‘Kill team’ brigade commander pushed ‘strike and destroy’

Was a brigade commander an instigator or just asleep at the switch while the 5th Stryker Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division, “kill team” was allegedly murdering civilians?

An Army investigation finds no “causal relationship” between Col. Harry D. Tunnell IV’s aggressive leadership and the killings, but it criticizes Tunnell for neglectfulness that created a climate ripe for misconduct.

The investigation, first reported by Der Spiegel on Monday, ended in a letter of admonition for Tunnell, per I Corps Commander Lt. Gen Curtis “Mike” Scaparotti.

Tunnell’s superiors in Afghanistan lost confidence in him after he threw out the playbook and butted heads with commanders, derisively rejecting capacity-building counterinsurgency doctrine in favor of a “counter-guerilla” strategy that concentrated in engaging and destroying the enemy.

“Soldiers lives are routinely put at hazard because the doctrine has not been written within a context of American military art and science, organization or capability,” he told investigators in his own statement for the report. “US Army forces are not organized, trained, or equipped to implement the doctrine.”

Der Speigel, quoting from the report, said Tunnell was on a personal crusade in Afghanistan to take revenge for being shot in the leg in Irag; He kept the metal rod from his leg on his desk and would use it “as an illustration,” one officer said.

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