Afghan civilians pay heavy price for faulty intelligence

US forces gain reputation for shooting first and asking questions later after another tragic accident

The bombing of the village of Kakarak may turn out to have caused the largest number of civilian casualties yet in the Afghan war, but it is just the latest tragic mishap during attacks by American forces.

Running the war in Afghanistan from headquarters in Tampa Florida, 6,000 miles away, is proving more difficult than expected – even with the aid of the most advanced hi-tech equipment deployed in combat.

From the first days of air strikes over Afghanistan, there had been repeated claims of civilians killed by American warplanes. But only since the fall of the Taliban government, and the influx of the media into the country, have the allegations been investigated to any degree.

The first big case to come under scrutiny arose at the inauguration of America's protégé, Hamid Karzai in mid- December last year. A party setting off from the south-east province of Paktia to attend the ceremony in Kabul was attacked by AC-130 gunships and Navy jets, killing 60 and injuring about 40.

Paktia, with its Pashtun population, had strong ties with the Taliban, and was thus the type of area that the new Karzai government needed to bring on board. Instead, the American attack led to widespread anger and protest.

The Pentagon insisted that what had been attacked was an al-Qa'ida convoy. The commander of the Afghan War, General Tommy Franks, said his forces were acting on intelligence and had retaliated after coming under fire from two surface-to-air missiles.

Inquiries discovered subsequently that the "intelligence" supplied had come from a Paktia warlord, Pacha Khan, who had a score to settle with the nomadic Kochi clan travelling in the convoy.

According to locals, his men had blocked off the main road between the towns of Khost and Gardez, forcing the convoy to get on to a remote mountain pass, thus making it appear to be trying to escape detection.

Khan, whose brother Amanullah Zadran, was a minister for borders in the Karzai administration, was accused of using the Americans to kill enemies on his behalf on a number of later occasions.

Despite pledges by the American military authorities, given unofficially, that more care would be taken over air strikes, deaths have continued. And not only Afghan civilians have fallen victim. A US pilot, with the call sign "Psycho", killed four Canadian soldiers, when he dropped a 500lb bomb on them. The soldiers had been on night fire exercise and they had notified US authorities of what they were doing.

They were the first Canadian soldiers to be killed on combat since the Korean war. An eight-week investigation decided that the pilot, Major Harry Schmidt, had ignored basic safety procedure. President George Bush took more than a day to apologise and Canadian anger was further fuelled by the seeming indifference of the US media.

The Pentagon's normal reaction to the civilian casualties has been to insist that fire had been returned in self-defence.