Three Points From Charity’s Review of U.S. Airstrike on Afghan Hospital

Doctors Without Borders has released the initial findings of an internal review of the U.S. airstrike on its hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan, last month in which 30 staffers and patients were killed.

The harrowing details in the initial report give pause about what the final document might contain.

Here are three chief takeaways:

1. The hospital was not a Taliban haven.

In recent days, Afghan officials have said that “huge numbers”—some have said “hundreds”—of Taliban forces were holed up in the hospital when the airstrike was carried out.

But the report from MSF–the acronym for the charity’s French name, Medecins Sans Frontieres–says that of the hospital’s 105 patients at the time of the assault, 20 were Taliban and all of them were wounded. Several days earlier, there had been about 65 wounded Taliban in the facility and 130 patients. None of these wounded militants, the report says, were armed—part of a strictly enforced “no weapons” policy at the hospital.

2. There were no hostilities in or around the hospital in the hours before the airstrike.

Fighting had been intense around the hospital in the preceding days, but hostilities had ceased before the assault began, the report says. According to MSF staff, there was no fighting; there were no airplanes in the skies, no gunshots, and no explosions. Some staff had gone outside onto the grounds of the compound to take advantage of the calm. This information calls into question the Afghan government’s claim that its forces had come under fire near the hospital and had asked the U.S. for help.

3. The airstrikes were “multiple, precise and sustained.”

This was not a case of weaponry raining down on a hospital and then ending as quickly as it started. The barrage lasted for about an hour. The report refers to “shooting that appears to follow the movement of people on the run.” MSF staff were targeted “while running to reach safety in a different part of the compound.”

The report is based on interviews with MSF staff, both Afghan and international. The findings raise unsettling questions for the U.S. and its Afghan partners.

The opinions expressed here are those solely of the author.

This article was originally published in the Washington Wire.