Pentagon: 2015 airstrike on Afghanistan hospital not war crime

WASHINGTON — The U.S. attack on a hospital in Afghanistan last year was not a war crime but was the result of a series of equipment failures and human errors that occurred during intense combat, a top commander said Friday.

"This I will highlight to you was an extreme situation," Army Gen. Joseph Votel, the head of U.S. Central Command, said during a briefing to release a 3,000-page investigation of the incident, which killed 42 people.

He said the crew did not know they were firing on a hospital and when they discovered the mistake, 30 minutes later, they immediately ceased the attack.

The military has disciplined 16 military personnel, including a general officer, for their role in last year's mistaken airstrike, Votel said.

The punishments are considered administrative and range from reassignments to letters or reprimand or formal counseling. The action does not include courts-martial, which are for more serious criminal charges.

The military said it would not release the names of those punished, since they only took administrative action.

A letter of reprimand or forced reassignment can effectively end a military career by making it difficult to get a promotion.

The airstrike occurred during intense fighting in Kunduz, after Taliban militants had seized the city in northern Afghanistan last fall.

A U.S. team of Special Forces soldiers rushed to the city to support Afghan forces in a desperate battle to eject the militants from the city in northern Afghanistan. By the time of the airstrike they had been engaged in heavy combat for five consecutive days, the investigation said.

An AC-130 gunship, which can be armed with 105mm howitzers and Gatling guns, was dispatched on Oct. 3 in response to a request for help from Afghan forces who planned to attack a building that Taliban militants had seized.

The U.S. commander in Kunduz authorized the support under his authority to approve strikes made in self defense, Votel said. Both the U.S. team and the Afghan forces they were supporting were under attack from militants.

The equipment problems started when the gunship was flying to Kunduz and experienced a failure with its communications system that prevented the flight crew from getting updates.

Once the plane arrived over Kunduz it was targeted by a surface to air missile, requiring it to take evasive maneuvers and then fly to a safer location away from the city center.

The Afghan forces provided the correct grid coordinates for the intended target to the Special Forces team, who then relayed the position to the aircraft. But when the flight crew entered the coordinates they were directed to an empty field.

The crew then attempted to locate the target visually. The hospital's structure was similar to the target and about 400 yards from it.

The hospital, operated by Doctors Without Borders, an international aid organization, was on a "no-strike list" database, but the air crew did not have access to the information.

At 2:08 a.m. the aircraft began firing on the hospital. About 10 minutes later hospital personnel notified U.S. government representatives that the hospital was taking fire. It was another 20 minutes before the information got to the aircraft. They immediately stopped firing.

The aircrew had thought they were firing on the intended target, Votel said.

"They were attempting to do the right thing," Votel said.

The U.S. has made 170 condolence payments to families and individuals in connection with the attack. Votel said $3,000 was paid for each person injured and $6,000 per death.

Some organizations, including Amnesty International, a human rights group, have called on the U.S. military to allow for an independent investigation into the bombing.

The U.S. military said its investigation was exhaustive, drawing on interviews with more than 65 witnesses. The general officers who conducted the review were brought in from outside Afghanistan, the military said in a statement.

Votel also told reporters Friday that the U.S. had no involvement in an airstrike on a hospital in Aleppo operated by Doctors Without Borders and the International Committee of the Red Cross. Dozens were killed Thursday. The U.S. blamed the strike on the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad.