As the Pentagon continues to “investigate” the horrific, and probably intentional, U.S. bombing of a girls’ primary school in Minab, Iran on Feb. 28, which killed over 155 children and teachers—an investigation which shows no signs of ever producing real findings—the Department of War’s Inspector General published a report this week which, according to The Intercept’s Nick Turse “says cuts to civilian harm mitigation and response efforts have been so severe under War Secretary Pete Hegseth that the United States cannot adequately protect civilians in conflict zones.” But the IG report fails to point to the purloined letter: that Hegseth’s cuts of the Civilian Harm Mitigation and Response Acton Plan (CHMR-AP) were intentional, and designed to cover up crimes.
Wes Bryant, who until last year served as the chief of civilian harm assessments and senior analyst and adviser on precision warfare, targeting, and civilian harm mitigation at the Center of Excellence, is one of those “lost personnel,” having been forced out of his job after blowing the whistle on efforts to dismantle CHMR efforts.
“It is completely whitewashed of the truth,” Bryant said of the report. “It reads as if the IG is completely deliberately ignoring the fact that the center and the entire CHMR enterprise was targeted for immediate shutdown, that 90 percent of billets were either terminated or forced out, and that what exists of the Center of Excellence since March 2025 is a shell on paper with no budget, no mandate or real mission, no authority and is completely locked out of visibility and oversight on all investigations and operations.”
