Pentagon admits error in deadly Kabul strike

Target turned out to be civilians, kids

WASHINGTON — The Pentagon acknowledged Friday that a U.S. drone strike in Afghanistan on Aug. 29 that officials said was necessary to prevent an attack on U.S. troops was a tragic mistake that killed 10 civilians, including seven children.

The explosives the military claimed were loaded in the trunk of a white Toyota sedan struck by the drone’s Hellfire missile were most likely water bottles, and a secondary explosion in the courtyard in a densely populated Kabul neighborhood where the attack took place was probably a propane or gas tank, officials said. In short, the car posed no threat at all, investigators concluded.

Senior Defense Department leaders acknowledged that the driver of the car, Zemerai Ahmadi, a longtime worker for a U.S. aid group, had nothing to do with the Islamic State group, as military officials had previously asserted. Ahmadi’s only connection to the terrorist group appeared to be a fleeting and innocuous interaction with people in what the military believed was an Islamic State group safe house in Kabul, an initial link that led military analysts to make one mistaken judgment after another while tracking Ahmadi’s movements in the sedan for

the next eight hours.

“I offer my profound condolences to the family and friends of those who were killed,” Gen. Kenneth McKenzie Jr., commander of U.S. Central Command, said Friday at a Pentagon news conference. He said the United States was “exploring the possibility of ex gratia payments” to compensate the families of the victims.

The chain of missteps ending with the missile strike happened days after a suicide attack at the Kabul airport claimed the lives of at least 170 Afghans and 13 U.S. troops, inviting a sense of urgency that may have been misplaced. It also highlights flaws in the Biden administration’s strategy for targeting threats that emerge in Afghanistan from long distance, a plan analysts have criticized as being vulnerable to inadequate intelligence and overconfidence among commanders reading ordinary behaviors as evidence of malicious intent.

The strike book ended the U.S.-led war with what has come to symbolize Western intervention in Afghanistan, the Middle East and Africa: Airstrikes that kill civilians, followed by initial Pentagon denials that it may have made mistakes.

“This is not the end of their obligations. They have to do their own internal investigation to figure out if any crimes were committed,” said Brian Castner, a senior crisis adviser at Amnesty International and a former Air Force bomb technician, describing international laws governing whether a strike is proportional to the threat it poses for civilians. “And there’s the obligation to families to then pay compensation afterward.”

McKenzie acknowledged that a New York Times investigation of video evidence helped investigators determine that they had struck a wrong target. “As we in fact worked on our investigation, we used all available information,” McKenzie told reporters. “Certainly that included some of the stuff The New York Times did.”

The findings of the inquiry by Central Command mirrored the Times’ investigation, which also included interviews with more than a dozen of the driver’s co-workers and family members in Kabul. The Times inquiry raised doubts about the U.S. version of events, including whether explosives were present in the vehicle, whether the driver had a connection to the Islamic State group and whether there was a second explosion after the missile struck the car.

Military officials cited investigations by the Times, The Washington Post and other media organizations as providing valuable visual and other evidence that forced the military to reassess the judgments that led it to believe, falsely, that the sedan posed a threat.

‘HORRIBLE TRAGEDY’

As recently as Monday, the Pentagon was still asserting that the last U.S. drone strike in the 20-year war in Afghanistan was necessary to prevent an attack on U.S. troops.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, had said that the missile was launched because the military had intelligence suggesting a credible, imminent threat to Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, where U.S. and allied troops were frantically trying to evacuate people. Milley later called the strike “righteous.”

On Friday, Milley sent a tacit acknowledgment that he spoke too soon.

“In a dynamic high-threat environment, the commanders on the ground had appropriate authority and had reasonable certainty that the target was valid, but after deeper post-strike analysis, our conclusion is that innocent civilians were killed,” Milley said in a statement. “This is a horrible tragedy of war and it’s heart-wrenching and we are committed to being fully transparent about this incident.”

McKenzie said the conditions on the ground before the strike contributed to the errant strike. “We did not have the luxury to develop pattern of life,” he said.

The Pentagon will work with the families and other government officials on reparations, McKenzie said. But without any U.S. troops on the ground in Afghanistan, he acknowledged the task may be difficult. Still, he said, “we recognize the obligation.”

Evidence suggests that Ahmadi’s travels that day actually involved transporting colleagues to and from work. And an analysis of video feeds showed that what the military may have seen was Ahmadi and a colleague loading canisters of water into his trunk to take home to his family.

“We now know that there was no connection between Mr. Ahmadi and ISIS-Khorasan, that his activities on that day were completely harmless and not at all related to the imminent threat we believed we faced, and that Mr. Ahmadi was just as innocent a victim as were the others tragically killed,” Austin said in a statement, referring to the Afghan branch of the Islamic State group.

Accounts from the family of the victims, documents from colleagues seen by The Associated Press, and the scene at the family home — Ahmadi’s car was struck by a Hellfire missile just as he pulled into the driveway — all painted a picture of a family that had worked for Americans and were trying to gain visas to the United States, fearing for their lives under the Taliban.

The family said that when the 37-year-old Ahmadi, alone in his car, pulled up to the house, he honked his horn. His 11-year-old son ran out and Ahmadi let the boy get in and drive the car into the driveway. The other kids ran out to watch, and the Hellfire missile incinerated the car, killing seven children and an adult son and nephew of Ahmadi.

Amnesty International, the humanitarian aid group, called the U.S. military’s admission of a mistake a good first step.

“The U.S. must now commit to a full, transparent, and impartial investigation into this incident,” said Castner, the Amnesty International adviser. “Anyone suspected of criminal responsibility should be prosecuted in a fair trial. Survivors and families of the victims should be kept informed of the progress of the investigation and be given full reparation.”

Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said a fuller explanation must be provided.

“We need to know what went wrong in the hours and minutes leading up to the strike to prevent similar tragedies in the future,” he said. “I am also concerned about the accuracy and completeness of public statements made in the immediate aftermath of the strike, and whether those accounted for all of the information possessed by the government at the time.”

RESOLUTION ON TALIBAN

Meanwhile, the U.N. Security Council unanimously approved a resolution Friday saying that Afghanistan’s new Taliban rulers need to establish an inclusive government that has “the full, equal and meaningful participation of women” and upholds human rights.

The resolution adopted by the U.N.’s most powerful body also extends the current mandate of the U.N. political mission in Afghanistan for six months and delivers a clear message that its 15 members will be watching closely what the Taliban do going forward.

The statement reflects widespread disappointment over the recently announced interim Taliban government that left out women and minorities, heralding what could be a return to harsh Taliban practices during their 19962001 rule.

The Taliban have promised an inclusive government and a more moderate form of Islamic rule than during their previous rule. But many Afghans, especially women, are deeply skeptical and fear a rollback of rights gained over the past two decades.

Since their sweep into power last month and the departure of the last U.S. forces after 20 years of war, the Taliban have broken up several protests by women and their supporters demanding equal rights from the new rulers.

On Friday, the Taliban ordered that all boys in grades six to 12 and male teachers to return to school and resume classes across Afghanistan, starting today — but made no mention of girls or women teachers.

Friday’s Security Council resolution, drafted by Norway and Estonia, essentially delays a decision on a new mandate for the U.N. mission in Afghanistan until March. At the same time, it stresses “the critical importance of a continued presence of [the Afghan mission]” and other U.N. agencies “in promoting peace and stability in Afghanistan.”

Before the Taliban takeover, the U.N. had about 300 international employees and 3,000 Afghans working throughout the country. Over 100 of the international employees have redeployed to Kazakhstan, but the world body is continuing its operations in Afghanistan, where it has had a presence since 1948.

Information for this article was contributed by Eric Schmitt and Helene Cooper of The New York Times; by Alex Horton, Joyce Sohyun Lee, Karoun Demirjian and Dan Lamothe of The Washington Post; and by Robert Burns and Edith M. Lederer of The Associated Press.