Person Killed by US Military Drone Was Not a Terrorist but a Shepherd

Last Year Mistakenly Killed as Terrorist in Syria
Central Command Investigates Following WP Report... Friendly Fire Confirmed

The U.S. military's drone strike last year in Syria, which targeted a person they identified as a terrorist, was later revealed to have killed an ordinary shepherd.

On the 2nd (local time), the U.S. Central Command announced this fact through a summary report of their investigation released that day. The summary report stated that on May 3rd of last year, Lutfi Hasan Misto, a resident of a village in northwestern Syria, died from a drone strike mistakenly targeting him as a terrorist. Initially, Central Command claimed that they attacked a high-ranking leader of the terrorist organization Al-Qaeda using a Predator drone without disclosing the target's identity.

The family of Mistoh, a shepherd who died last May due to a misfire by a U.S. military drone, is sitting next to his grave.
[Photo by AP Yonhap News]

However, the American daily The Washington Post (WP) reported that the person killed in the drone strike was not a terrorist but an ordinary shepherd named Misto. Following this, the U.S. military launched a fact-finding investigation in June last year. Central Command formed an investigative team led by a brigadier general, consisting of 10 military and civilian experts to examine the incident.

Central Command stated, "Through this investigation, we identified several issues that require improvement," and added, "We are committed to improving the targeting process based on the lessons learned from this mistake." However, they did not disclose specific details about the issues. They also did not explain why the results, completed in November last year, were only made public five months later. It remains unknown who was held responsible for the civilian casualties caused by the mistaken strike.

Last week, a Department of Defense official analyzed, "The failure of Central Command's drone strike was the result of confirmation bias and insufficient 'Red Teaming' (a method to verify vulnerabilities)." The official added that the Al-Qaeda terrorist originally targeted by the U.S. military had escaped.

Meanwhile, there have been previous cases of U.S. military friendly fire. In 2021, during the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, a friendly fire incident resulted in the deaths of 10 civilians, including seven children, drawing severe criticism. Additionally, in 2022, the Joe Biden administration announced measures to prevent recurrence after being criticized for the military's concealment of multiple past cases where innocent victims were killed during airstrikes.