![]() Now, they said, because they are so precise and they had a deliberative and careful process to strike, that you could do that, you could use that kind of firepower, and avoid civilian casualties. And in the course of trying to drive ISIS out of Syria and Iraq between 20, the United States dropped about 112,000 bombs and missiles. You can drop a missile or a bomb on a pinhead. What has the military generally said about the policies that govern their use, their selection of targets and their care to avoid civilian deaths?ĭAVE PHILIPPS: Well, it is pretty astounding how precise America's weapons are now. And these weapons dispatched from the sky in the way of drones and bombing raids bring enormous death-dealing power. You know, in this war against ISIS, Americans were generally not involved in combat roles, but American forces provided air support in a big way to Iraqi and Kurdish forces. Well, Dave Philipps, welcome back to FRESH AIR. His latest book about the Navy SEAL accused of war crimes in Iraq and acquitted of the most serious charges is "Alpha: Eddie Gallagher And The War For The Soul Of The Navy SEALs." Dave Philipps is a Pulitzer Prize-winning correspondent covering the military for The New York Times. Despite complaints from others in the military and the CIA, Philipps reports, the attacks have been largely unacknowledged by the military, and no one has been disciplined for the civilian deaths. Philipps details one particularly horrific bombing in 2019, which appears to have killed as many as 70 women and children. military was allowed to pick targets for drone attacks and bombing runs with little oversight, and that as the conflict wore on, it increasingly sidestepped rules to protect noncombatants, ordering airstrikes that killed farmers in their fields, children in the street and families fleeing combat. In recent stories, Philipps reports that a top-secret unit of the U.S. Civilian casualties are sadly common in most armed conflicts, but our guest today, New York Times correspondent Dave Philipps, says the United States' air war against ISIS seems to have been particularly brutal on innocent civilians in Syria. I'm Dave Davies, in today for Terry Gross.
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