The 2014 Gaza Valley airstrike was a friendly fire incident that took place in Zabul Province, Afghanistan on 9 June 2014 when five U.S. troops and one Afghan interpreter were killed when a B-1B Lancer bomber inadvertently dropped laser-guided bombs on their position during a firefight with Taliban forces. U.S. and Afghan government forces were in the Gaza Valley area of Arghandab District conducting security operations in advance of the 2014 Afghan presidential elections when they came under attack from Taliban militants, sparking a firefight. An American air controller on the ground requested close air support from a B-1B bomber flying in the vicinity to support a team of soldiers maneuvering on a ridge. The U.S. aircraft dropped two guided bombs on the position, killing the team of Americans and an Afghan soldier.
It was the deadliest incident of fratricide to take place between American forces in the country since the beginning of the Afghanistan War, and raised questions over the standard operating procedures of U.S. troops and their close air support assets. An investigation of the incident blamed the airstrike on the commander of the American troops on the ground, the U.S. combat air controller who coordinated the strike, and a flaw in the design of the B-1B bomber's targeting pod which prevents the aircrew from being able to identify the infrared strobes on the helmets of American soldiers that serve to allow pilots to distinguish friendly troops from enemy troops.
Background
Before operation
Zabul Province is a semi-mountainous region in southern Afghanistan that borders Pakistan to the east, Kandahar in the west and in the south, and Oruzgan in the north. Predominantly Pashtun, it is one of Afghanistan's most sparsely populated provinces with just 45 people per square mile according to a 2015 census, mostly rural tribe members spread among numerous isolated villages in the region. Zabul is one of Afghanistan's poorest provinces and serves as a transit point for fighters entering the country through the porous border with Pakistan. The Taliban have had a presence in Zabul for many years. In 2003, it was the first province in Afghanistan where the group was successful in establishing a large base after the invasion two years prior. However, Zabul was the first province to see Afghan army forces operate independently from NATO forces and was heralded as a model for other provinces, and the presence of U.S. troops has largely been reduced to special operations forces.
In 2014, Afghanistan held a presidential election to replace incumbent Hamid Karzai. The first round of the election was held with no candidate reaching the required 50% threshold to clinch the presidency leaving former Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah and ex-World Bank economist Ashraf Ghani to proceed to a runoff election to be held on 14 June. The election was marked by periods of violence perpetrated by the country's Taliban insurgency and it was the first presidential election in Afghanistan where Afghan security forces were leading security for the event. One week before the first round elections, militants attacked the headquarters of the country's election commission in Kabul. In early June 2014, Abdullah Abdullah survived an assassination attempt when his convoy was attacked by a suicide bomber, killing three of his bodyguards.
B-1B Lancer
Though not designed as a close air support platform the Rockwell B-1B Lancer, a four-engine heavy bomber, has been utilized copiously in support of U.S. and coalition ground forces engaged in combat operations against insurgent forces. In 2012, the nine B-1B bombers of the 9th Expeditionary Bomb Squadron flew 770 sorties on its deployment to Afghanistan. The bomber has proved popular in Afghanistan due to its ability to carry a large payload, and remain in the air for long periods of time, allowing it to fly throughout the country and support multiple ground operations in just one sortie. Beginning in 2007, B-1B bombers began to be outfitted with Sniper Advanced Targeting Pods (AN/AAQ-33), an advanced targeting pod that provides high-resolution FLIR imagery to aircrews to help identify ground targets. According to Air Force Colonel Marilyn Kott the pod, "increases the speed and accuracy with which the aircrew and the JTAC can execute the find-fix-track-target portion of the kill chain."