Confusion reigned in aftermath of Afghanistan massacre, even as spin had begun

In the days following the attack, in the Panjway district of Kandahar province, confusion reigned as villagers, local officials and officials from the U.S.-led coalition sorted through the grim details of the killings. The conflicting accounts of what happened in the early hours of March 11 are still being pieced together as Bales - whom U.S. officials have called the sole suspect - sits in a U.S. military prison at Fort Leavenworth, Kan., awaiting his first court appearance.


What's clear, however, is that the narrative in Afghanistan of the most devastating civilian massacre of the decade-long U.S.-led war was shaped by several Afghan leaders who tried to exploit the massacre for political purposes. It's also clear that a severe trust deficit mars the presence of U.S. forces in an area that American officials not long ago described as under control, and which they view as crucial to Afghanistan's long-term stability.


Many local and international journalists faced challenges in their search for the truth behind the killings. In the fog of information - and with Afghan leaders including President Hamid Karzai under public pressure to respond to the tragedy - there was not just confusion but spin, disinformation and outright lies.


For reporters in Kandahar, news about the killings started trickling in shortly after sunrise that day. "Come quickly," they were told. "There's been a massacre." They grabbed their notebooks and cameras, scrambled for their cars, and headed for Panjway.


Near the district center, a convoy carrying two senior Afghan officials - Haji Agha Lalai, the head of Kandahar's provincial council, and Asadullah Khalid, Afghanistan's minister of tribal and border affairs and formerly governor of Kandahar province - linked up with reporters. Their vehicles roared along a paved road that winds its way past fields and farms, flanked in places by hills and mountains. Soldiers and policemen stood to attention outside the many checkpoints and bases that punctuate the landscape.


Turning onto a dusty road, they came to the small but heavily fortified joint U.S.-Afghan base known as Camp Belambay. A crowd of local villagers sat nearby while Afghan soldiers stood guard at the main gate, nervously cradling their assault rifles.


The officials were ushered inside along with Afghan journalists who'd reached the scene. The dead, who had been shot and in some cases stabbed, lay shrouded in blankets just outside the base.

Khalid and Agha Lalai were shown the bodies. "They were really angry," said one Afghan journalist, who asked not to be identified to protect his job. "They were very upset because the bodies were burnt, the children were burnt. It was a horrible scene."