A top-secret U.S. military unit sidestepped safeguards and repeatedly ordered airstrikes that killed civilians as it worked to identify targets in the U.S. bombing campaign against the Islamic State in Syria. The New York Times reports the unit of Army Delta Force commandos, known as “Talon Anvil,” worked in three shifts around the clock between 2014 and 2019 to select buildings, vehicles and crowds of people to attack. Those struck included civilians who had no role in the conflict: farmers harvesting their fields, children playing in the street, families fleeing fighting, and people sheltering in buildings. The Times reports the civilian killings alarmed Talon Anvil’s partners in the military and the CIA, who complained to superiors up the chain of command, but their protests were ignored.