One suicide bomber was behind Kabul airport attack that killed 13 US troops
By Ellen Mitchell - 02/04/22 05:56 PM EST
The deadly Aug. 26 bombing outside the Kabul airport that killed 13 U.S. service members was carried out by a single bomber and was not a “complex” attack as U.S. officials first thought, according to a Pentagon investigation into the blast.
Officials found the bomber detonated an explosive containing ball bearings, killing at least 170 Afghan civilians in addition to the service members, as they approached the Abbey Gate at Hamid Karzai International Airport, U.S. Central Command head Marine Corps Gen. Kenneth McKenzie told reporters Friday.
McKenzie acknowledged the findings were different from what officials initially believed, which was that the attack used two bombs and gunman.
“At the time, the best information we had in the immediate aftermath of the attack indicated that it was a complex attack by both a suicide bomber and ISIS-K gunman,” McKenzie said. “We now know that the explosively fired ball bearings cause wounds that look like gunshots and when combined with a small number of warning shots, that led many to assume that a complex attack had occurred.”
He added: “the battlefield is a confusing and contradictory place and it gets more confusing the closer you are to the actual action.”
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https://thehill.com/policy/defense/592922-one-suicide-bomber-behind-afghanistan-airport-attack-that-killed-13-us-troops
