The U.S. Errors That Led to the Airstrike on an Elementary School

A continuing military investigation has determined that the United States is responsible for a strike that hit an elementary school in Iran, according to U.S. officials and others familiar with the preliminary findings. Iranian officials have said the death toll was at least 175 people, most of them children.

Malachy Browne and Julian E. Barnes, who have been covering the strike, discuss what probably led to one of the most devastating military errors in decades.

Guest:

• Malachy Browne, the enterprise director of the Visual Investigations team at The New York Times.
• Julian E. Barnes, a reporter covering the U.S. intelligence agencies and international security matters for The New York Times.

Background reading: 

• A preliminary inquiry said that the United States was at fault in a strike that hit a school in Iran.
• A New York Times visual investigation suggested that the strike appeared to have been part of an attack on an adjacent naval base.

Photo: In a photograph made available by an Iranian semiofficial news agency, rescue workers and residents searched through rubble in Minab, Iran, after a strike heavily damaged a school. Mehr News Agency, via Associated Press

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday. 

Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.