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100,000 Civilians Dead in Iraq
asldihf writes "New Scientist is reporting that 100,000 civilians in Iraq are now dead due to America's war in Iraq. Make sure you vote next week."
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How many of his own people Saddam killed. And how many of those deaths are due to terrorists trying to recapture his legacy.
http://www.iraqbodycount.net/
Different sites have different stats, but one civilian death is one too many.
(Sponsored by cheeseSource for President 2012)
I was going to make a +5 Funny post about how George W. Bush is keeping us safe, but the subject is just too horrible.
The war on terror is not meant to be won, it's meant to be an excuse for any atrocity.
How can anyone think this is justified? It's sick.
The overall risk of death was 1.5 times more after the invasion than before.
That also includes the invasion itself. At this rate, eventually it may go down.
Latewire
Uh- Kerry always said he would have gone to war too, that's why I voted for Kucinich in the primary. The difference is he would have gone with more troops- even if it meant a draft- and more planning- even if it meant giving the inspectors a few more weeks- and better intelligence- even if it meant confirming every detail- and probably would have actually *bothered* to guard or destroy munitions depots as we went. Plus, as a Democrat, he wouldn't have given in to the Iraqi NRA- he would have disarmed civilians as we invaded as well (how stupid do you have to be to invade a country, destroy it's entire civil government, and NOT disarm the people?). I think all of that would have ended up with fewer battle casualties- and more friendly fire incidents.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
For this report, the sample numbers were EXTREMELY EXTREMELY low: 988 housholds. The potential for error here is astounding. So they had confirmation of 6%. That's silly. The death count is constantly overreported. Every article about military firefights ends with a quote from some official saying how the Americans attacked mostly women, children, and the elderly. It's the standard line and it gets old and less believable each time. I would really like to see statistics on who was killed and how the deaths occurred. Firefights with US troops? Bombings? Deaths during reconstruction? Who is called a "civilian?"
Household Survey Sees 100,000 Iraqi Deaths
And there are some troblesome excerpts:
Just so we're clear, this is what that guy who think's he's a reporter(drudge) has on his site:
NBCNEWS Brokaw interviewed John Kerry Thursday evening.
Brokaw: "If you had been President, Saddam Hussein would be in power."
Kerry: "Not necessarily."
Brokaw: "You said you wouldn't go to war against him."
Kerry: "That's not true. Because under the inspection process, Saddam Hussein was required to destroy those kinds of materials and weapons."
Brokaw: "But he wasn't destroying them."
Kerry: "That's what you have inspectors for. That's why I voted for the threat of force, because he only does things when you have a legitimate threat of force. It's irresponsible to suggest that if I were President, he wouldn't be gone. He might be gone, because if he hadn't complied, we might have had to go to war, but if we did, we would have gone with allies, so the American people weren't carrying the entire burden. And the entire world would understand why we did it."
Hmmm...Where did Kerry say he would have gone to war to? He was responding to the statement that Saddam would still be in power and he said "not necessarily". Then he stated about how we "may" have gone to war with all our allies if Saddam hadn't backed down and stopped farting around with the weapons inspectors.
But to take what he said and just thrown out flippantly "would probably have been the same" is kind of not true.
Two wrongs don't make a right. We shouldn't be in a position where we are comparing ourselves to Saddam Hussein.
I'm calling BS on this article. They conducted a sampling survey to generate these numbers? Come on now. I'm more inclined to believe iraqbodycount.org and the media always gets it wrong (and never corrects themselves.) And to blame most of the deaths on the US bombing? Total horse $hit. Have innocent people died in Iraq? Hell yes. Have many of them been our fault? Yes. Have any of them been deliberate? No. Half of the innocent lives lost over here, by estimation and observation for the past eight months I've been in Baghdad (being a little involved in intelligence reports), come from the insurgents/terrorists. Their road-side bombs and car bombs as often target civilians and Iraqi security forces (the ones who take huge personal risk upon themselves and their families to try to make a difference in the future of their country) as they target Coalition Forces. This article is BS BS BS BS!
> I could swear the president's right hand man said that they would minimize civilian casualties?
Here's another good one:
The neocons are trying to sell imperialism by portraying it as cheap and painless. Reality hasn't conformed to the plan yet.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
...is what would the cost in lives have been if the U.S. had done nothing? In the short term I'm guessing more lives have been lost because of the war, but in the long term, will it have been worth it?
My guess is that history will prove that the war was worth it, not only for Iraqis but for the world as a whole.
I'm interested in seeing the new movie "Voices of Iraq" that just came out. From the reviews I've read, including one on NPR last night, it sounds like it provides evidence that the average ordinary Iraqi is grateful for what the U.S. has done (even though they want us to leave as soon as possible).
How many of those 100,000 civilians were involved in attempts to attack American troops? How about the hundreds of thousands of people who are now free from tyranny in Iraq under Sadam's regime?
Interesting...so we were there to help.
Ah, so if another country...say China for instance...were to send troops to America to "help" us we would just lay down our arms, and welcome them with open arms? I mean, they're just trying to help right?
And if by "free from tyranny" you mean "all out civil war" then yeah, that's really something!
"Leo Fender was in a 'state of grace' when he designed the Stratocaster." -- Paul Reed Smith
Can I mod the article as -1:Troll? "Make sure you vote next week?" Let's skip all the rigamaroll...just post at the end of every politics article "And remember...we don't like Bush, we like Kerry!".
I'm pissed when I get modded down for any of my pro-Bush comments, but this is just blatant bias in the text of an article. A little more objectivity wouldn't hurt here.
--trb
Terrorists are considered Civilians according to international reports. Insurgents are considered Civilians according to most international reports.
So what % of those civilians are terrorists and insurgents?
-=[ Who Is John Galt? ]=-
None of your quotations are attacking any actual part of the method used in the study, they're just generalisations.
There is no official figure for the number of
Iraqis killed since the conflict began
Well of course there's no fucking official figure. Who could possibly give an "official" figure? God?
some non-governmental estimates range from 10,000 to 30,000.
As time goes on, more people are killed, and it is possible to establish that more people have been killed.
concede that the data they based their projections on were of "limited precision,"
As opposed to most studies which are of infinite precision?
quality of the information depends on the accuracy of the household interviews used for the study
Well yes.
report was released just days before the U.S. presidential election, and the lead researcher said he wanted it that way.
And why not? Isn't this the most vital time that people hear this information?
possible that they may have zoned in on hotspots that might not be representative of the death toll across Iraq
However, this information could be biased in either direction. Some areas of Iraq were excluded because they were too dangerous for the investigators; weren't they likely to have suffered more deaths?
more household clusters would have improved the precision of the report
Well obviously. This is true for any study or poll ever published.
In planning the war, it was estimated that the civilian casualties would be only about 10,000 if the US invaded Iraq. This estimate went into the decision of whether or not we should go forward with the invasion.
Fuck Soddam, fuck Bush, fuck Kerry, fuck Osama.
Why do these people have the power to start war?
Joe American doesn't want a war.
He wants to screw his girlfriend, work his job, and drink a few beers.
We're all human; why the hell do we let these people make us kill each other?
As TFA notes: this is 100,000 deaths above the death rate for a previous pre-war period, and; the most common cause of these deaths was airstrikes.
So unless you're suggesting that their countrymen have an extensive air force that they'd been planning on using regardless of the US's invasion, no, it's pretty accurate to characterize these deaths as being the result of American acts.
When both Presidential nominees, Giant Douche and Turd Sandwich, support the war what the hell is "make sure you vote next week" supposed to mean? If you're really against the war you'll be voting Nadar or Badnarik, but I'd be off my rocker to think that's what michael was implying by letting the article through.
Article points:
+100,000 flamebait (for every dead Iraqi by US)
+1,000,000 overrated (for every dead Iraqi by Saddam)
+5 insightful (for accidentally pointing out that the 3rd parties are the only ones against it all)
Direct away from face when opening.
Too bad we can't moderate stories as trolls or flamebait.
It was a war people! The purpose of war is to KILL PEOPLE.
It's funny how attitudes have changed. 200 years ago, we would have cited "empire-building" as the reason for invading Iraq, and the world would have been fine with it, just as they were with the English, Dutch, Spanish, French, Danish, Portuguese, Italians, Russians, and Germans.
How many native americans died during Cortez's conquest of Latin/South America? How many Gauls died during Julius Caesar's conquest of Western Europe? How many Persians died at the hands of Alexander's army?
Heck, it wasn't even until last century that the Ottoman and British Empires were laid to rest!
I'm not saying that invading Iraq was the right thing to do - I went on record then saying that I didn't think we had enough cause to invade. But it is an interesting thing to observe, I think, how much different the worlds' attitude toward empires is now.
Firstly it started off as WMDs, which are now proved to be complete crap
Then it turned into Osama and Iraq were working together which has not only not been proved, but I believe it was made official this week that there was no link
Then it turned suddenly to regieme change, yeah that's a good one lets throw out one dictator.. and put in one that's several thousand miles away
The problem with the regieme change is there are loads of other countries that are far far worse than Iraq but we like to keep those quiet.
It basically all comes down to the fact that whichever of the many reasons you choose to believe, this was an immoral and illegal war in the opinion of most people, and the US and UK governments think we're all so stupid that we'll just swallow whatever they say. And the sad thing is, a lot of us will.
What's worrying is this: I've watched part of the debates, and I watched some of question time last night. People were heckling and jeering opinions that didn't match their own. No one in the USA (and this is the viewpoint of a fair few UK people) seems to ever listen. Everyone believes whatever they choose to beleive, usually on one-sided evidence and refuses to listen to the other side. Unfortunately, those people are then allowed to vote.
I just hope that whatever does happen, someone keeps their brain in gear, because only when all the world leaders come up from their bunkers and see there is no one and nothing left to rule over, will they realise that nobody wins a war. Nobody.
Get paid to search..It's geniune and
But it is an interesting thing to observe, I think, how much different the worlds' attitude toward empires is now.
We also frown upon tying people to crosses and lighting them on fire. Funny how times change.