The Pentagon won't discipline any US personnel involved in the mistaken drone strike that killed 10 civilians in Afghanistan in August. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin accepted recommendations on the issue that did not include punishment, press secretary John Kirby said Monday. The recommendations from two commanders were mostly procedural, the Hill reports, and Kirby said, "There was no overt recommendation made by either specific to accountability and any punishment for anyone." An independent Pentagon review had come to a similar conclusion, saying there was no evidence of negligence. Seven of the 10 people killed were children.
The aid organization that one of the victims worked for immediately criticized the decision, per CNBC. Nutrition & Education International said the US hasn't kept its promises to provide compensation to the victims' families and get them out of the country. "How can our military wrongly take the lives of 10 precious Afghan people, and hold no one accountable in any way?" asked the group's president, Dr. Steven Kwon. Zemerai Ahmadi, who was killed along with his family, worked for the organization for 15 years. US commanders mistakenly thought he was an ISIS-K operative when they ordered the strike in Kabul.
"What we saw here was a breakdown in process and execution in procedural events," Kirby said Monday, "not the result of negligence, not the result of misconduct, not the result of poor leadership." Austin previously had called the drone attack a "horrible mistake," though the Defense Department at first called it a "righteous strike." US operations have killed hundreds of civilians, at least, in war zones over the past 20 years, rarely holding an individual responsible, per the Hill. (More Afghanistan stories.)
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