Reply #171: Consider what happened during the last one, 600,000+ Americans died on both sides using

[Uncle Joe]

19th century weapons out of a total population of approximately 30+ million, that's approximately 10% of today's U.S. population.

As tragic as our losses have been in Iraq and Afghanistan you could combine the totals and quite a few single battles of our Civil War exceeded those numbers in one day.

If we had the same % of Americans killed today as what happened during the Civil War, that would come to about six million Americans, considering that our weapons are far deadlier today than they were in the 19th century, I believe that's a conservative estimate.

As for torture, it's not over until it's over, as a nation we still have the power to reverse course.

As for crimes against humanity although it's a long shot, justice may yet prevail.

I'm fairly certain of one thing, had we entered a Civil War, the motivations, breakdown of institutions and wherewithal would've certainly encouraged and enabled a far greater number of torturous incidents and war crimes.