'The Americans ... They Just Drop Their Bombs and Leave' Afghanistan: U.S. airstrikes were highly accurate, but hundreds of civilians still died. Now, some survivors want compensation
by David Zucchino
TORA BORA, Afghanistan -- After the American warplanes were gone and the hilltop village of Mudoh lay in ruins, survivors tried to collect and bury their dead.
There were problems. Most of the men and boys who had survived the Nov. 30 airstrike were bloodied and dazed. The village cemetery was not big enough to accommodate the dead. And the remains were not intact.
"No one should ever have to bury a baby's hand," said Janat Khan, the silver-bearded mayor of Mudoh, who said he collected the body parts of 15 villagers, wrapped them in plastic shopping bags and buried them in a single grave. A new cemetery carved from a rocky bluff where the village once stood holds the remains of 150 men, women and children, according to villagers and pro-American commanders. They were killed, and the village obliterated, by American warplanes during the battle that drove Taliban and Al Qaeda forces from nearby Tora Bora.
The carnage at Mudoh is the residue of a bombing campaign that, while exceptionally accurate, nonetheless killed, at minimum, hundreds of civilians and wounded thousands more. At 25 sites visited by The Times, witnesses said U.S. warplanes killed and maimed civilians because of unreliable intelligence, stray ordnance and faulty targeting, or because enemy fighters mingled with civilians.
Grieving villagers readily acknowledge that they are glad to be rid of the Taliban. But they are puzzled and angry about the United States' reluctance to apologize or provide compensation. More than seven months after U.S. planes began dropping bombs, pain and recriminations endure in villages across Afghanistan.
U.S. bombs killed 45 men, women and children at the desert oasis of Showkar Kariz near Kandahar on Oct. 22, according to pro-American provincial officials and the only remaining inhabitant.
Bombs killed four civilian passersby and eight pro-American fighters of the Northern Alliance who were driving Toyota pickups they had just captured from the Taliban at Tora Bora on Dec. 1. The next day, district officials say, nine employees of the shura, or council, in Pacheer-o-Agam near Tora Bora were killed by bombing shortly after they took over the council office from the Taliban.
American bombs killed about 40 civilians at Esterghich, a village north of Kabul, in early November during an airstrike on Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters, said Northern Alliance soldiers from the village.
Victims of such attacks are demanding compensation for their lost loved ones and ruined villages. Some commanders who fought alongside the Americans are adding their voices to the demands.
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