In a landmark development that caps years of investigations into alleged atrocities by Australian special forces in Afghanistan, one of the nation’s most celebrated former military personnel has been taken into custody on multiple charges of war crime murder. Australian Federal Police (AFP) announced Tuesday the arrest of 47-year-old Ben Roberts-Smith, a recipient of the Victoria Cross — Australia’s highest award for battlefield gallantry — who has long been at the center of mounting allegations of unlawful killings of unarmed civilians and prisoners during his deployment.
AFP Commissioner Krissy Barrett confirmed to reporters that the former Special Air Service Regiment (SASR) soldier faces five counts of war crime murder. The alleged offenses took place between 2009 and 2012, during Australia’s long-term participation in US- and NATO-led counter-insurgency operations in Afghanistan. All of the victims were civilians or detained prisoners who were not actively engaged in hostilities at the time of their deaths, Barrett said. Prosecutors will argue that the victims were either shot directly by Roberts-Smith, or killed by his subordinates acting on explicit orders from him.
Once hailed as Australia’s most distinguished living war hero, Roberts-Smith’s reputation began to unravel in 2018, when investigative journalists from *The Age* and *The Sydney Morning Herald* published a series of explosive reports linking him to a pattern of unlawful killings and unprofessional conduct during his tour of duty. The outlets alleged that Roberts-Smith kicked an unarmed Afghan civilian off a cliff before ordering his troops to shoot the man, and that he participated in the machine-gun killing of a man with a prosthetic leg — later repurposing the limb as a drinking trophy during celebrations with fellow soldiers.
The 2018 media reports triggered a sweeping national inquiry into allegations of war crimes committed by Australian special forces in Afghanistan. A landmark 2020 military-led investigation ultimately confirmed that special forces personnel unlawfully killed 39 unarmed Afghan civilians and prisoners between 2005 and 2016, uncovering widespread evidence of summary executions, competitive body-counting practices, and systemic torture among deployed troops.
Under intense public and international pressure to hold perpetrators accountable, the Australian government established a dedicated special investigation unit to pursue criminal charges against current and former service members linked to the atrocities. Throughout the years of investigation and public scrutiny, Roberts-Smith has consistently maintained his complete innocence. He launched a costly defamation lawsuit, reported to be worth millions of Australian dollars, against the newspapers that first published the war crime allegations against him.
Over the 20-year duration of the Western military campaign in Afghanistan, Australia deployed more than 39,000 troops to the country to fight against the Taliban and other affiliated militant groups. In recent years, as veterans have returned to civilian life, the conduct of Australian troops during the conflict has come under unprecedented legal and public scrutiny, with Roberts-Smith’s arrest marking one of the most high-profile legal actions to date in the national reckoning over wartime conduct.