How a Cascade of Errors Led to the U.S. Airstrike on an Afghan Hospital

Sixteen American military personnel have been punished for their roles in the attack, but none of them will face criminal charges because a military investigation determined the attack to be unintentional.

Why is it that these American military personnel can seemingly get away with such monstrous mistakes. How can people who unintentionally destroy a hospital get away with it for the sole reason that it was an accident. These people spend decades training and are released from any prosecution merely because they made a mistake. People who kill others by accident have gone to jail in this country many times.

Even after the targeting system was fixed and correctly aligned with the intended target, the crew continued to focus on the hospital.

They found the intended target and still attacked the hospital. The fact that they ended up having the correct target and still attacked the hospital completely boggles my mind.

Eleven minutes into the airstrike, Doctors Without Borders succeeded in reaching several United States government officials to alert them of the attack. But the strike was not called off until 19 minutes later...

If this is not a reason or prosecution then I really don't understand what is. This is more than just an "unintentional" attack. This shows incompetence and negligence to a point where these military personnel should most definitely be put on trial.

The immunity that these military personnel receive is worrying in that it gives little to no incentive to act carefully when attacking a target. Attacking a hospital full of the sick and injured can be destroyed and nobody will be held accountable for it. You are attacking and bombing targets in a foreign country. You honestly should be 100% sure that you are attacking the intended target. Otherwise any mistake that is made in an attack must be thoroughly investigated and any person responsible for the mistake should be held accountable. It is utterly ridiculous that this isn't already implemented.

/r/news Thread Link - nytimes.com