Defence chief says US must do more to prevent civilian deaths

WASHINGTON • US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin has said the military needs to do more to prevent civilian casualties, his first public comments about an American air strike in Syria in 2019 that killed women and children.

Mr Austin had requested a briefing on the strike after a New York Times investigation over the weekend described allegations that top officers and civilian officials sought to conceal casualties.

The Defence Secretary promised to revamp military procedures and hold top officers responsible for civilian harm, but he did not discuss any systemic problems that allowed civilian casualties to persist on battlefields in Syria and Afghanistan. He also did not say whether senior officers would be held accountable.

"Every civilian casualty is tragic," Mr Austin told reporters at the Pentagon. "Where we see we're not doing things as well as we could, we should adjust."

After his remarks, the House Armed Services Committee announced it would investigate the matter.

"Both the incident and the efforts to cover it up are deeply disturbing," Representative Adam Smith, a Washington Democrat and the chair of the panel, said in an e-mail to the New York Times.

Mr Austin, who became defence chief this year, received a classified briefing on Tuesday about the strike and the military's handling of it from General Kenneth McKenzie Jr, head of the military's Central Command which oversaw the air war in Syria.

Aides said on Wednesday that Mr Austin was still digesting Gen McKenzie's briefing, as well as newly submitted plans from top commanders on how to mitigate civilian casualties. Those steps were recommended in a separate investigation into a drone strike in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Aug 29 that killed 10 civilians, including seven children.

On Monday, Mr John Kirby, the Pentagon's top spokesman, declined to comment on details of the Syria strike, which took place near the town of Baghuz on March 18, 2019, as part of the final battle against fighters from the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria group in a remnant of a once-sprawling religious state across the two countries.

The New York Times investigation showed that the death toll from the strike - 80 people - was almost immediately apparent to military officials.

A legal officer flagged the bombing as a possible war crime that required an investigation. But at nearly every step, the military made moves that concealed the catastrophic strike.

NYTIMES