The Atlantic

A Tale of Two Air Strikes

One that did happen, in Mosul, killed hundreds of civilians. Could one that didn’t, in Syria in 2013, have helped save innocent lives today?
Source: Goran Tomasevic / Reuters

Three weeks ago, the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq and Syria appears to have carried out an airstrike in Mosul that killed upwards of 200 innocent civilians. Very sadly, I have enough experience with these kinds of incidents as a policymaker that I always want to wait to see the results of the U.S. military’s investigation before judging what happened. The U.S. military isn’t always correct in its conclusions, but at the very least, I want to see more data before making a judgement about the actions or intentions of those involved.

That is not, to say the least,

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