Spokesman for US central command says many of the allegations of fatalities have been dismissed or cannot be verified

The US-led coalition’s bombing of Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, which has been described as the “most precise ever”, faces allegations that civilians have been killed in 71 separate air raids.

A spokesman for US central command (Centcom) disclosed the claims to the Guardian. Many of the claims have been dismissed, but he said 10 incidents were the subject of fuller, formal investigations. Five investigations have been concluded, although only one has been published.

To date, the coalition acknowledges civilian deaths in a single strike: in November 2014 a US strike on Syria killed two children, a Centcom investigation published in May found. Centcom said it will only publish investigations where a “preponderance of evidence” suggests civilians have died.



Monitoring groups questioned how thorough the investigations were.

The international coalition has carried out more than 6,500 strikes since last August. Lt Gen John Hesterman, the US commander who leads the international air campaign against Isis in Iraq and Syria, described the campaign in June as “the most precise and disciplined in the history of aerial warfare”.



Centcom outlined details of the reports of fatalities in response to questions about one of its internal documents on the investigations being obtained by journalist Joseph Trevithick of the blog War is Boring, which gives details of 45 strikes alleged to have caused fatalities.

The independent monitoring group Airwars last month reported that public information suggested at least 459 civilians have died. Other monitoring groups, including the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, also record significant civilian deaths in coalition airstrikes.

The Centcom document obtained by Airwars tracks claims of civilian deaths in 45 airstrikes between September 2014 and April 2015, including attacks by Australian, Canadian, French and Dutch aircraft. US strikes, which make up nearly 80% of the campaign’s total, appear to account for at least 40 of the report’s strikes.

Investigating such allegations within Isis-controlled territory is “extremely challenging”, Centcom spokesman Cmdr Kyle Raines said. “Traditional investigation methods, such as interviewing witnesses and examining the site, are not typically available … we seek to investigate as thoroughly as possible given the limitations.”

The document records allegations of civilian casualties reported by social and traditional media, monitoring groups, NGOs and local politicians. It also has 19 incidents picked up internally through routine post-strike processes, reports by military personnel, the FBI and other non-public channels.



Claims are given an initial assessment and then a credibility check. Allegations that are judged to be credible proceed to a full investigation. More than half of the claims in the document were dismissed at the first stage, sometimes because there were no coalition airstrikes in the vicinity that day, and sometimes because there was not enough detail to match allegations to a particular strike.

In other cases, it is less clear why the allegation was dropped. In November 2014, FBI sources reported concerns that an attack on Mosul had killed 41 Yazidi women who were being held captive by Isis. The report notes that the closest strike that day was on a target 3.2km away, but that the operation had included a “cold shift” – believed to be a reference to when a missile is diverted from its original target to avoid civilian casualties. The document states: “No further inquiry required.”

Airwars researchers have identified local media reports claiming that a group of Yazidi women escaped captivity that day following a coalition airstrike. The more detailed credibility assessment stage includes reviewing video footage and other material gathered by drones and other aircraft, speaking to local forces such as the Kurdish Peshmerga, and to other government sources.

Many claims are deemed not credible or closed at this stage due to a lack of evidence. These include one of the bloodiest reported strikes, an attack in December 2014 on an Isis facility in al-Bab, Syria, that was being used as a makeshift prison.

Local casualty recording organisations reported at least 58 prisoners were killed, but Centcom refused for a fortnight to confirm it had conducted strikes in the area, despite repeated questions from the news agency McClatchy. The report notes that there were Syrian government strikes on the same day, and finds “insufficient evidence to determine civcas [civilian casualties]”.

In February, Isis claimed the American hostage Kayla Mueller died in a Jordanian strike in Syria. The group sent photos of her corpse to her family. The report notes: “Jordan officially denied the allegation.” Three days later, it adds that US government agencies “reported that the allegation was not credible. Analysis of photographs indicates individual was unlikely killed by airstrikes”.

Six strikes recorded in the document are selected for further investigation.

Even where civilian deaths are acknowledged, there is no guarantee that their families will receive compensation or condolence payments for their loss. Raines told the Guardian that conditions in Isis-controlled territory made it “extremely difficult” to make such payments. In the case of the two children whose deaths Centcom has acknowledged, Raines said: “After reviewing the circumstances of the case and given the operational and environmental challenges involved, no ex gratia payments were made.”

One of the document’s rare incidents in which civilian deaths are deemed “likely credible” is a strike on an Isis checkpoint in Hatra, Iraq ,in March, after which a woman contacted the coalition requesting compensation for a damaged car.

Ministry of Defence (MoD) releases show British forces were among those conducting strikes in the area that day. However, defence officials insist that they have not received any allegation of civilian casualties in British airstrikes. An MoD spokeswomansaid: “We are not aware of any incidents of civilian casualties as a result of UK strike activity over Iraq. Our overriding concern in conducting is to protect innocent people from the terrorists we are targeting.”

Airwars’ project leader Chris Woods said that while it was encouraging that the coalition was investigating so many claims, Centcom was often worryingly quick to decide there was no case to answer: more than 80% of the cases were concluded within 48 hours of the claim being received.

“The situation in Iraq and Syria is particularly fraught and getting information out of the areas is a challenge. There just doesn’t seem to be evidence here that the coalition is keeping a genuinely open mind and reassessing as new information comes through,” Woods said. “When you look at it on a case-by-case basis, there’s cause for concern here.”

Trevithick, the journalist to whom Centcom released the document, welcomed the release as a possible sign of increased transparency over claims of civilian deaths. “When you keep this secret and hide it behind a wall, the narrative about civilian casualties falls to Isis and our enemies.

“It can only lend credibility to Centcom’s public statements about how they are trying harder than IS to avoid civilian casualties if they admit to it when they screw up,” he said.