From BBC.com An AC-130 gunship and a B-52 bomber were involved Reports from Afghanistan say the United States air force has mistakenly bombed a village wedding party, killing many of the participants. A witness from the village, in Uruzgan province, told the BBC the overnight raid left scores of people - many of them women - dead. Afghan officials in the capital, Kabul, put the death toll at at least 30, although other reports say the figure is much higher. In Washington, a military spokesman said a coalition air reconnaissance patrol flying in the area had reported coming under anti-aircraft artillery fire. The Pentagon said other coalition aircraft in the patrol retaliated and acknowledged there had been an error. "At least one bomb was errant. We don't know where it fell," he said. An AC-130 gunship, a B-52 bomber and other aircraft were involved in the incident. Afghan leader Hamid Karzai said aid was being organised for the area and a commission had been set up to investigate the incident. Some reports suggest that the American planes may have mistaken gunfiring at the wedding for hostile fire aimed at them. Afghans often fire guns in the air during weddings and other celebrations. An investigation has also been launched by the US military. A US military spokesman added that four injured civilians had been airlifted to hospital by US forces. "There are no Taleban or al-Qaeda or Arabs here - these people were all civilians, women and children "- Villager Abdul Saboor A resident from the bombed area, Abdul Saboor, told the BBC: "There was no-one to help last night. "We managed to transfer some of the wounded to Kandahar in the morning. Some of the foreigners' choppers also came to help. "There are no Taleban or al-Qaeda or Arabs here. These people were all civilians, women and children." Children orphaned At the Mir Wais hospital in Kandahar, staff said they had been told most of the dead were women and children. Nurse Mohammed Nadir said: "The villagers brought these children and they have no parents. "Everyone says that their parents are dead." One six-year-old girl was brought to the hospital still wearing her party dress. She was injured, and villagers said all members of her family were killed. Targeting errors US forces operating in Afghanistan have made a number of errors during the campaign against the Taleban and al-Qaeda forces. Four Canadian soldiers were killed in April when a US fighter bombed them by mistake during a training exercise. In January, US bombs killed civilians in the village of Hazar Qadam, targeted as a Taleban compound. In December, planes bombed a convoy from the eastern town of Khost, killing people Mr Karzai said were tribal elders travelling for his inauguration. Last October, a targeting error led to a bomb hitting a residential area of Kabul, instead of a helicopter at the airport.
This is terrible news. I was going to post something about this as well. I'm sure it wasn't intentional but what troubles me the most is these incidents can be prevented. One, the US has a responsibility to not take everything as enemy fire unless they can confirm its source. If tradition is to shoot guns in the air at weddings, then the US has to take this under consideration at all times. The Afghani people never know where the US is operating but the US military knows. They need to be extremely cautious and consider all possibilities before just responding with full force. It doesn't look like they did this here but we don't know all the circumstances yet. Two, if the villagers would refrain from tradition and not fire their weapons into the air, then this stuff would not happen. They have to take into account that there is a foreign military on their soil who are on edge battling terrorists. They will react aggressively to perceived fire against them and may not always be able to verify the target as hostile 100% of the time. Whether Harmid Karzai issues a statement telling them to stop shooting at weddings or what, there is going to be risk in doing this at all times. I don't think the US can just say our aircraft encountered anti-aircraft fire and that is that. I think of anti-aircraft fire as those big guns like Iraq was using to shoot at our planes. I don't consider an AK-47 an anti-aircraft weapon although I guess it could do some damage at a close range. I seriously doubt the Afghans celebrating the wedding were shooting huge guns in the air and there is no way for them to know at 1am in the morning what is up in the sky(who holds a wedding at that time anyway?). It's not like they have anti-aircraft radar anywhere in Afghanistan. This sounds like the same thing with the Canadian troops that were killed and the wedding a couple months back. Has the US military not learned anything by these incidents? Itchy trigger fingers to say the least. You better be damn certain they are firing at you and identify your target visually as hostile before you drop bombs like this. There are just too many of these incidents to be excused IMHO. I don't care if it is the enemy and they get away. If your not sure, then you cannot fully engage. I certainly hope there is more to this story than a wedding and they were engaged on the ground with enemy forces. Otherwise, there needs to be an investigation, compensation to the victims(like that is going to excuse what happened), and possible blame and repurcussions to those responsible. Otherwise, we need a statement that says "If we get any kind of fire at all, then we will engage the source of that fire." . This basically means every citizen is at their own risk if they choose to fire weapons in the air. Isn't this what is happening anyway?
Some reports (from Afghan officials) are saying that as many as 250 may have been killed as well as 400 injured. Truly sad.
http://msnbc.com/news/627086.asp Another article related to the incident. It seems there is some confusion about the incident, and until the dust settles, we won't know precisely what has happened. Some are saying 250 dead, some are saying 40. "This area is considered Taliban country and a suspected hiding spot for Taliban leader Mullah Omar. Once it was confirmed that a number of enemy forces were on the ground, U.S. aircraft — including at least one B-52 bomber and an AC-130 gunship — began to bomb the target. U.S. military officials told NBC News that it appears the errant bomb was a JDAM (a 2,000-pound GPS-guided weapon known as the Joint Direct Attack Munition) dropped by a B-52 bomber overnight. The B-52 was part of a military operation in Uruzgan in which U.S. aircraft were bombing caves and bunkers suspected of housing Taliban or al-Qaida militants, according to the officials. The officials added that they still do not know where the errant bomb landed and cannot yet confirm any deaths associated with it. Advertisement “Right now there are a lot of different opinions as to what happened,” said U.S. military spokesman Col. Roger King at the Bagram air base north of Kabul. He added that U.S. investigators would be sent to the area and that four people who were injured were treated by U.S. forces. Afghan President Hamid Karzai told the local Bakhtar Information Agency the “sudden attack” happened in the Dehrawud district of Uruzgan province. “We are trying to organize aid and a commission has gone there headed by the ministry of frontiers affairs,” he said. U.S. forces have been targeting al-Qaida hideouts in the area. There have been several reports of the United States’ mistakenly attacking civilian targets since Washington’s bombing offensive started in Afghanistan on Oct. 7 last year."
Awful awful news. Those people need a break from this crap. Hopefully, we are building up their infastructure so we can leave the area soon. DaDakota
I don't find this "joke" very funny. We don't deliberately target civilians. In fact, we spend billions of dollars to create weapons designed to limit civilian deaths. I feel horrible for the Afghan civilians who died, and I pray for the soldiers that made this terrible mistake during this mission to free the Afghan people from their oppressive theocratic rulers.
Amen to that! The BBC is the best news source there is. If you go to their UK website -- www.bbc.co.uk -- you can listen to all of their radio broadcasts. Great stuff.
I was making a jab at another poster. I feel nothing but sympathy for the unforunate people who died.
Are any of you starting to think that our entire operations in Afghanistan is doing more harm than good? It doesn't seem much safer here in the US, we haven't captured many of the top Al-Queda, or Taliban leadership and the entire region from Kashmir to Isreal is worse than ever.
Elvis, you may be right. This is tragic, and I can't help but think many Afghans will turn on us for this mistake. It makes me sick to think about it.
I don't really believe that. Another poster said something along the lines of "It'd be understandable if we bombed citizens since they all wear sandals and robes".
Infact the BBC is so great,... I rely on it for entertainment since they make TLC, History channel, Dicovery channel and the like...
