NPR Investigation Reveals Flaws In U.S. Claims About Baghdadi Raid Casualties
Consider This from NPR
NPR
4.2 • 6.2K Ratings
🗓️ 28 July 2023
⏱️ 13 minutes
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Summary
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.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | What really happened in Northwest Syria the night of October 26, 2019? |
| 0:12.2 | Last night the United States brought the world's number one terrorist leader to justice. |
| 0:18.5 | The U.S. military tells one version, a daring and successful raid against the founder |
| 0:22.6 | of ISIS, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. |
| 0:25.5 | Troops raided his hideout and he blew himself up, and then President Donald Trump praised |
| 0:30.3 | the operation. |
| 0:31.4 | This raid was impeccable. |
| 0:33.7 | The U.S. says its troops killed no civilians in that raid. |
| 0:37.4 | Here's the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Mark Milley. |
| 0:40.0 | Our forces isolated the compound and protected all the non-combatants. |
| 0:44.2 | But Syrians tell a very different story about that night. |
| 0:48.0 | The day after the raid, NPR heard from a Syrian source that two of his relatives were killed |
| 0:52.6 | in the attack, civilians. |
| 0:55.0 | We dug into the story, found footage of the scene, had photos of Shrapnel, analyzed by |
| 0:59.5 | a former Pentagon official who identified it as a U.S. helicopter rocket strike, and talked |
| 1:04.6 | to seven relatives of the victims, including one of their mothers, Ritiba Kormo. |
| 1:10.4 | The boy and the car are gone, the boy and the car are gone. |
| 1:16.4 | The van they were driving was hit by a U.S. air strike. |
| 1:19.7 | Two cousins were killed, and a friend riding with them lost a hand. |
| 1:23.9 | When NPR broke this story back in 2019, a U.S. defense official said it was the first |
| 1:28.1 | they'd heard of possible civilian casualties. |
| 1:31.1 | The Pentagon launched a review. |
... |
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