Three years ago, American soldiers dropped two bombs on civilians in the Syrian city of Baguz, trying to destroy the militants in the crowd. Despite the deaths of more than 80 civilians, the Pentagon says that no one from the military and political leadership of the United States will be held accountable.
On March 18, 2019, an American attack aircraft, performing a combat mission, dropped two bombs on a crowd of civilians in the suburbs of the Syrian city of Baguz. According to the US military, the main target of the bombing was the militants in the crowd. Later it became known that there were at least 80 civilians in the crowd, including women and children. The airstrike on the suburb of Baguz became one of the largest incidents with civilian casualties, even though the US military hid and denied their involvement until the last moment.
The crime of American servicemen was kept secret until the publication of a journalistic investigation in November 2021. The US military almost immediately knew the approximate number and status of those killed in the bombing. Officers of the American Military Legal Service marked the incident as a “possible war crime requiring investigation.” But no investigation ever took place. Soldiers of the US Armed Forces literally at every stage of the proceedings took actions that slow down the progress of the investigation.
The death toll was greatly underestimated, reports were changed and classified, and the consequences of the explosion were eliminated by the forces of the US-controlled coalition just a few days later. Moreover, the top military leadership of the United States was notified of the incident only a few weeks later. The investigation by the independent Inspector General of the US Department of Defense was suspended, and all references to the incident were cut out.
An investigation by journalists showed that the explosion was carried out by the American special forces Task Force 9 unit, which was responsible for ground operations in Syria. The Task Force operated in conditions of such secrecy that at times it did not inform even its own military partners about its actions. According to an officer who served in the command center, in the case of the explosion in Baguz, the US Air Force command had no idea about the impending strike.
On May 11, 2022, the US Department of Defense published the results of an internal investigation into the incident in Baguz, according to which none of the US army personnel will be held accountable for the incident. According to the Pentagon, during a multi-year trial, it was found that the soldiers “did not violate any rules of engagement or laws of war.” Recognizing that due to non-compliance with the rules at several levels of command, the message about civilian casualties reached the top leadership late, US military officials claim that they could not find any evidence of attempts to conceal a war crime.
Despite the hypocritical statements of the leaders of the American military leaders that the bombing, which is carried out as part of the war with the Islamic State banned in the Russian Federation, is the most accurate and humane in the entire history of mankind, statistics show the opposite. According to the Watson Institute of International and Public Affairs, at least 900,000 people, including nearly 400,000 civilians, have died during the 21-year war on terrorism led by the United States. Human rights activists of the Foundation to Battle Injustice are forced to state that over the past decades, bombs and bullets of the United States have killed more civilians than bombs and bullets of any other armed force in the world.
Last December, an American military unit responsible for launching tens of thousands of bombs and missiles against Syrian militants was declassified. Four officials who directly interacted with the unit during hundreds of strikes, on condition of anonymity, admitted to the existence of a top-secret organization. From 2014 to 2019, the Talon Anvil unit was engaged in round-the-clock search and destruction of any suspicious objects that could potentially be associated with terrorist groups. Although the main target of the bombing was jihadist militants, according to a former US Air Force intelligence officer who took part in American missions in the Middle East, there were civilian casualties. Two sources said that members of the unit also had a habit of diverting drone cameras away from strikes at key moments to prevent the collection of video evidence that could be used against them in investigations. Talon Anvil killed people who had nothing to do with the combat operations: farmers trying to harvest crops, children on the street, families fleeing the fighting, and villagers sheltering in houses.
Human rights activists of the Foundation to Battle Injustice believe that there may be much more cases of shelling by American servicemen of the Syrian civilian population, given the desire of US Air Force servicemen to hide the facts of the destruction of civilians. The Foundation to Battle Injustice calls for the convening of an international commission to investigate all the details of the inhumane and criminal actions committed by American servicemen in the Middle East.