Airwars Staff

Our work in 2022-2023

How we're applying our methodology

All deaths reported were in Afghanistan

Civilian harm trends continued sharply downwards across all conflicts monitored by Airwars during 2021 – particularly after the Biden administration took office in January. However both Russian and Turkish campaigns in Syria – and Turkish actions in northern Iraq – continued at an occasionally aggressive rate. Ongoing concerns at US military accountability peaked with the […]

The Pentagon’s annual report to Congress on civilian deaths and injuries resulting from US military actions around the world has declared more than 100 recent casualties. Researchers and human rights groups, including Airwars, Amnesty International and UN monitors in Afghanistan, place the actual toll significantly higher. For 2020 alone, the Department of Defence said that […]

Airwars and PAX have published a new joint report, Seeing Through The Rubble, examining the dire and long-lasting effects of explosive weapons on civilian populations in urban areas in recent international military campaigns in Mosul, Raqqa and Hawijah. The report calls upon States to develop and support an international political declaration to better protect civilians against […]

The Department of Defense (DoD) informed Congress on May 6th that US forces in Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq and Somalia had between them killed at least 132 civilians and injured 91 more during 2019. The Pentagon also reported a further 79 historical deaths from its actions in Syria and Iraq during 2017-18. The 22-page Annual Report […]

Responding to an ongoing US Department of Defense review process on civilian harm mitigation, Airwars submitted a short interim briefing paper outlining 25 better practice recommendations. These were based primarily on our granular engagement with civilian casualty assessment cells within the US military over several years. Our recommendations ranged from the US military ensuring wherever […]

Our third briefing paper for Dutch MPs was issued after the Netherlands conceded civilian harm in Iraq in up to three incidents between 2014 and 2016 – but refused to say where or when. The paper noted that without more detail, affected Iraqis would never know that Dutch aircraft were responsible for their loved ones being […]

Airwars was invited to address a committee of Dutch MPs at The Hague on November 29th, to discuss issues relating to the expected resumption of Netherlands airstrikes against ISIS from January 1st 2018. Our short report made clear that the war has become far more destructive in recent months; that civilian harm had worsened; and […]

As Brussels debated whether to extend airstrikes to Syria, we submitted a short report to parliament urging improved public transparency. The report concluded that “The act of waging war rightly places onerous responsibilities upon all combatants. It is surely right not only that nations are held accountable for their military actions – but that they […]

Our analysis of Russian airstrikes in Syria between September 30th and December 31st 2015 found that despite Moscow’s continuing assertions that no civilians have been killed in its ongoing Syrian air war, there were credible indications from open source reporting that to December 31st 2015 only, between 1,098 and 1,450 non-combatants had likely died in […]

Our report submitted to the Dutch Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee argued that despite being an advanced democracy with membership both of the European Union and NATO, The Netherlands had also been one of the least transparent partners in the US-led Coalition against ISIS – a situation which has further deteriorated over time. “It is an […]

Our first major report challenged claims by the US-led Coalition’s airstrikes against so-called Islamic State were not harming civilians. As we noted at the time, “Efforts to limit the risk to civilians on the ground continue to be hampered by an absence of effective transparency and accountability from almost all Coalition members. It is unacceptable […]

ABOVE: A bomb-laden Belgian F-16 prepares for a mission in Iraq, December 2014 (Belgian MoD)   Major Developments Belgium announces it has ended its military role in the coalition, withdrawing its F-16s after approximately 41 airstrikes 13 fresh problem events are reported for June in both Iraq and Syria, involving multiple civilian deaths allegedly caused by […]