In Strikes on Libya by NATO, an Unspoken Civilian Toll

[xchrom]

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/18/world/africa/scores-of-unintended-casualties-in-nato-war-in-libya.html?ref=world

TRIPOLI, Libya — NATO’s seven-month air campaign in Libya, hailed by the alliance and many Libyans for blunting a lethal crackdown by Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi and helping to push him from power, came with an unrecognized toll: scores of civilian casualties the alliance has long refused to acknowledge or investigate.

By NATO’s telling during the war, and in statements since sorties ended on Oct. 31, the alliance-led operation was nearly flawless — a model air war that used high technology, meticulous planning and restraint to protect civilians from Colonel Qaddafi’s troops, which was the alliance’s mandate.

“We have carried out this operation very carefully, without confirmed civilian casualties,” the secretary general of NATO, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, said in November.

But an on-the-ground examination by The New York Times of airstrike sites across Libya — including interviews with survivors, doctors and witnesses, and the collection of munitions remnants, medical reports, death certificates and photographs — found credible accounts of dozens of civilians killed by NATO in many distinct attacks. The victims, including at least 29 women or children, often had been asleep in homes when the ordnance hit.

[karynnj]

1. I assume no one thought that you could bomb a country and no innocents would die

Reading the details, I think the title is overblown. When they get to numbers from their investigation, they say:

"In all, at least 40 civilians, and perhaps more than 70, were killed by NATO at these sites, available evidence suggests. "

Though any deaths are tragic and to be avoided, these numbers do show that NATO did give priority to avoiding civilian deaths. This number has to be balanced by the number of people Qaddafi was killing - or saying he would kill. I believe that was greater than 70 The questions to be asked are whether it was Qaddafi's threats to kill the protesters was credible in view of past actions and, if you think they were, is humanitarian intervention that will result in its own casualties, justified.

[tabatha]

2. Yes.

NATO took the utmost care to avoid civilian deaths - Gaddafi was only interested in killing civilians.

Here are some comments from a :Libyan FB page:

Oliver Deák Frankly, given that NATO made more than 27,000 strikes on various targets 2 wrong target identification (Majer and Sirt) plus one bomb malfunction (Tripoli) is the highest succesfull rate of all time in any operation carried out by any airforce anywhere in the world. Wether we like it or not mistakes happen, bad intelligence killed a lot of people in warzones but in this case we have 2 wrong strikes becuase of intelligence failure. 2 from 27 000. As for the debris, Im sorry but there is simply no way to avoid them, NATO had a choice to leave ammunition bunkers alone and thus to be used for futher military actions by pro-G forces and bomb them and risk that secondary explosions and debris may hit someone. But the target was clearly military one, that goes without a question.
14 hours ago

Amatullah Katchina Nato has done very Well for my family in Libya of which there are over one hundred family members..dont speak of something you dont know about First Hand
10 hours ago

Marguerite Dehler Amatullah Katchine I know it very closely -- I have friends that died, friends that lived through it -- and I know many who ran around trying to notify NATO, willing to sacrifice their lives to show them where to hit. I am glad all your family members survived, that is wonderful
9 hours ago