‘Human error’ cited in mistaken US airstrike on Kunduz hospital

The top U.S. general in Afghanistan says the investigation into the mistaken airstrike of a Doctors Without Borders hospital in Kunduz was “a tragic but avoidable accident caused primarily by human error.”

Gen. John Campbell told reporters today that the crew of an AC-130 gunship struck the hospital, mistaking it for another building a several hundred meters away that had been taken over by the Taliban. Campbell said some of the individuals involved in the accident have been suspended from their duties and referred to U.S. Special Operations Command for possible disciplinary action.

“We failed to meet our own high expectations,” Campbell said in releasing the findings of a 3,000-page investigation conducted by an official not under his command, U.S. Army Major Gen. William Hickman.

The investigation determined that the airstrike on the Doctors Without Borders trauma center “was a direct result of human error compounded by systems and signals failure.”

Campbell said the crew aboard the AC-130 gunship did not know the hospital they had targeted was a trauma center. “They believed they were striking a building located several hundred meters away taken over by insurgents,” he said.

An Afghan special operations unit had requested an airstrike on a government building being used by the Taliban. Because of technical difficulties aboard the aircraft, the AC-130 crew relied on visual descriptions provided by U.S. special operations troops serving with the Afghan forces.

“Those who called and conducted the strike did not take procedures to verify this was a legitimate target,” Campbell said.

Campbell said the aircraft was unable to send videos or text communications back to its headquarters at Bagram Airfield.

Believing they had earlier been targeted by a missile, the crew of the AC-130 pulled 8 miles away, which “degraded the accuracy of certain targeting systems which contributed to the misidentification of the trauma center,” Campbell said.

Based on the visual descriptions provided by the ground forces, the crew of the AC-130 believed they had identified the target that turned out to be the hospital. They did not use GPS coordinates to verify that was the target being described by the ground forces.

But a minute prior to the airstrike, the crew of the AC-130 did communicate the coordinates to its headquarters at Bagram Airfield, which did not realize the location matched a no-strike list location.

Doctors Without Borders notified the U.S. military shortly after the airstrike began, but by the time the headquarters verified the “fatal mistake,” the 29-minute airstrike had concluded.

Those involved in the airstrike “did not follow the rules of engagement,” Brigadier Gen. Wilson Shoffner, the top U.S. military spokesman in Afghanistan, told reporters at a briefing to release the investigation’s finding.

“We did not intentionally strike the hospital, we are absolutely heartbroken,” Shoffner said, adding the U.S. military in Afghanistan will ensure “it does not happen again.”