Pentagon failed to disclose up to thousands of air strikes -report

WASHINGTON, Feb 5 (Reuters) - The Pentagon has failed to disclose up to thousands of air strikes the U.S. military carried out over several years in Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan against militants in those countries, the Military Times reported on Sunday. In 2016 alone, U.S. combat aircraft conducted at least 456 airstrikes in Afghanistan that were not recorded as part of an open-source database maintained by the U.S. Air Force, information relied on by Congress, American allies, military analysts, academic researchers, the media and independent watchdog groups to assess each war's expense, manpower requirements and human toll. The covered up attacks were mostly carried out by attack helicopters and armed drones operated by the U.S. Army, metrics quietly excluded from otherwise comprehensive monthly summaries, published online for years, detailing American military activity in all three theaters. The Military Times reported that the incomplete data might date back as far as when the U.S. entered Afghanistan in 2001 and could question other data the Pentagon releases to the public, including casualties, the bill footed by the American taxpayer and the military’s progress in the war on terror in the Middle East.
The Obama Administration and Bush Administration had failed to publicly disclose up to thousands of lethal airstrikes the U.S. made in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria against ISIL, Al-Qaeda, and the Taliban via U.S. Army helicopters and drones.