NationStates Jolt Archive

1862 Americans, 13 Bulgarians, 93 Britons, 1 Dane, 2 El Salvadoreans, 2 Estonians, 1 Hungarian, 27 Italians, 1 Kazakhstani, 1 Latvian, 2 Netherlanders, 17 Poles, 3 Slovakians, 2 Thais, and 18 Ukranians.

1862 Americans, 13 Bulgarians, 93 Britons, 1 Dane, 2 El Salvadoreans, 2 Estonians, 1 Hungarian, 27 Italians, 1 Kazakhstani, 1 Latvian, 2 Netherlanders, 17 Poles, 3 Slovakians, 2 Thais, and 18 Ukranians.

Uhh..the numbers of soldiers killed in Iraq?

Death toll in Iraq so far? :D

These and many more coalition soldiers have died and will continue to die in the unending War on Terror. :(

Uhh..the numbers of soldiers killed in Iraq?

'Coalition' soldiers, yes.

Give that man a cigar.

It's amazing that so few troops have died in the process of conquering and attempting to passify a country.

You left out the 100,000 Iraqis, BTW.

The Independent newspaper ran a story yesterday about an audit of the main Baghdad hospital's mortuary records revealing a current death toll of several dozen a day in their juristiction, with an extrapolated 36,000 per year nationally.

Apparently the vast majority are executions.

What a difference we made.

It's amazing that so few troops have died in the process of conquering and attempting to passify a country.
I thought you were 'liberating' not conquering. I thought you were bringing freedom...not pacification.

It's amazing that so few troops have died in the process of conquering and attempting to passify a country.

True, but what about all those contractors associated with the US military (the ones who get kidnapped, tortured and then shot).

You left out the 100,000 Iraqis, BTW.

The Independent newspaper ran a story yesterday about an audit of the main Baghdad hospital's mortuary records revealing a current death toll of several dozen a day in their juristiction, with an extrapolated 36,000 per year nationally.

Apparently the vast majority are executions.

What a difference we made.
That's the highest estimate. I've got a feeling that the true number of Iraqis who were killed as a direct result of the war is much lower. but still probably higher than the official Iraqi government count of 8000, which is the lowest estimate.

Multiply by 5 for the number wounded. 'Wounded' could be anything from a shrapnel wound to that guy who woke up in a body bag on a helicopter..

1862 Americans, 13 Bulgarians, 93 Britons, 1 Dane, 2 El Salvadoreans, 2 Estonians, 1 Hungarian, 27 Italians, 1 Kazakhstani, 1 Latvian, 2 Netherlanders, 17 Poles, 3 Slovakians, 2 Thais, and 18 Ukranians.
the number of dudes who fancy TInk? ;) :D

True, but what about all those contractors associated with the US military (the ones who get kidnapped, tortured and then shot).Have even a hundred of them been kidnapped?

I thought you were 'liberating' not conquering. I thought you were bringing freedom...not pacification.
Hey, the war wasn't my idea. I thought it was a bad gamble from the beginning.

Multiply by 5 for the number wounded.

By 7, at the risk of being pedantic, but hey, what are a couple of sucking chest wounds or broken fingers between friends?

Have even a hundred of them been kidnapped?

I don't know, but at least 250 foreign contractors have been killed.

Have even a hundred of them been kidnapped?

How are we to know? The US military don't exactly want to release this kind of information publicly. Sure, there's the publicity with some but the rest are *HUSH* *HUSH*.

That's the highest estimate. I've got a feeling that the true number of Iraqis who were killed as a direct result of the war is much lower. but still probably higher than the official Iraqi government count of 8000, which is the lowest estimate.
Well, the old estimate was done by an NGO visiting relatives.

This is more of an epidemiological study, in July the Baghdad mortuary received 1100 Iraqi civilian bodies. Last Sunday, 36 were brought in, that's the norm now. The rate has been this high since the invasion, that's 13,000 per year in Baghdad alone.

I'm sure you can fault a study by a charity or even a UN agency, but the body count of doctors doing post-mortems?

EDIT: I should add that in the case of the majority, the cause of death is gunshot wounds, usually to the head, often with signs of restraints being applied and other injuries inflicted through beatings and torture.

In fact, here is the first part of the article, for the rest, you have to register.

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/fisk/article306436.ece

This is more of an epidemiological study, in July the Baghdad mortuary received 1100 Iraqi civilian bodies. Last Sunday, 36 were brought in, that's the norm now. The rate has been this high since the invasion, that's 13,000 per year in Baghdad alone.

I would be suspicious of blaming all these on the conflcit or its side-effects. If Baghdad has a population of just under 6 million, what would the standard inflow of civilian bodies be?

A quick back of the envelope calculation, assuming a life span of three score years and ten, seems to suggest that a city that size should be generating 230 deaths from 'natural causes' each day. My maths may be fatally flawed here...

Is this mortuary meant to be receiving all the dead from Baghdad?


EDIT: the article that TG linked to suggests that this mortuary is not receiving all the corpses in Baghdad, and it is hard to argue with the fivefold increase in bodies that it has received, provided that other mortuaries continue to operate as normal.

Well, the old estimate was done by an NGO visiting relatives.

This is more of an epidemiological study, in July the Baghdad mortuary received 1100 Iraqi civilian bodies. Last Sunday, 36 were brought in, that's the norm now. The rate has been this high since the invasion, that's 13,000 per year in Baghdad alone.

I'm sure you can fault a study by a charity or even a UN agency, but the body count of doctors doing post-mortems?
Iraqbodycount.org begs to differ. It's clearly got an anti-war agenda, yet even it can't support numbers as high as 100,000. They put the death toll at around 26,000. Also most of the deaths are attributed to criminals and terrorists.

the number of dudes who fancy TInk? ;) :D

*L* Very good!

Whats the running total of Iraqi civilian corpses uncovered from mass graves all around the country?

People dying from natural causes tend to be buried the same day by their relatives, in accordance with Muslim tradition. The bodies the mortuary receives are the unclaimed, those that are dumped by roadsides, where relatives obviously cannot find them.

EDIT: The numbers certainly put the civilian war dead into the tens of thousands, not thousands as the coalition claims.

Whats the running total of Iraqi civilian corpses uncovered from mass graves all around the country?

EDIT: hang on.

People dying from natural causes tend to be buried the same day by their relatives, in accordance with Muslim tradition. The bodies the mortuary receives are the unclaimed, those that are dumped by roadsides, where relatives obviously cannot find them.
Some of those bodies that aren't claimed are carrying fake Iraqi ID because they're foreign fighters. Some of them are victims of crime that have been dumped by their kidnappers. It's not like the coalition troops are just randomly shooting people on the street.

Some of those bodies that aren't claimed are carrying fake Iraqi ID because they're foreign fighters. Some of them are victims of crime that have been dumped by their kidnappers. It's not like the coalition troops are just randomly shooting people on the street.
I never said it was mostly US forces killing them, many more are killed by the US-backed Iraqi military and police apparatus, some by the gangsters you get in the chaos of any conflict, some by insurgents as a result of suicide bombings.

Iraqbodycount.org begs to differ. It's clearly got an anti-war agenda, yet even it can't support numbers as high as 100,000. They put the death toll at around 26,000. Also most of the deaths are attributed to criminals and terrorists.

Eh? According to http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article7906.htm

More Civilians Killed By coalition And Iraq Forces Than By Iraqi Resistance: Iraq's Ministry of Health:

In the six months ending 1 January 2005, 3,274 Iraqi civilians were killed. Of those deaths, 60% - 2,041 civilians - were killed by the coalition and Iraqi security forces. Insurgent attacks claimed 1,233 lives, and wounded 4,115 people, during the same period.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3738368.stm


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/04/29/AR2005042901191.html


Just two of many sites...the one states they are estimates close to 300,000 bodies in mass graves. Many shot in the head and bulldozed over.

In the six months ending 1 January 2005, 3,274 Iraqi civilians were killed. Of those deaths, 60% - 2,041 civilians - were killed by the coalition and Iraqi security forces. Insurgent attacks claimed 1,233 lives, and wounded 4,115 people, during the same period.
I have to agree, judging from the full article in the Independent, the majority of the victims in the morgue meet their deaths at the hands of government forces. It's fairly easy to tell them apart - the pure gunshot wounds are insurgents executing captured security officers and collaborators, the tortured and mutilated bodies finished off by gunshot wounds are victims of Iraqi police and military interrogation.

Just two of many sites...the one states they are estimates close to 300,000 bodies in mass graves. Many shot in the head and bulldozed over.
Cheers for that, so we have 6 more years of morality credits to get the job done. :)

I have to agree, judging from the full article in the Independent, the majority of the victims in the morgue meet their deaths at the hands of government forces. It's fairly easy to tell them apart - the pure gunshot wounds are insurgents executing captured security officers and collaborators, the tortured and mutilated bodies finished off by gunshot wounds are victims of Iraqi police and military interrogation.
http://www.iraqbodycount.net/press/pr12.php

I couldn't find a password on "bugmenot" for the Independant article and didn't feel like registering. Anyway, I'm providing my source in the link above.

Just two of many sites...the one states they are estimates close to 300,000 bodies in mass graves. Many shot in the head and bulldozed over.

Well, technically it doesn't actually say that, instead it says: "Mr Kehoe said that work to uncover graves around Iraq, where about 300,000 people are thought to have been killed during Saddam Hussein's regime, was slow as experienced European investigators were not taking part", which is a slightly different thing.


Let us not forget that the estimated 300,000 was over a 24 year period. We could do a crass calculation here and compare the amount of people he killed each year with the amount of people killed as a result of the Coalition invasion... the numbers average out as certainly within the same order of magnitude per year, and are perhaps surprisingly close. 12500 compared to about 9500.


EDIT: Life in liberated Iraq. Now 24% less fatal than under Saddam Hussein!

This is a human security project to establish an independent and comprehensive public database of media-reported civilian deaths in Iraq resulting directly from military action by the USA and its allies in 2003.
This is the weakness, it only counts what is reported. A lot of it goes unreported, which is why it is important to go to the places where the bodies are processed.

Post-invasion pacification missions are always the most dangerous and most costly of all military operations.

The insurgent Iraqis and their cohorts who are fighting (and killing) Coalition forces end up killing more of their countrymen than the Coalition troops.

This is the weakness, it only counts what is reported. A lot of it goes unreported, which is why it is important to go to the places where the bodies are processed.
But did they go to every place where the bodies are processed, or did they go to a small sampling of morgues and assume that every other morgue would see a similar increase in business? For example, morgues in the Kurdish part of Iraq wouldn't be busy at all. Can't assume that they'll see the same increase in deaths as Baghdad morgues.

The insurgent Iraqis and their cohorts who are fighting (and killing) Coalition forces end up killing more of their countrymen than the Coalition troops.

http://forums2.jolt.co.uk/showpost.php?p=9468960&postcount=27

Well, technically it doesn't actually say that, instead it says: "Mr Kehoe said that work to uncover graves around Iraq, where about 300,000 people are thought to have been killed during Saddam Hussein's regime, was slow as experienced European investigators were not taking part", which is a slightly different thing.


Let us not forget that the estimated 300,000 was over a 24 year period. We could do a crass calculation here and compare the amount of people he killed each year with the amount of people killed as a result of the Coalition invasion... the numbers average out as certainly within the same order of magnitude per year, and are perhaps surprisingly close. 12500 compared to about 9500.


EDIT: Life in liberated Iraq. Now 24% less fatal than under Saddam Hussein!

Yes. I guess we could take estimates and twist them anyway we need to support our beliefs.

But did they go to every place where the bodies are processed, or did they go to a small sampling of morgues and assume that every other morgue would see a similar increase in business? For example, morgues in the Kurdish part of Iraq wouldn't be busy at all. Can't assume that they'll see the same increase in deaths as Baghdad morgues.
True, but the central portion in Iraq where it is all going on, contains the bulk of the population.

Yes. I guess we could take estimates and twist them anyway we need to support our beliefs.

Surely you're not saying that its okay when you use estimates to support your position, but not okay when I use exactly the same estimates to support my position?

All I know for sure is that since we've eliminated Saddam's government we can't leave Iraq until there's a strong new government in place to maintain order and provide services to the Iraqi people. How many people, coalition or Iraqi, die in the process is a secondary concern.

All I know for sure is that since we've eliminated Saddam's government we can't leave Iraq until there's a strong new government in place to maintain order and provide services to the Iraqi people. How many people, coalition or Iraqi, die in the process is a secondary concern.

Surely if the insurgents are such strong and fearsome opponents, the fastest way to bring a 'strong new government' into existence would be to pull out the troops and let them form one?

Surely if the insurgents are such strong and fearsome opponents, the fastest way to bring a 'strong new government' into existence would be to pull out the troops and let them form one?
Sorry, I forgot to state that the government should be one that doesn't support or sponsor international terrorism. The insurgents would become a new Taliban. If that happens then we'll just have to invade again in a few years.

All I know for sure is that since we've eliminated Saddam's government we can't leave Iraq until there's a strong new government in place to maintain order and provide services to the Iraqi people. How many people, coalition or Iraqi, die in the process is a secondary concern.

I know the US has got itself stuck in a mess of it's own making but now the families of the Coalition soldiers, and Iraqi population are paying for the decisions of a few idiots. Sure Saddam is gone, but the place isn't much safer at the moment.

True, but what about all those contractors associated with the US military (the ones who get kidnapped, tortured and then shot).

They aren't soldiers and they choose to be there. Their fault...not the war.

If you choose to stick your hand in dog's mouth and it bites you it's the your fault not the dog's.

Sorry, I forgot to state that the government should be one that doesn't support or sponsor international terrorism.

Yeah, my last post wasn't intended to be quite taken at face value.

The insurgents would become a new Taliban. If that happens then we'll just have to invade again in a few years.

Lets us not forget which government supporting illegal combatants in foreign countries was largely responsible for the formation of the Taliban as a military force.

I know the US has got itself stuck in a mess of it's own making but now the families of the Coalition soldiers, and Iraqi population are paying for the decisions of a few idiots. Sure Saddam is gone, but the place isn't much safer at the moment.
And abandoning Iraq to the new taliban wouldn't make it any safer. Even if they manage to restore some order they will invariably sponsor terrorist attacks and that will lead to another invasion.

If you choose to stick your hand in dog's mouth and it bites you it's the your fault not the dog's.

Current US foreign policy appears to be that America has every right to stick its metaphorical hand in the dog's mouth without being bitten, and on this basis they have launched a program of de-toothing of dogs.

And abandoning Iraq to the new taliban wouldn't make it any safer. Even if they manage to restore some order they will invariably sponsor terrorist attacks and that will lead to another invasion.

There's more Taliban/Al Quaida in Iraq after the US invasion because Saddam didn't want them to steal his thunder (and he was a megamaniac).

There's more Taliban/Al Quaida in Iraq after the US invasion because Saddam didn't want them to steal his thunder (and he was a megamaniac).
I know. That's one of the reasons I was against the war. We risked increasing the number of extremists, diverting funds and resources from Afghanistan, and incuring the costs of rebuilding Iraq, and if we managed to pull it off perfectly, which we haven't, we didn't get much. Saddam was brutal, but he was secular, and didn't sponsor terrorism against the west.

It's funny how the Bush administration, with help from intel analysts at the CIA and DIA, and pentagon strategists couldn't see what a stupid gamble the Iraq war was, yet regular guys like me knew from the start that going into Iraq was seriously counterproductive.

I know. That's one of the reasons I was against the war. We risked increasing the number of extremists, diverting funds and resources from Afghanistan, and incuring the costs of rebuilding Iraq, and if we managed to pull it off perfectly, which we haven't, we didn't get much. Saddam was brutal, but he was secular, and didn't sponsor terrorism against the west.

Which makes Iraq as the choice of continuing the 'war on terror' all the more bizzare.

WooHoo! No Australian troops kill in Iraq. A little surprising considering how gun-ho friendly-fire the yanks are.