The U.S. bombing attack on a Doctors Without Borders hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan, was grotesque, lasting more than half an hour and burning people alive — medical staff and patients alike — in the kind of facility that rules of war recognize as a safe haven.

There should have been no question about the nature of the work done there. Doctors Without Borders has operated the hospital for four years. It had reminded the U.S. and Afghan forces just days earlier its location, and it reportedly told U.S. military officials mid-attack that it was under fire from a helicopter gunship.

Yet the attack continued, destroying the facility, killing 12 staff members and 10 patients, including three children, and wounding 37 more.

The Pentagon, after some initial confusion about what had occurred, acknowledged the hospital was mistakenly struck and promised to investigate, which is the appropriate response. Gen. John F. Campbell, who leads the U.S. forces in Afghanistan, reportedly suspects U.S. troops failed to follow established protocol in approving and conducting the attack. That’s troubling, if true, and the Pentagon should investigate quickly and transparently.

War, it is said, is conducted in a fog, and while civilian deaths are to be avoided and lamented, they are also inevitable. But the incident was more than a misdirected bomb. It was a sustained attack.

Although Campbell said the Afghan forces requested the air support, the decision to provide it and the approval of the target came from within the U.S. command. He told a Senate committee this week that he has ordered the “entire force to undergo in-depth training ... to review all of our operational authorities and rules of engagement.”

Doctors Without Borders is understandably outraged by the attack and closed its operations in Kunduz, a regrettable loss of medical support in that war-torn city.

President Obama offered his apology to Joanne Liu, the head of Doctors Without Borders, but the organization is pressing its allegation that the attack constitutes a war crime and has called for a non-prosecutorial investigation by the International Humanitarian Fact-finding Commission under the Geneva Convention. The medical relief organization is within its rights to seek that independent assessment, and the U.S. government should cooperate.

— Los Angeles Times