A government inquiry has heard that high-ranking military officials showed no interest in investigating alleged war crimes committed by the SAS.
A former UK Special Forces officer testified to a government inquiry that British SAS operatives enjoyed impunity in Afghanistan, describing it as a “golden pass allowing them to get away with murder.” Other witnesses corroborated accounts of British forces routinely executing unarmed civilians.
The officer’s confidential testimony, submitted earlier this year to the UK’s Independent Inquiry Relating to Afghanistan, was included in a batch of documents released by the inquiry on Tuesday.
The former officer detailed concerns about the killing of unarmed civilians in 2011, alleging a cover-up within the SAS. He stated that senior figures within UK Special Forces – encompassing the SAS, SBS, and four other covert units – showed no interest in investigating these killings, effectively providing SAS operatives with “a golden pass allowing them to get away with murder.”
The Afghanistan Inquiry is examining night raids conducted by British special forces between 2010 and 2013, the period during which the alleged killings occurred.
A junior officer informed the inquest that “all fighting age males” were killed during these raids, regardless of whether they were armed. The inquest heard that SAS personnel sometimes placed weapons beside dead bodies after the killings to make them appear as combatants.
The witness recounted instances of prisoners being executed after being restrained. “In one case, it was mentioned a pillow was put over the head of an individual before being killed with a pistol,” the document stated.
The inquiry is investigating the killings of at least 80 prisoners.
”What shocked me most wasn’t the execution of potential members of the Taliban, which was of course wrong and illegal, but it was more the age and the methods and, you know, the details of things like pillows,” the officer said, noting that some victims were “100%” aged 16 or younger.
The officer expressed fear for his safety following his testimony.
”Basically, there appears to be a culture there of ‘shut up, don’t question’,” another officer told the inquiry.
Allegations of war crimes committed by British special forces in Afghanistan have been previously reported, with BBC Panorama, the Sunday Times, and other news outlets reporting on the routine killing of civilians during night raids. In one instance, the US military reportedly possessed video evidence of a massacre, but this footage was withheld when a British court requested it.
Late last year, the BBC reported that one of the UK’s most senior generals withheld evidence from the inquiry related to soldiers executing handcuffed detainees in Afghanistan.