Cost of Iraq War

As the casualties mount in the besieged Iraqi city of Fallujah, Qatar-based Al Jazeera has been one of the only news networks broadcasting from the inside, relaying images of destruction and civilian victims-- including women and children. But when CNN anchor Daryn Kagan interviewed the network's editor-in-chief, Ahmed Al-Sheik, on Monday (4/12/04)-- a rare opportunity to get independent information about events in Fallujah-- she used the occasion to badger Al-Sheik about whether the civilian deaths were really "the story" in Fallujah.

"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies in the final sense
a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed."

Deaths of Scores of Mercenaries Not Reported
By Robert Fisk and Patrick Cockburn
The Star (South Africa)
http://www.thestar.co.za/index.php?fArticleId=401463
Tuesday 13 April 2004

Baghdad - At least 80 foreign mercenaries - security guards recruited from the United States, Europe and South Africa and working for American companies - have been killed in the past eight days in Iraq.

Lieutenant-General Mark Kimmitt admitted on Tuesday that "about 70" American and other Western troops had died during the Iraqi insurgency since April 1 but he made no mention of the mercenaries, apparently fearful that the full total of Western dead would have serious political fallout.

He did not give a figure for Iraqi dead, which, across the country may be as high as 900.

Full total of Western dead would have serious political fallout

At least 18 000 mercenaries, many of them tasked to protect US troops and personnel, are now believed to be in Iraq, some of them earning $1,000 (about R6,300) a day. But their companies rarely acknowledge their losses unless - like the four American murdered and mutilated in Fallujah three weeks ago - their deaths are already public knowledge.

Disappearing the Dead: Iraq, Afghanistan, and the Idea of a ‘New Warfare’ by Carl Conetta. PDA Research Monograph #9, 18 February 2004. Examines the Pentagon’s treatment of the civilian casualty issue in the Iraq and Afghan wars, reviews the "spin" and "news frames" used by defense officials to shape the public debate over casualties, and critiques the concept of a "precision warfare" as misleading. Case studies include the Baghdad bombing campaign. An appendix provides a comprehensive Guide to Surveys and Reporting on Casualties in the Afghan and Iraq Wars.
The Wages of War: Iraqi Combatant and Noncombatant Fatalities in the 2003 Conflict by Carl Conetta. PDA Research Monograph #8, 20 October 2003. How many Iraqis died in the 2003 Iraq war? What are the implications for stability in Iraq, the war on terrorism, and the "new warfare"? The report estimates the total number of Iraqis killed in the 2003 war, based on hospital and burial reports, combat statistics, and battlefield testimony from both sides. Uniquely, the report distinguishes noncombatant and combatant civilians. And it compares the experience of Operations Iraqi Freedom and Desert Storm. With two appendices: Appendix 1. Survey and assessment of reported Iraqi combatant fatalities in the 2003 War and Appendix 2. Iraqi Combatant and Noncombatant Fatalities in the 1991 Gulf War

In a study of civilian casualties from the Iraq war, Human Rights Watch (HRW) found that although the air force use of cluster bombs had become more careful since fierce criticism of civilian casualties in Yugoslavia in 1999, the US and British armies continued to use such munitions extensively, firing thousands of artillery shells and rockets, each filled with hundreds of explosive bomblets, or grenades.

U.S. Says Other Afghan Children Died in Earlier Raid

ABUL, Afghanistan, Dec. 10 — For the second time in a week, the American military has acknowledged that children were victims of airstrikes aimed at Taliban fighters.

A military spokesman said Wednesday that six children and two adults were found under a collapsed wall after an attack on Friday night by American Special Forces on the compound of a known militant. The airstrike was called in after the soldiers came under heavy machine-gun fire.

The United States previously acknowledged having killed nine children in an airstrike on Saturday against a suspected Taliban fighter in southern Afghanistan.

Remember him? Mr. "Smoke 'em out." Mr. "Bring 'em on." Mr. Top Gun, who pulled that stunt landing on the aircraft carrier, strutting for the cameras under a White House banner declaring: "Mission Accomplished."

But now that nearly twice as many soldiers have died in Iraq after they raised that banner than before it – and with coffins of our dead troops still coming home almost daily – where's the president who was so visible when sending troops off to war?

The hard job is not sending them off... but seeing the boxes come home. Where's George in this hour of national need? Bush has not attended the funeral of any American soldier killed in action in his war. We recently saw a photo-op of him hugging a woman who'd lost her house in the California wildfires – but he's simply been AWOL when it comes to appearing at the funerals of those shipped home from Iraq.

His political henchmen say they don't want George to get mired down in the daily body counts. Even when 15 Americans died in a Chinook helicopter that was recently shot down in Iraq – not a peep from George. He stayed way out of sight at his ranchette in Crawford, Texas.

The White House political Machiavellions think that if there's no presidential focus on the deadly price of the Iraqi occupation, the public won't notice that things are going very badly over there. Indeed, the Pentagon has even barred the media from covering the arrival of the coffins at the air base in Dover, Deleware. And the Pentagon also has stopped reporting the number of soliders wounded in Iraq – as though if they don't report it, it's not happening.

The White House warmongers have isolated themselves from the harsh pain of their ambitions for empire. But, if the sons and daughters of Bush, Cheney, and the other warmongers were the ones coming home in boxes, then you'd see a sharp change in presidential attitude... and in policy.

Continuing Collateral Damage: The health and environmental costs of war on Iraq
A new report from MEDACT

This report issued November 11, 2003 calculates the toll, and shows how the general state of health of the Iraqi people, already poor by international standards, has been compromised further by the war. The findings have emerged from a comprehensive independent survey undertaken by the UK global health charity Medact. Part-funded by Oxfam and the Polden-Puckham Charitable Foundation, an international team of authors and advisers, all experts on health and conflict, have assessed the health and environmental impact of the war.

WASHINGTON, Nov. 14 (UPI) -- The number of U.S. casualties from Operation Iraqi Freedom -- troops killed, wounded or evacuated due to injury or illness -- has passed 9,000, according to new Pentagon data.

In addition to the 397 service members who have died and the 1,967 wounded, 6,861 troops were medically evacuated for non-combat conditions between March 19 and Oct. 30, the Army Surgeon General's office said.

That brings total casualties among all services to more than 9,200, and represents an increase of nearly 3,000 non-combat medical evacuations reported since the first week of October. The Army offered no immediate explanation for the increase.

FORT KNOX, Ky., Oct. 29 (UPI) -- More than 400 sick and injured soldiers, including some who served in Operation Iraqi Freedom, are stuck at Fort Knox, waiting weeks and sometimes months for medical treatment, a score of soldiers said in interviews.

The delays appear to have demolished morale -- many said they had lost faith in the Army and would not serve again -- and could jeopardize some soldiers' health, the soldiers said.

The Army Reserve and National Guard soldiers are in what the Army calls "medical hold," like roughly 600 soldiers under similar circumstances waiting for doctors at Fort Stewart, Ga.

The apparent lack of care at both locations raises the specter that Reserve and Guard soldiers, including many who returned from Iraq, could be languishing at locations across the country, according to Senate investigators.