In Memory of

17-25 civilians

killed on late in the afternoon of June 29, 2005

in the tiny village of Chichal located in the mountains next to the Korengal Valley, Kunar Province. U.S. B-52 bombers dropped two “precision-guided” JDAM bombs upon homes in the village located some 5 kms from where a U.S. Special Operations MH-47 helicopter of the Army’s 160^th Special Operations Aviation Regiment was downed by resistance ground fire. But instead of killing an insurgent leader who was not there, the strike slaughtered some 17-25 innocent civilians. The U.S. military propaganda system described the houses as “a known operating base for terrorist attacks…as well as a base for a medium-level terrorist leader.” Note the use of the word “terrorist” for anyone fighting the U.S. occupation, and that no evidence is provided about the U.S assertions. Villagers who went to help those killed and injured in the initial U.S. bombing were hit in the second strike, completely violating established international rules of conducting war. Even the puppet governor of Kunar, Assadullah Wafa, mentioned that the 20 dead included women and children. On July 1^st, the Americans were still bombing the Mano Gai area.

The U.S. bombing took place amidst a search mission trying to locate 4 missing U.S. Navy Seals.  Whereas the U.S. mainstream corporate press produced yards of print on the missing Seals, next to nothing appeared on the 17-25 dead Afghans. Pentagon spokesperson, Lawrence Di Rita offered the usual platitude saying the U.S. military takes “great strides” in trying to be precise when targeting combatants. Di Rita added, “it is obviously an unfortunate situation. It was in the context of counter-terrorism operations…[T]these things do occur and we obviously regret when they do.” Amen. On June 30^th, another Pentagon spokesman, Lt. Colonel Jerry O’Hara said, “the attack targeted a compound which in our assessment we had to hit immediately.”

B-52 bombers drop two JDAM bombs upon a tiny hamlet