OxBlog

Tuesday, March 04, 2003

# Posted 9:30 PM by Ariel David Adesnik  

AFGHAN CASUALTIES: In February 17, 2002, the Boston Globe ran a front page story on its somewhat-comprehensive study of Afghan casualties. The study included strong data on 830 civilian deaths, plus a projection of a few hundred more. (Sorry, no permalink -- stil using Nexis-Lexis.)

What's interesting about both this study as well as the one by the LA Times which I cited before is that both are presented as revelations of brutatlity that the US government has refused to acknowledge. The following quote gives a sense of how the Globe spins the issue:
Along with faulty intelligence and the imprecision of aerial warfare, a large number of deaths can be attributed to the selection of targets in civilian areas. One high-profile example occurred during the war at Tora Bora when a US warplane hit the home of an associate of Osama bin Laden at the suggestion of Afghan commanders who knew he was not there. That attack in Pachir Agam killed an estimated 70 villagers.

The conflict's very nature, analysts said, played a role as well. When the war shifted from the dispatch of the Taliban to the narrower hunt for bin Laden, Mullah Mohammed Omar, and a few top cohorts, the task became more difficult. In at least three such targeted attempts, US bombs killed scores of villagers - many children among them - who had no connection to the top terrorists or their associates.

In past weeks, the Pentagon has faced questions from the media as well as some Afghan officials about the military decisions that resulted in civilian casualties.

General Tommy R. Franks, the commander of the war in Afghanistan, defended the campaign as "the most accurate war ever fought" in US history. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has steadfastly maintained that the war has cost relatively few civilian lives.

"If one were to take this activity in Afghanistan and rank it as to the number of civilian deaths" and the care taken by US forces to avoid them, Franks said, "I can't imagine there's been a conflict in history where there has been less collateral damage, less unintended consequences."

But one need look no further back than the estimated 500 civilian deaths in the 1999 Kosovo war to undercut that claim.
My first reaction to this is that Sarah Sewall was right about how bad the US military is at dealing with civilian casualty issues. If I were confronted with hyperbolic statements like the one by Tommy Franks, I'd also go looking for injured children.

On the other hand, the attitude of the Globe and LAT correspondents makes a mockey of Marc Herold's accusation that they are corporate stooges. God bless John Peter Zenger!
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