casualty Files indicate this. During the global war on terror, we must remember that the U.S. Military utilized drones as weapons in sovereign countries like Syria, Afghanistan, Pakistan’s tribal areas, and Iraq. For a moment, let’s reverse the situation and assume that there are “bad” guys roaming around in the U.S. that another country didn’t like.
How would the U.S. Government and Americans react if that country began to conduct “surgical” drone strikes all over America to eliminate these “bad” guys? Would the U.S. Government ever allow another country to fly armed drones over its country to target people? The answer is a resounding ‘No.’ U.S. hypocrisy on this matter is unbelievable and a typical case of “do as I say not as I do.”
Will the revelations of these papers lead to accountability of both the U.S. political and military leadership? The most likely answer is a sad “No.” If the U.S. Congress seeks true accountability for the debacle of the war on terrorism, it should first look inwards before blaming external forces but we all know that the U.S. establishment has a bad habit of scapegoating.
Furthermore, when we hear military officials and the corporate media talk about “surgical” strikes and “precision,” we must remember that these terms have become misnomers given the revelations of these Pentagon documents.
