Afghan Prison Massacre

A group of captured Taliban soldiers staged a prison revolt in the fortress of Qala Jangi, near Mazar-i-Sharif in Afghanistan, on Nov. 25. It was reported in English-language papers and on wire services all over the world, yet the story printed in US papers differed from the ones appearing in the British press and on wire services. A careful reading of those stories revealed some interesting facts.

In US papers, including the New York Times and the Washington Post, Pentagon and US military sources were quoted liberally. The sources said about 30 Taliban smuggled weapons into the compound and opened fire on their guards. No Americans were killed. The Taliban captured an armory inside the fortress. The uprising was finally crushed when US warplanes bombed the fortress, killing a hundred prisoners or so. "It was definitely a suicide mission," according to a military spokesman quoted in the New York Times. This story, vastly simplified, was printed in most other newspapers in the US.

If one reads past the official quotes, a few unpleasant facts emerge. In the New York Times, Carlotta Gall reported from the scene of the fighting that one American was killed, the Northern Alliance had lost 50 men in the fighting, with an estimated 100 injured, and: "Soldiers interviewed today confirmed that the prisoners feared that they were about to be executed and were angered by the presence of Americans interviewing the prisoners. The Northern Alliance soldiers said one American intelligence official was killed almost immediately." This was paragraph 18 of a 30-paragraph story. (11/27/01)

The Washington Post also reported: "a Time magazine correspondent, Alex Perry, who witnessed much of the battle, said the prisoners simply rushed at their guards, seized their guns and fought their way to a part of the fort where weapons were stored." One has to read to paragraph 11 to get this information. (11/26/01)

The British press and wire services carried a far different and more complex story.

The best source was The London Times. Their reporter, Oliver August, witnessed most of the fighting and immediately interviewed Northern Alliance soldiers who were in the vicinity when it started. They said that two CIA agents attempted on their own to interrogate a group of dozens of captured Taliban; August implies that the CIA agents were either incompetent or overconfident. When one of them--the man we now know was Mike Spann--asked one of the Taliban why he had come to Afghanistan, the Taliban man replied: "We're here to kill you," then he launched himself on Spann. Spann shot him and two others with his pistol but was quickly overwhelmed by other Taliban soldiers who beat, kicked, and bit him to death. The other CIA agent emptied his pistol at another Taliban soldier attacking him, then fled. He said later: "There was no way of stopping them. They ran straight into gunfire." The Taliban overwhelmed their 20 Northern Alliance guards, and began shooting.

August wrote: "General Dostum [the Northern Alliance commander in charge of the fortress] had allegedly given assurances that the prisoners would not be mistreated, but there is no evidence that the captured Taleban expected to be treated in accordance with the Geneva Convention, or had any clue any such thing existed. Warfare in Afghanistan has its own, bloodier conventions ... Rebellion may also have been sparked by efforts to tie up the Taleban prisoners, many of whom apparently believed they were about to be killed. About 250 had been bound, according to one report, before the rest rebelled."

This is not the only mention of bound prisoners at Qala Jangi, although no US papers reported it. August wrote: "The arms and hands of some of the dead had been bound with scarves before they were killed." (11/29/01) Burt Herman of the Associated Press reported: "An Associated Press photographer saw a field of about 50 bodies laid out in the southern part of the fort on Wednesday. Northern Alliance fighters were cutting scarves from the hands of the corpses with knives and scissors ... Shabudin, a Morthern Alliance fighter, said his comrades had been tying the hands of some of the fighters who were believed to be Arabs at some point early in the revolt, when some Taliban grabbed guns and began shooting." (11/28/01)

Nobody mentioned why the Northern Alliance were tying their prisoners, but it could be inferred from reading the Boston Globe, the BBC, and AP reports that Gen. Dostum took most of his troops with him to the siege of Kunduz, leaving the fortress understaffed.

AP reports of Northern Alliance troops killing captured Taliban in Kunduz show that the NA troops are a thuggish lot, more willing to kill their prisoners than guard them. The AP's Herman reported: "Footage from a German television crew that was inside the compound, 10 miles west of Mazar-e-Sharif, showed guards atop walls firing down into crowds of prisoners below." (11/25/01) Herman didn't say if this was before or after the revolt began.

There was a lot of confusion about who killed whom. The US press reports say that US bombs killed most of the Taliban, while a report in the UK Guardian said that the estimated 30 US airstrikes killed many of the Taliban, but didn't finish them off. It was only after an AC-130 helicopter gunship destroyed the armory that the Northern Alliance could finally send in a tank and NA troops to kill the remaining Taliban.

The British press and wire services, unlike the US papers, attempted to put a number on the dead. Herman reported that estimates of the dead "ran from 300 to as high as 800." (11/26/01) The BBC reported that 500 Taliban were being held in the fortress. (11/28/01) Michael Steen of Reuters reported 600 prisoners killed in the fighting. (11/28/01) The AP's Herman and the BBC reported that a US JDAM smart bomb "went off-target," killing six NA troops and injuring five American US special forces troops. The London Times reported that one of those American troops was killed: "The body of the American lay on the ground right here by an iron gate. He was definitely killed during the airstrike." (11/29/01)

According to these eyewitness accounts, no weapons were smuggled into the fortress. At least two Americans were killed and as many as 800 Taliban. It was not a suicide mission, but the response of desperate prisoners who believed they would be executed without trial. The incompetence of two CIA agents, Gen. Rashid Dostum, and the Northern Alliance troops caused this horrible prison massacre.

--Maria Tomchick

For a list of sources for this article, send an e-mail to ets@scn.org or send us a self-address stamped envelope to Eat the State!, PO Box 85541, Seattle WA 98145.