The former director of UK special forces and other senior military officers tried to cover up concerns that SAS units were carrying out unlawful killings in Afghanistan, an inquiry has heard.
A senior special forces whistleblower said the chain of command failed to stop extrajudicial shootings, including of two small children, after the alarm was first raised in early 2011. That failure allegedly allowed them to continue until 2013.
The cover-up allegations are among the most severe to be raised at an ongoing inquiry into claims that 80 people were summarily killed by members of three different British SAS units operating in Afghanistan. The inquiry, led by Lord Justice Haddon-Cave, was launched in 2023.
The whistleblower, referred to only by the cipher N1466, said he first flagged concerns about possible “war crimes” to the director of special forces and others in February 2011.
According to newly released redacted transcripts of evidence given in secret last year, the officer said: “We could have stopped it in February 2011. Those people who died unnecessarily from that point onwards, there were two toddlers shot in their bed next to their parents … all that would not necessarily have come to pass if that had been stopped.”
The officer’s allegation appears to refer to the serious injuries sustained by the children of Hussain Uzbakzai and his wife, Ruqquia Haleem, Imran and Bilal, who are alleged to have been shot while asleep in their beds during a night-time operation in the village of Shesh Aba in Nimruz province in 2012. Imran and Bilal’s parents were both killed.
Speaking to the inquiry in a short video in 2023, the children’s uncle Aziz said: “Even to this day, they are grieving the incident that happened to us … We are asking for the court to listen to these children and bring justice.”
N1466 alleged that the then director and others tried to suppress information about the alleged criminality. He told the inquiry: “The director … made a conscious decision that he is going to suppress this, cover this up and do a little fake exercise to make it look like he’s done something.”
He told the inquiry the director ordered a review of tactics, techniques and procedures (TTP) as a way of avoiding external scrutiny. He said: “It was blatantly clear from the statistics and the patterns that there was something wrong here … I believe he knew it wasn’t … a problem with the TTP.” He added: “The root problem was the intent [to kill].”
After leaving the special forces for a period, N1466 returned in 2014 to find evidence that killings had continued. A summary of his evidence said: “It was apparent when he came back to UK special forces in 2014 that it had not stopped at all. In fact, it had carried on at least into 2013. He found that quite shocking.”
When he reported concerns to the military police in 2015, N1466 complained he was “part of an organisation which allowed rogue elements to act as they did outside the law”.
Citing one raid, he told the military police that special forces shot at a mosquito net until there was no movement. He said: “When the net was uncovered it was women and children. The incident was covered up and the individual who did the shooting was given some form of award to make it look legitimate.”
He also expressed regret that he failed to report his suspicions about unlawful killings to the serious investigations branch in 2011. “I had lost all faith that the chain of command would be minded to support a transparent and accountable investigation,” he told the inquiry.
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N1466 said there were “quite a lot of people who wanted this suppressed”. He said he was “surprised” and “disappointed” that a special forces lawyer did not recommend reporting the concerns to the special investigations branch.
When reviewing accounts of SAS raids, N1466 was alarmed to notice a sharp rise in the ratio of killings to recovered weapons in SAS raids. In one raid nine Afghans were killed and only three rifles recovered. There were also repeated examples of detainees being taken along to raids and then shot dead.
He said: “We are talking about war crimes … taking detainees back on target and executing them, with the pretence being that they conducted violence against the forces … As detainees, UKSF owed a duty of care to them under the Geneva conventions. To have repeated breaches of the Geneva conventions was clearly not acceptable.”
N1466 also cited suspicion that weapons were being planted on the victims. And he pointed to photographic evidence suggesting that victims were shot in the head at close range, including as they slept.
He added: “I was deeply troubled by what I strongly suspected was the unlawful killing of innocent people, including children, and that the success of the whole campaign with the heavy investment of lives lost by UK and Afghan forces was being jeopardised by these killings.”
N1466 said the killings were a “stain” on the reputation of the special forces and sacrifice of others.
He told the inquiry: “We didn’t join UKSF for this sort of behaviour – toddlers to get shot in their beds or random killing. It’s not special, it’s not elite, it’s not what we stand for and most of us, I don’t believe, would either wish to condone it or to cover it up.”
A Ministry of Defence spokesperson said: “The government is fully committed to supporting the independent inquiry relating to Afghanistan as it continues its work, and we are hugely grateful to all former and current defence employees who have so far given evidence.
“We also remain committed to providing the support that our special forces deserve, whilst maintaining the transparency and accountability that the British people rightly expect from their armed forces. It is appropriate that we await the outcome of the inquiry’s work before commenting further.”
