US Absence Disrupts Global Talks on Civilian Protections in Combat

“There will be a day when people who care about mitigating civilian harm can come back and say, ‘OK, are we ready to solve this problem?’” said Jenny McAvoy — a question that, for now, hangs over a NATO headquarters meeting in Brussels where the United States is not present.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s restructuring of CHMR

Three years after the Pentagon launched a civilian protection effort, the U.S. role has contracted sharply. The Defense Department adopted the civilian harm mitigation and response mission (CHMR) in 2022 and helped build an international network; today, ProPublica reporting says Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has dismantled the civilian protection mission. According to that reporting, staff dedicated to CHMR fell from nearly 200 to about two dozen. The same ProPublica story also reports that Hegseth has disparaged rules of engagement as “woke,” a characterization tied in reporting to the department’s decision to gut the program. The Pentagon declined to comment about the lack of U.S. participation in the Brussels talks, the reporting notes. A spokesperson previously told ProPublica that the Defense Department factors civilian protections into all phases of operational planning and “remains committed to fulfilling its civilian harm mitigation and response responsibilities.”

The International Contact Group on Civilian Harm Mitigation and Response — Brussels summit

The International Contact Group on Civilian Harm Mitigation and Response — CHMR, pronounced “chimmer” — convened for a two-day summit at NATO headquarters in Belgium. The U.S., a co-founder of the group alongside the Netherlands, was not listed as a participant for this meeting; there was no sign of a U.S. delegation for the opening sessions. The agenda reviewed by ProPublica shows a first day open to advocacy groups and academics discussing CHMR topics such as application in coalitions and maritime operations, and a second day reserved for a closed-door session among senior representatives of member states, followed by a “looking ahead” panel. ProPublica reporting puts the genesis of the international coalition in 2023, when the U.S. and the Netherlands formed the loose coalition and the group met about half a dozen times since then to share best practices and briefings on civilian casualty trends.

Past participants and the gap Washington leaves

Past attendees of the contact group include Austria, Australia, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Germany, and Norway — a cohort with differing approaches and needs on civilian harm mitigation. The U.K. and the Netherlands have taken on visible roles since the U.S. stepped back, with the U.K. and the Netherlands leading the group’s continuation this year, participants told ProPublica. Observers quoted in the reporting described the U.S. absence as a clear signal: early momentum from the American side has evaporated and the “era of U.S. leadership on civilian protection” appears to have ended for the moment. Advocates and former officials called the reduction in U.S. engagement “humiliating” and “dangerous,” pointing to reported increases in civilian casualties in Iran following strikes on schools and homes.

The Netherlands, the U.K., and NATO’s evolving roles

The coalition grew in part from shared experiences: the Netherlands was responding to a 2015 operation in Iraq where air strikes targeting a car-bomb factory ignited a munitions depot and an explosion that killed at least 70 civilians and wounded hundreds, with Dutch responsibility revealed in 2019 and producing a national scandal. That sequence helped catalyze Dutch interest in international cooperation on civilian harm mitigation. Advocacy groups told ProPublica that the U.S. CHMR framework encouraged other governments to adopt similar practices by signaling that it was acceptable to acknowledge and learn from civilian harm. With the U.S. reduced to minimal representation, advocates have urged the U.K. to fill leadership gaps; the British Ministry of Defence has an internal report, according to reporting, recommending formalization of a CHMR program including systems to track civilian harm, investigate, and offer post-harm response. NATO itself has a civilian protection policy predating the U.S. model, and the alliance is incorporating elements of the American approach. Andrew Hyde of the Stimson Center told ProPublica that NATO and other partners must now step up on coordination; he argued the shift could make the work more resilient to changes in U.S. administrations and that “NATO has continued to push forward without U.S. support or participation, keeping up the momentum and ready for U.S. re-engagement.”

Advocacy groups, former officials, and the civilian toll

Advocacy groups and former Defense Department staff played a central role in pushing CHMR into being, the reporting notes, reframing civilian casualties as strategically harmful and morally unacceptable rather than mere “collateral damage.” Jenny McAvoy, a former Defense Department official who helped craft the U.S. program, warned that abandoning the work already has “enormous consequences.” Others highlighted contemporary reports of rising civilian casualties in Iran after strikes on schools and homes as evidence of why sustained international mechanisms matter. The meeting in Brussels proceeded without a visible U.S. presence, led instead by European partners and advocacy organizations. Whether that momentum will stabilize into a multilateral standard independent of Washington — or await a future U.S. return to the table — remains the immediate question for practitioners and civilians alike. As Hyde put it, NATO is “ready for U.S. re-engagement”; the diplomats and commanders now in the room will decide how long they will wait.

Source: Defense One (reporting on ProPublica)