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UK special forces who fought in Afghanistan had a “golden pass” which allowed them to get away with murder and operated under a “code of silence” which prevented soldiers from speaking, a public inquiry into suspected war crimes has revealed.
The allegations were contained in testimony released on Wednesday by the Afghan inquiry as part of the release of material summarizing closed-door hearings held with seven UK special forces soldiers.
The inquiry is looking into allegations of killings carried out by British special forces during nighttime raids against the Taliban between 2010 and 2013, which were then covered up.
One officer told the inquiry that British special forces appeared to have a “golden pass which allows them to get away with murder”.
Asked by Oliver Glasgow, an adviser to the inquiry, whether the mission’s operational reports could be read to also suggest that UK special forces “may have committed extraordinary killings”, the officer replied: “Yes.”
Another officer said soldiers who wanted to expose suspected wrongdoers were allegedly “stabbed” by their colleagues and told “it’s not your place to interrogate”.
“I believe the UKSF has a code of silence or omerta, which prevents people from speaking,” he said. “I am concerned for my personal safety after making this statement.”
The mystique of the United Kingdom’s Special Forces, the Special Air Service and the Special Naval Service, is maintained by the secrecy of their operations. In practice, political oversight is limited to a select few — often only the Minister of Defense and the Prime Minister.
The material released to the public on Wednesday summarizes the testimony of the closed hearings held last year, to which only eyewitnesses and representatives of the Ministry of Defense were allowed to attend. Testimonials are also anonymized.
But the hundreds of pages of released documents paint a rare picture – in sometimes graphic detail – of the alleged aggressive tactics some special forces units used to hunt down the Taliban.
One unit “adopted a policy of killing all combat-capable men on target”, the inquest heard. Some units may have decided to take “the law into their own hands” rather than release suspected Taliban insurgents.
“It was likely that frustrations with the inadequacy of detention processes in Afghanistan may have led people to conclude that they should take the law into their own hands,” said one soldier.
Another officer said that some special forces soldiers referred to the killed Afghans as “depressed”. He was also asked about the planted weapon – known colloquially as “Mr. Wolf” – which was sometimes placed next to corpses to make it appear they were armed when they were killed.
Glasgow, the inquiry’s representative, asked if it was a reference to a Hollywood film Pulp Fictionin which the character, Mr. Wolf, arrives at the scene of the murder and announces that he is there “to solve problems”.
The officer replied, “Exactly. I didn’t put two and two together.”
