The US military, which invaded and illegally occupied Afghanistan for almost two decades, killed 12 Afghan civilians in 2021, according to a congressionally mandated Pentagon report, pointing to a tip of an iceberg.
Faraan: They were killed in a botched drone strike the American military carried out in the Afghan capital Kabul on August 29, 2021, the report states, one day before the phased US military drawdown ended.
Seven of the ten civilians killed in that incident were children, according to the report released on Tuesday, which constitutes only a fraction of atrocities unleashed by the US forces in Afghanistan. It also documents the killing of a civilian in a US strike on January 8 in western Herat province, and another on August 11 in southern Kandahar province. The botched drone strike in August 2021 prompted a half-hearted apology from then-head of US Central Command Gen. Frank McKenzie, who admitted it was a “mistake.”
However, no US military officials or troops were punished or held accountable for the deadly strike. Taliban staged a stunning comeback in August 2021, toppling the West-backed government in Kabul and forcing the US and its allies to abandon the country after years of futile military adventure. The dramatic collapse of the former Afghan government and its national security forces followed by the Taliban. For two decades, the war in Afghanistan remained an enigma for the successive US governments, from George Bush to Joe Biden, finally ending in a botched military exit and a disgraceful defeat.
It started on February 29, 2020, when then-US President Donald Trump’s administration signed an agreement with the Taliban to pull out US troops from the country by May 1, 2021. The deal, however, failed to de-escalate tensions between the two sides. On April 14, 2021, President Joe Biden announced that the remaining 2,500-3,500 US troops in Afghanistan would withdraw by September 11 to end what he called America’s “forever war.”
