The former director of Britain’s special forces and other senior military officers tried to conceal concerns that SAS units were carrying out unlawful killings in Afghanistan, an investigation has revealed.
A senior special forces whistleblower said that after the alarm was first raised in early 2011, the chain of command failed to stop the extrajudicial shootings, including those of two young children. That failure reportedly allowed him to continue until 2013.
The cover-up allegations are among the most serious allegations in the ongoing investigation into claims that 80 people were summarily executed by members of three different British SAS units operating in Afghanistan. The inquiry, led by Lord Justice Haddon-Cave, was to be launched in 2023.
The whistleblower, referred to only by the cipher N1466, said he first expressed concerns about possible “war crimes” to the director of special forces and others in February 2011.
According to newly released redacted transcripts of evidence given under cover last year, the officer said: “We could have stopped this in February 2011. People who died needlessly from that point on, two children shot in their beds next to their parents … had it been stopped all this wouldn’t have happened necessarily.”
The officer’s charge appears to be related to the serious injuries suffered by Hussein Uzbakzai and his wife, Ruqiya Halim, children Imran and Bilal, who were shot while sleeping in their beds during a night-time operation in the village of Shesh Aba in Nimruz province in 2012. Both the parents of Imran and Bilal were killed.
Aziz, the children’s uncle, said during questioning in a brief video in 2023: “Even today, they are grieving what happened to us… We are asking the court to listen to these children and give them justice.”
N1466 alleged that the then-director and others tried to suppress information about alleged criminality. He told the inquest: “The director… made a conscious decision that he was going to suppress it, hide it and do a bit of fake rehearsal to make it look like he had done something.”
He told the inquiry that the director ordered a review of tactics, techniques and procedures (TTP) as a way to avoid external scrutiny. He said: “It was absolutely clear from the data and the pattern that there was something wrong here… I believe he knew it wasn’t… there was a problem with the TTP.” He said: “The basic problem was the intention (to kill).”
After leaving the Special Forces for some time, N1466 returned in 2014 to find evidence that the killings were continuing. A summary of his evidence said: “When he returned to UK Special Forces in 2014 it was clear that it had not stopped at all. In fact, it had continued until at least 2013. He found this quite shocking.”
When he raised concerns to military police in 2015, N1466 complained that he was “part of an organization that allowed rogue elements to operate outside the law”.
Referring to one raid, he told military police that special forces fired at mosquito nets until there was no movement. He said: “When the net was exposed there were women and children in it. The incident was covered up and the person who did the shooting was given some kind of reward to make it look legitimate.”
He also expressed regret that he failed to report his suspicions about unlawful killings to the Serious Investigation Branch in 2011. “I had lost all confidence that the chain of command would consider supporting a transparent and accountable investigation,” he told the inquiry.
After newsletter promotion
N1466 said that “there were a lot of people who wanted to suppress it”. He said he was “surprised” and “disappointed” that a Special Forces lawyer did not recommend reporting concerns to the Special Investigations Branch.
When reviewing accounts of SAS raids, N1466 became concerned to see a sharp increase in the ratio of kills to weapons recovered in SAS raids. Nine Afghans were killed in one raid and only three rifles were recovered. Such instances also came to light again and again when prisoners were taken along for raids and then shot dead.
He said: “We are talking about war crimes… targeting detainees and executing them, under the pretense that they committed violence against forces… As detainees, the UKSF has a duty of care under the Geneva Conventions. Repeatedly violating the Geneva Conventions was clearly not acceptable.”
N1466 also raised suspicions that weapons were being planted on the victims. And he pointed to photographic evidence that showed victims were shot in the head at very close range, even while they were sleeping.
He added: “I was deeply troubled by what I strongly suspected were innocent people, including children, being unlawfully killed, and the success of the entire operation, with the huge investment of lives lost by UK and Afghan forces, was being jeopardized by these killings.”
N1466 said the killings were a “stain” on the reputation of the special forces and the sacrifices of others.
He told the inquiry: “We didn’t join the UKSF for this kind of behavior – shooting children in their beds or random murder. It’s not special, it’s not typical, it’s not what we stand for and most of us, I don’t believe, would want to either condone it or hide it.”
A Ministry of Defense spokesperson said: “The government is fully committed to supporting the independent investigation related to Afghanistan as it continues its work, and we are very grateful to all former and current defense staff who have given evidence so far.
“We are also committed to providing the support that our special forces deserve, while maintaining the transparency and accountability that the British people expect from their armed forces. It is appropriate that we await the outcome of the investigation before commenting further.”
<a href