US Special Forces 'Tried to Cover-up' Botched Khataba Raid in Afghanistan

April 05, 2010 "The Times" -- US special forces soldiers dug bullets out of their victims’ bodies in the bloody aftermath of a botched night raid, then washed the wounds with alcohol before lying to their superiors about what happened, Afghan investigators have told The Times.

Two pregnant women, a teenage girl, a police officer and his brother were shot on February 12 when US and Afghan special forces stormed their home in Khataba village, outside Gardez in eastern Afghanistan. The precise composition of the force has never been made public.

The claims were made as Nato admitted responsibility for all the deaths for the first time last night. It had initially claimed that the women had been dead for several hours when the assault force discovered their bodies.

“Despite earlier reports we have determined that the women were accidentally killed as a result of the joint force firing at the men,” said Lieutenant-Colonel Todd Breasseale, a Nato spokesman. The coalition continued to deny that there had been a cover-up and said that its legal investigation, which is ongoing, had found no evidence of inappropriate conduct.

The Kabul headquarters of General Stanley McChrystal, the commander of US and Nato forces, claimed originally that the women had been “tied up, gagged and killed”.

A senior Afghan official involved in a government investigation told The Times: “I think the special forces lied to McChrystal.”

“Why did the special forces collect their bullets from the area?” the official said. “They washed the area of the injuries with alcohol and brought out the bullets from the dead bodies. The bodies showed there were big holes.”

www.informationclearinghouse.info...

What kind of monsters are we creating? Is our military unaccountable and above all laws of all lands?

We not only have a video of our military gunning down journalist in the street carrying tripods NOT guns. You would think with our military high technologies to just zoom in with their cameras they would have seen these were not guns this was a classic case of our military NOT following the rules of engagement.

Now we have another story of US and Afghan Special Forces stormed in these innocent people home in Khataba.

Do you all think if we let serial killers investigate their own crimes that the end result would be the same as above?

Is our military creating monsters? In addition, I do not want to hear Oh, this is just collateral damage. This is a clear case of cover-up.


[edit on 6-4-2010 by impressme]

reply to post by impressme


I agree collateral damage happens...that much I get. I also get that people make mistakes in war, good people even. But there is never an excuse for lying and covering up a wrong doing. For what gain? Why do we need to cover anything up. To stop people from becoming enraged so they don't kill our troops? Anyone that buys that load of BS coming from our politicians must have forgotten we are at war and the fighting has not stopped in almost 10 years. They already know we kill accidentally or wrecklessly. It is about time the American people know this reality as well.

I agree with expostfacto for the most part. But the war we are fighting is a strange one. Men and women strap themselves with explosive in order to kill or injure as many people as possible. Hell, I read an article the other day that talked about Doctors being able to place explosive in women so they can board an plane, then blow it up in the air. These breast implants are loaded with the same explosive the crotch bomber used.
This basically boils down to the fog of war. While it is unfortunate that women are killed, it all boils down to who can a soldier trust in a war zone. The answer is simple. Trust no one but your squad mates. They are the only one that have your six!