WASHINGTON, July 1 (UPI) — Paired with a new executive order aimed at reducing the dangers from U.S. airstrikes for civilians, government officials said Friday that the number of non-combatants killed by American military strikes during President Barack Obama’s administration has been relatively low — maybe even less than 100.
Friday’s disclosure, on the eve of the Independence Day holiday weekend, reflects continuing efforts by the administration for greater transparency and accountability in acknowledging civilian casualty figures — an aspect of the U.S. war on terror that has not traditionally received much official documentation.
According to a report by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, U.S. strikes targeting militants or terrorist facilities outside conventional war zones resulted in at least 64, but no greater than 116, civilian deaths between Obama’s inauguration in 2009 and Dec. 31 — a time span that included 473 airstrikes and resulted in nearly 2,600 combatant deaths.
The civilian deaths in question occurred outside the areas of active hostilities — Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria, the report said, and many were the result of drone strikes.
The figures were released the same day as a new executive order from Obama, which seeks greater protection for civilians in dangerous areas and requires that death tolls associated with U.S. airstrikes be disclosed by the federal government every year.
“This Executive Order applies to all of our operations, regardless of where they are conducted, and underscores that our legal and policy commitments regarding the protection of civilians are fundamentally consistent with the effective, efficient, and decisive use of force in pursuit of our Nation’s interests,” the White House said Friday.
Obama’s order details numerous measures intended to avert and better handle civilian casualties, such as additional training, cooperation with humanitarian organizations like the Red Cross, and financial payments to civilian victims and their families.
Under the order, the DNI, and possibly other department heads, will be instructed to detail military strikes and any civilian casualties resulting from such operations on a yearly basis.
“The President has underscored that we will continue to develop a sustainable legal and policy architecture to guide our counterterrorism activities going forward,” the White House also stated in Friday’s news release.
Obama has publicly continued efforts since he took office in 2009 to address the civilian casualty issue. In 2013, he issued Presidential Policy Guidance that established policy standards for potentially deadly military actions by specifically defining who can, and who cannot, be targeted by lethal U.S. anti-terror force.
The administration’s stated civilian death toll is difficult to confirm and it remains unclear how and why they were targeted, or what affiliations they may have had. Independent groups which attempt to track civilian casualties have in recent months and years indicated that the toll is significantly higher than the White House estimate.
“They’re guessing, too,” Bill Roggio, editor of the Long War Journal at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, who tracks civilian deaths, told the New York Times Friday. “Theirs may be a little more educated than my guesses. But they cannot be completely accurate.”
The DNI’s report cited various potential reasons for the discrepancies between government and independent death tolls.
“There are a number of possible reasons that these non-governmental organizations’ reports of the number of noncombatants killed may differ from the U.S. Government assessments,” the report said.
“The U.S. Government may have reliable information that certain individuals are combatants, but are being counted as non-combatants by nongovernmental organizations,” it continued. “Non-governmental organizations’ reports … may be further complicated by the deliberate spread of misinformation by some actors, including terrorist organizations, in local media reports on which some non-governmental estimates rely.
“Although the U.S. Government has access to a wide range of information, the figures released today should be considered in light of the inherent limitations on the ability to determine the precise number of combatant and non-combatant deaths given the non-permissive environments in which these strikes often occur. The U.S. Government remains committed to considering new, credible information regarding non-combatant deaths that may emerge and revising previous assessments.”
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