Washington | Wednesday
IN a public relations setback, the Pentagon acknowledged on Tuesday that US warplanes missed their targets in two separate incidents over the weekend, dropping bombs on a residential area of Kabul and near a senior citizens home on the outskirts of Herat.
Pentagon representative Victoria Clarke said the Pentagon had no information that US bombs had struck either a civilian hospital in Herat, as claimed by Taliban officials on Monday, or a military hospital, as reported by a UN representative in Islamabad.
“We take extraordinary care on the targeting process. Our targets are military. Our targets are Al Qaeda. That is what we’re going after. There is unintended damage. There is collateral damage.
Thus far, it has been extremely limited from what we’ve seen,” she said.
But the disclosures come amid Taliban claims of mounting civilian casualties and UN expressions of concern over US air strikes in residential areas of Kabul as Taliban forces move in to hide from US bombs.
The first incident occurred on Saturday when a US Navy F-14 Tomcat missed its target — parked military vehicles — and dropped two 227-kilogram bombs about half a mile away into a residential area northwest of Kabul, Clarke said.
On Sunday, a US Navy F/A-18 Hornet dropped a 454-kilogram bomb in an open area near a senior citizens home about 91 meters from its intended target, a vehicle storage building at the Herat army barracks, she said.
A US defence official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said earlier that there were indications that a building had been hit in the bombing. A second defence official said there may have been “secondary effects” from the explosion but it did not hit a building.
“Although the details are still being investigated, preliminary indications are that the weapons guidance system malfunctioned,” she said.
Clarke said the Pentagon had no information on casualties in either case.
Taliban officials had said on Monday that more than 100 people were killed in an airstrike on a Herat hospital, a claim initially disputed by US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
In Islamabad, UN representative Stephanie Bunker said the United Nations had received information late on Tuesday that a military hospital in a compound on the outskirts of Herat was hit and reportedly destroyed.
She also said there were reports that several bombs had hit residential areas close to health and feeding centres in Kabul, and that a residential area called Macroyan had been hit.
“Residential areas and some villages around Kabul are becoming more dangerous because Taliban troops are moving into those areas,” Bunker told a press conference in Islamabad.
Rear Admiral John Stufflebeem, deputy director of operations for the Joint Staff, said there were anecdotal reports of Taliban forces using residential areas as cover, but he said US air forces were acting with restraint.
“What hits may have occurred in residential areas are rare mistakes — or rare errors, is probably more appropriate. When we do go into Kabul as we have done, we’re going after a very specific military target, Taliban target, and we’re using very precise ways to get at it,” he said.
“There is not an intention to open or widen attacks in the cities. We will find other ways, …, using the full spectrum capability of our military, to get at those who might cowardly decide to hide in residential neighbourhoods,” he said.
The struggle to shape the public’s perception of the conflict has emerged as a key battlefield, particularly in the Muslim world, where sympathy for the war’s civilian victims plays against US assurances the campaign targets terrorists, not Islam.
The Taliban has said that more than 1 000 civilians have been killed in the air raids, and has issued a stream of daily reports of attacks on mosques and residential areas.
Rumsfeld last week denounced the Taliban as “accomplished liars” and Clarke on Tuesday dismissed their claims as “outright lies.”
Pentagon officials insist the air campaign has focused on legitimate military targets, most of them in remote areas and chosen with an eye to minimizing the risk of civilian casualties or damage. – AFP