MADRID (AP) — U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter on Sunday promised a full and transparent investigation into whether a U.S. aircraft providing support for American and Afghan commandos was responsible for the explosions that destroyed a hospital in northern Afghanistan, killing 22 people.
Speaking to reporters traveling with him to Spain, Carter said, “the situation there is confused and complicated, so it may take some time to get the facts, but we will get the facts.”
He said he spoke to Gen. John Campbell, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, and to Marine Gen. Joseph Dunford, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, during his flight to Madrid, adding that “there will be accountability as always in these incidents, if that is required.”
Carter said he told Campbell to make sure that the U.S. provides any medical care needed for those in the northern city of Kunduz.
U.S. officials said American special operations forces advising Afghan commandos in the vicinity of the hospital requested the air support when they came under fire in Kunduz. The officials said the AC-130 gunship responded and fired on the area, but Carter said it’s not certain yet whether that was what destroyed the hospital.
Carter said he believes the U.S. will have better information in the coming days, once U.S. and international investigators get access to the hospital site. Officials said the senior U.S. military investigator is in Kunduz but hasn’t yet been able to get to the site because it continues to be a contested area between the Afghans and the Taliban militants.
The officials were not authorized to discuss the incident publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.
Carter is in the first day of a weeklong trip to Europe. He will visit Spain, Italy and London for meetings with top defense leaders. He also will attend a NATO meeting of defense ministers in Brussels.
Earlier this year, Carter visited Estonia and met with eastern European defense chiefs, announcing he will send tanks, armored vehicles and other military equipment to six former Soviet bloc nations to help reassure NATO allies facing threats from Russia.
This trip will focus more on the threats to southern Europe, including Russian aggression as well as Islamic State terrorists and other violent extremists from the Middle East and northern Africa.
Carter said he believed it was important to go to “the southern flank” because the violence, lawlessness and the refugee crisis are all having a tremendous impact across Europe.
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Well, that’s just great. Once again, the US military displays an utter lack of concern for avoiding civilian casualties.
Who else is in the air over Afghanistan?
For thousands of years now, one sure mark of how long a given empire has endured has been - is - how many times it invades Afghanistan.
Since every invading force loses there, it takes time to forget or get effectively vague on the costs before restoring the naivete sufficiently to go in again.
Lots have invaded there, including every empire with the least interest in the region. More often than many of us might imagine invade with some motive that could actually be argued as good intent. But once there, all invading forces fail - always - taking on staggering costs to their culture in lost people, resources & ideals.
Russia has been out of there for almost 2 decades now, yet Russia is still suffering massive devastating effects to their economy, national self-image, military morale and international prestige from invading and occupying Afghanistan. Tho of course it fails - it always fails - but recent Putin adventurism in Ukraine and in Syria can easily be traced back to efforts to overcome Russia in Afghanistan.
Being still there for closing in on 15 years now, we can expect to suffer at least something like the same long term effects as did Russia. The grosser ones are already evident: the dead, the forever wounded, the weakening and thinning out of our military forces, and hundreds of billions spent, most if not all wasted.
On just this event, SoD Ash Carter may have spoken today with best of intentions. If it turns out, as I think is inevitable, that the U.S. caused this, those good intentions will be degraded and sabotaged due to internal politics and fear of effects on domestic politics. And no matter what gets found out, there will be no reckoning.
Ashton Carter is a card carrying NEOCON. This was an intentional strike to terrorize everyone even more. I’m betting on it. Why not? Seems fairly routine as the regime’s Crimes Against Humanity go. No holds are barred in world conquest, never have been, never will be. Remember, the hospital was in constant contact with their USA attackers for weeks before the strike, and during it. This was not a “mistake”. Don’t be fooled by anything this regime says. It speaks no truth, ever, none of them.
The attack by the US on this hospital was intentional. Remember, Obama / Carter tell us over and over again their strikes are “surgical”. Well, here’s another one. This is how a fascist terrorist regime operates - bloodthirsty to the max to terrorize everyone, create maximum chaos and suffering. This is advantageous in their attempt to rule the planet, and trivial in the eyes of the NeoCons / Obama / dubya et. al.