General orders new probe into deadly battle

A top US military commander has ordered a new investigation into a firefight in Afghanistan that claimed the lives of nine American soldiers and led to claims of negligence by their senior commanders.

General David Petraeus, who heads the US Central Command, has appointed Richard Natonski, a Marine Corps lieutenant general, to handle the inquiry, Central Command announced.

New issues have arisen since an official army investigation into the battle was completed more than a year ago, the command said, but it would not say what those issues were.

Family members of the soldiers killed when their remote outpost was attacked by around 200 Taliban have said the army’s investigation was inadequate. More than two dozen soldiers were wounded during the battle on July 13 2008.

“When you have an entire infantry platoon basically rendered combat ineffective, surprised by 200 insurgents, something just doesn’t sit right,” said David Brostrom, a retired army colonel whose son Jonathan was one of the soldiers killed.

In a July 9 letter, Senator Jim Webb, a Virginia Democrat, had asked the Pentagon inspector general for an independent review of “the actions taken at each level of the chain of command” during what has become known as the Battle of Wanat involving a platoon from the 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team.

In the letter, Senator Webb cited information from Mr Brostrom and a study of the battle by the Combat Studies Institute at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, that counters the army’s initial finding that there was no fault by senior commanders.

According to Senator Webb, the platoon leader on the scene was required to establish his combat outpost at a site selected by his higher-level commanders instead of a location based on his own judgment.

“There is evidence the site was chosen for political reasons following protracted (10-month) negotiations with local Afghan leaders,” Senator Webb wrote.

When the platoon was ordered to Wanat, a small village in north-eastern Afghanistan, an ongoing transfer of brigade-size units may have distracted commanders from a “rapidly evolving insurgent threat” under way in the area, the senator said.

He also said the platoon leader was in frequent communication with higher headquarters two days before the attacks. But commanders there did not heed his warnings about the growing risk of hostilities.

Instead, according to the Combat Studies Institute review, they ordered the withdrawal of intelligence and surveillance gear from Wanat on July 12, a day before the assault.

Kurt Zwilling, whose son Gunnar was killed, said putting an officer outside the army in charge should give the review needed impartiality.

“The people that were in charge of that disaster investigated themselves and found that they did nothing wrong,” Mr Zwilling said.

“I thought the first investigation was a sham.”