Civilian Casualties

U.S. pilots who bombed Iraqi targets were under special orders to avoid civilian casualties if possible, but many high-priority targets are in heavily populated areas, increasing the potential for civilian casualties, senior Defense Department officials said Wednesday. Secret rules of engagement issued by Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf ordered "all reasonable precautions" to avoid killing noncombatants during all operations, according to Defense Department officials.

At a time of rising public outrage over civilian casualties, Western troops killed three Afghan children and wounded seven other noncombatants in an errant artillery strike Monday, military officials said. The latest instance of civilian deaths and injuries could hardly have occurred at a more sensitive time. The United Nations, the Afghan government and the American military are investigating allegations that as many as 90 civilians, including 60 children, were killed Aug. 22 in a U.S.-led airstrike in western Afghanistan.

Americans were horrified and saddened when U.S. troops bombed Hiroshima and Dresden in World War II, pounded Hanoi in the Vietnam War and leveled part of the impoverished neighborhood of Chorrillo during the 1989 invasion of Panama. But civilian casualties were not enough to change Americans' views of those conflicts, and many public opinion analysts believe the same may be true with this week's report that a U.S.

U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates, standing beside Afghan President Hamid Karzai, said Tuesday that the buildup of troops ordered by President Obama will not change U.S. policy that stresses the avoidance of civilian casualties during clashes with the Taliban. Even as it gets increasingly aggressive against the Taliban, the U.S. will continue to put a priority on safeguarding civilians, Gates said at a joint news conference, "unlike the enemies of Afghanistan who target innocent Afghans and lie about it."

The United States and its European allies began gearing up Wednesday for possible air strikes in Bosnia, using allied aircraft already in the region and equipped for nighttime bombing, and laser-guided munitions designed to minimize civilian casualties.

When NATO bombs wrecked civilian homes in a southern Serbian town last month, Nebojsa Vujovic made the four-hour road trip from this capital to face TV cameras in the rubble where 10 people died. His tone was measured, his face like stone, his English fluent. Denouncing what he called "the latest NATO aggressive bestiality against civilians," Vujovic scored another point in his country's propaganda war against the 19-nation alliance.

Making a rare personal appeal before an audience of 53 world leaders, President Clinton on Thursday urged Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin to seek a negotiated peace in Chechnya. Yeltsin, defiant and defensive, said the West's criticism is unacceptable while Russia is trying to end "the cancer of terrorism."

Seeking to reduce civilian casualties and collateral damage, the Pentagon will soon deploy a new generation of drones the size of model planes, packing tiny explosive warheads that can be delivered with pinpoint accuracy. Errant drone strikes have been blamed for killing and injuring scores of civilians throughout Pakistan and Afghanistan, giving the U.S. government a black eye as it targets elusive terrorist groups. The Predator and Reaper drones deployed in these regions typically carry 100-pound laser-guided Hellfire missiles or 500-pound GPS-guided smart bombs that can reduce buildings to smoldering rubble.

A car bomb exploded Wednesday near several restaurants in a Shiite neighborhood of northwest Baghdad, killing at least 34 people and injuring more than 70, police and hospital officials said. The blast appeared timed for maximum civilian casualties, going off about 7 p.m., when many Baghdad residents take advantage of cooler evening temperatures for shopping and dining in outdoor kebab restaurants.

WASHINGTON - President Obama's top counter-terrorism advisor Monday defended using drones to launch missiles against militants in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia, saying the growing use of armed unmanned aircraft had saved American lives and caused few civilian casualties. The comments by John Brennan, coming shortly before the first anniversary of the U.S. Navy SEAL raid that killed Osama bin Laden, marks the first time a senior White House official has spoken at length in public about widely reported but officially secret drone operations.