Consider This from NPR - NPR Investigation Reveals Flaws In U.S. Claims About Baghdadi Raid Casualties

Episode Date: July 28, 2023

Editor's note: This episode contains graphic descriptions of violence.The U.S. military has consistently maintained that its troops didn't harm civilians during the 2019 raid on the Syrian hideout of ISIS founder Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, which lead to Baghdadi blowing himself up.It stuck to that version of events even after NPR reported on claims from Syrians that civilians were killed and maimed by U.S. helicopter fire during the raid. The Pentagon claimed the men were enemy combatants.NPR sued the Pentagon under the Freedom of Information Act to release documentation of the airstrikes, and obtained a redacted copy of the Defense Department's confidential 2020 report on the incident.NPR's Daniel Estrin digs into the document, and finds that it reveals flaws in the Pentagon's conclusion.His investigation, in English and Arabic, includes declassified Pentagon documents, photos, maps and videos. In participating regions, you'll also hear a local news segment to help you make sense of what's going on in your community.Email us at [e-mail] more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

This message comes from Indiana University. Indiana University is committed to moving the world forward, working to tackle some of society's biggest challenges. Nine campuses, one purpose. Creating tomorrow, today. More at iu.edu. What really happened in northwest Syria the night of October 26, 2019? Last night, the United States brought the world's number one terrorist leader to justice. The U.S. military tells one version, a daring and successful raid against the founder of ISIS, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Troops raided his hideout and he blew himself up. And then President Donald Trump praised the operation.

This raid was impeccable. The U.S. says its troops killed no civilians in that raid. Here's the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Mark Milley. Our forces isolated the compound and protected all the noncombatants. But Syrians tell a very different story about that night. The day after the raid, NPR heard from a Syrian source that two of his relatives were killed in the attack. Civilians. We dug into the story, found footage of the scene, had photos of shrapnel analyzed by a former Pentagon official who identified it as a U.S. helicopter rocket strike,

and talked to seven relatives of the victims, including one of their mothers, Ratiba Kormo. The boy and the car are gone. The boy and the car are gone. The van they were driving was hit by a U.S. airstrike. Two cousins were killed and a friend riding with them lost a hand. When NPR broke this story back in 2019, a U.S. defense official said it was the first they'd heard of possible civilian casualties. The Pentagon launched a review. But after that review, the Pentagon rejected the claim of civilian casualties. It admitted to firing on the van, but said the men who were killed displayed hostile intent and were enemy combatants. So NPR sued the Pentagon for a copy of its confidential review

under the Freedom of Information Act. The Pentagon turned over a copy of the report. Some of it was redacted, but there was a lot of new information. Consider this. NPR analyzed the documents we obtained and found flaws in the Pentagon's conclusions, and now members of Congress want answers from the Pentagon. Ahead, we'll dig into what we found and we'll hear from the injured man who survived the attack and wants compensation. How is this my fault? I'm just a civilian. I didn't have any weapons. We're farmers. I make less than a dollar a day. Now I'm handicapped

and my two friends are in their graves. From NPR, I'm Scott Detrow. It's Friday, July 28th. This message comes from WISE, the app for doing things in other currencies. Send, spend, or receive money internationally, and always get the real-time mid-market exchange rate with no hidden fees. Download the WISE app today or visit WISE.com. T's and C's apply. It's Consider This from NPR. Before we dive into our reporting, here are the key points again.

Contrary to U.S. announcements, Syrians told NPR that civilians were killed and maimed in the U.S. raid on the founder of ISIS back in 2019. NPR's reporting prompted the Pentagon to conduct a confidential review of the raid and of NPR's reporting on the raid, and it denied those claims of civilian casualties. And now NPR has obtained a copy of that confidential review. We'll turn things over to NPR's Daniel Estrin, who's been reporting this story from the start. And a warning, this episode includes some graphic details. It was nighttime, and Barakat Ahmed Barakat says his two friends were giving him a ride home after work at an olive oil press. There was nothing suspicious at all. We kept moving normally.

There was nothing ahead of us on the road. Suddenly, I felt something hit us. Airstrikes targeted their van. As it turned out, they were approaching the hideout of ISIS founder Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi just as U.S. forces were raiding it. My friend was wounded all over his body and fell over onto the dashboard. Do a Google image search of Baghdadi and Carr, and you'll see photos of their mangled van seen around the world. There's footage of a white van that was riddled with bullets that was right next to the scene. A journalist asked about this in a press conference after the raid. Here's what General Kenneth McKenzie, who oversaw the operation, said. So the white van that you talk about was one of the vehicles that displayed hostile intent, came to order us and it was destroyed.

The men fled the van. Barakat says he carried his wounded friend across his chest and reached the side of the road when they were targeted with more airstrikes. I was so terrified that I didn't understand what exactly was striking us or what was happening. That's Barakat speaking this month at the very spot where this happened in 2019. AFP's Omar Hajqadur filmed him for NPR. In the airstrikes, Barakat's two friends were killed, and his right hand was blown off.

Cell phone video that surfaced after the attack shows a destroyed van, two pockmarked bodies, and a severed hand. NPR learned about this account at the time of the raid and brought these claims to the Pentagon that Syrian civilians were hit in U.S. airstrikes. The Pentagon launched a confidential review of the incident and told us the airstrikes were necessary. It said the men were enemy combatants who threatened forces because they didn't stop their car when troops fired warning shots. I didn't know what was going on. I was just trying to escape death. NPR sued the Pentagon to release its confidential review

under the Freedom of Information Act, and the Pentagon released a redacted copy. We showed it to experts, including Larry Lewis from the federally funded Center for Naval Analyses. He's advised the military on how to reduce civilian casualties, and he thinks the military got it wrong here. When I read it, and this is based on reading literally thousands of these cases, it seems very familiar. There are civilians going about their daily lives, and then they suddenly encounter a military force unexpectedly. The report redacts what kind of aircraft carried out the airstrikes, but military officials have said attack helicopters were used in the operation. Here's the timeline according to the Pentagon

report. First, there were combatants who opened fire on U.S. troops, and the troops fired back. Then Barakat's van passed through that spot and drove in the direction of ground troops further down the road. The report says a U.S. aircraft fired warning shots about 50 feet in front of the van, but the van kept going, so the aircraft targeted it directly. This is the core of the Pentagon's claim. The van demonstrated hostile intent because it didn't stop or alter course following warning shots.

But NPR's investigation found there was hardly any time to respond between the warning shots and the airstrike on the van. Here's how we reach that conclusion. The aerial photos in the report show that the aircraft struck the van in the same place it fired the warning shots. Looking at the photos, the van had only traveled about 50 feet, or maybe as much as 70. Barakat says they were going slowly.

So say as an estimate, the van was traveling just 15 miles an hour. They only had two or three seconds before the van was hit. Lewis says all this would have been a blur to someone driving in the dark. Tragically, what happens too often is that the military does not effectively communicate what it really wants. They want the van to stop. But what do they use? They use lethal force. So you get this escalation based on misunderstandings.

Here's another claim. The military report says after the airstrikes hit the van, the pilot thought there were explosions from the van, which could mean it was carrying explosives or weapons. And the pilot fired a rocket at the men as they fled. But the report says looking back, the men as they fled. But the report says, looking back, the Pentagon could not confirm what caused the explosions. There's no record the Pentagon contacted the airstrike survivor. Barakat says they never did.

Larry Lewis again. Military forces see a vehicle or an individual, they believe it is hostile, it's a threat, but they're mistaken, that it's actually civilian. And we call that misidentification. That's how I would characterize what is happening here. One of the Pentagon documents says something curious. It says, given the high visibility of this strike and allegation, it recommends the military provide a top secret document that, quote, further addresses the characterization of the individuals killed and injured as unlawful enemy belligerence, if the existing intelligence so supports.

I asked Lewis, what does the author mean by this? It does indicate kind of this question in the person that was writing this, like, you know, why are we so insistent that these people that we use force on, what is the real evidence that they were in fact combatants, that they weren't civilians that were caught in the wrong place at the wrong time? We asked the Pentagon. It said there is no record officials ever compiled any top secret document. so the Pentagon didn't provide the intelligence to support its own conclusion. We showed the Pentagon report to former Defense Department Special Counsel Ryan Goodman. There are several red flags that raise concerns. the analysis in these documents conflates or muddles an assessment of the decision-making at the time

under the fog of war versus the post-strike analysis that they may have gotten it wrong. In other words, it's one thing to say that troops acted reasonably in the heat of the moment. They saw a van approaching, decided in a matter of seconds that it was hostile, and fired on it. But it's another thing for the Pentagon to look at this months later

and still rely on the initial judgment troops made during the fog of war. One, that there were combatants in the area, even though the van did not open fire. And two, that the van ignored the Army's warning shots, even though we know those shots provided the van little time to react. In response to NPR's findings, U.S. Central Command spokesman Major John Moore said there was no formal investigation into the incident because the Pentagon found the allegations that U.S. troops killed civilians to be not credible, and it had no plans to reassess the allegations and, quote, nothing additional to offer. I brought all this to Barakat, whose hand was blown off in the strike.

He's had surgery to remove shrapnel from his other hand. He says he can hold things again. But he cannot afford his $8 physical therapy sessions and can't find work to provide enough food for his five young children. He's 39 now. He wants compensation. My future is destroyed. I have a family, kids. How is this their fault? Last year, the Defense Department introduced a new action plan to mitigate civilian casualties. And a U.S.-based nonprofit has taken up Barakat's case, the Zomia Center, which advocates for civilian victims of military strikes. Joanna Naples-Mitchell directs the group's redress program and wants the Defense Department to take a fresh look at this case.

She's collected documentation showing what Barakat was doing in the area, receipts from his work at a nearby olive oil press. The big takeaway from this is that two men are dead. Barakat is severely disabled. The military owes him a lot more. They owe him a real explanation for what happened to him because the military has not even taken basic steps to check their own assumptions from that night. She's requesting Barakat's case be reopened.

And last month after NPR inquired with the Pentagon, she says the Pentagon told her it's looking into the request. So the official U.S. narrative about civilian casualties in the raid against the head of ISIS may not be case closed. That's NPR's Daniel Estrin. In response to this NPR investigation, members of Congress have called for accountability for this case and for other past cases of civilian casualties. Senator Dick Durbin says he's, quote, troubled by the findings. And Senator Chris Murphy said, quote, it is inexcusable that this investigation was so flawed and the findings. And Senator Chris Murphy said, quote, it is inexcusable that this investigation was so flawed and clearly incomplete. And two members of the House are

calling on the Pentagon to redo its investigation. Representative Sarah Jacobs of the House Armed Services Committee, which oversees the Pentagon, is calling for the Pentagon to take another look at what happened that night in Syria and to, quote, reopen this investigation immediately and make amends if necessary. Representative Jason Crowe from the House Foreign Affairs Committee, who's a former soldier who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, has urged the same. You can check the episode notes for a link to the declassified Pentagon documents, photos of the survivor, and maps and video of the route he took the night of the attack. It's all available in English and in Arabic.

It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Scott Detrow.