Who counts the civilian casualties?

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0331/p15s01-wogi.html

THE COSTS OF WAR: An Iraqi family grieved for a 3-year-old girl killed in Fallujah last fall when US forces battled insurgents.

LASZLO BALOGH/REUTERS

Not long before the United States launched its invasion of Iraq, President Bush told the American people: "If war is forced upon us, we will fight in a just cause and by just means - sparing, in every way we can, the innocent."

He meant civilians: men, women, and children who had lived for a quarter-century under Saddam Hussein's iron-fisted rule - who were not part of Iraq's military forces, yet could not escape the horrors of war.

How well has Mr. Bush's pledge been kept? How many civilian casualties - "collateral damage," to use the antiseptic phrase - have resulted from the war, and the subsequent occupation in which people are killed and wounded nearly every day?

It's an impossible question to answer with sure accuracy. The nature of war - in particular this kind of war in this kind of place - makes it hard to tally the "innocent" victims. The Pentagon says it "monitors" civilian casualties but doesn't keep such figures. Human rights groups try, but they acknowledge that their figures are estimates at best.

Those estimates, however, signal that losses have been severe. Between 8,789 and 10,638 civilians have died since war began March 19, 2003, according to one group of British and American researchers that surveys media reports and eyewitness accounts.

more

[greatauntoftriplets]

1. Closest I've ever seen is Iraq Body Count -- linked below.

http://www.iraqbodycount.net/

[theHandpuppet]

2. Check this out...

I think you may find this site of interest...

http://www.comw.org/pda/

Currently Featured:

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.

[ConcernedCanuk]

3. This is what the American People are closing their eyes to !!

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.
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I DO appreciate the loss of the American young that Bush has sent to their deaths,

I believe it's over 500 now,not to mention the thousands of wounded Americans . .

BUT

how about the TENS of thousands of Iraqis this war has massacred, and remember, There are 100's of thousands more wounded and dismembered by George W Bush's bombs ..

American's may forget

Iraqi's will not

[FloridaPat]

4. There was a group just after the invasion part was over

that went town to town and asked everyone the names of the dead. They had 30,000-40,000 estimated before the US government put a stop to counting. Seems we murdered 4 million in Vietnam in our pursuit of like-minded Vietnamese, and we are doing the same thing is Iraq. Our government if filled with murderers.

[boobooday]

5. Hey, hey now

Why you gotta bring that up? Remember what our fearless defense secretary said, and turn that frown upside down!

"Death tends to give people a depressing view of war."
-- Rumsfeld

Uh, yeah. Especially when you are talking about THREE YEAR OLD GIRLS!

Not only do we not see the return of our own soldiers after they are "sacrificed" for Bush's corporate war, we don't even count all the human lives snuffed out who weren't even involved.

The Bush administration is a bunch of punk-ass war criminals.

http://www.wgoeshome.com

[riverwalker]

6. buried in the desert

My brother was in the first Iraq war, he told of the stories of US troops bulldozing piles of bodies after a battle. They will never be counted, and even if found, we will probably just claim they were victims of Saddam. When this war started last spring, I watched the "coverage" 24/7. One night CNN was showing live feed from a foreign agency, I think BBC. The video footage was showing a man whose two very young sons (like 4 and 6 years old) were killed by US troops when they fired upon his vehicle. The soldiers were helping him dig graves for them in the desert sand, they were crying and the father was crying. I will never forget it. Nothing presented the horror and insanity of the war as that small group in that desolate desert. Anyway, CNN quickly pulled the story when they realized it showed the actual war, it was never seen again. CNN buried the story just like the soldiers buried the children.

[saigon68]

7. A lot of this going on

There are some very evil peole in charge of the news.

[Streetdoc270]

10. Makes you wonder....

(tinfoil hat warning)
Could some of "Saddam's Mass Graves" found by US to expose the atrocities of the Brutal Dictator actually be mass graves of Iraqi war dead from GW1?

[The_Casual_Observer]

8. "Who counts the civilian casualties?"

Nobody does because in bush's oil war world people don't count.

These people aren't considered human. It is very much the same as how the murdered in the death camps in Poland were not considered human, simply "figuren" or "dolls" by the SS (see the film Shoah). They didn't keep very good records in the camps either. The same shit is going on now, I defy anyone to make a clear distinction.

[DrWeird]

9. Nits begit lice.

That's the usual excuse.

[GoddessOfGuinness]

11. The spring edition of Pathways magazine

includes an interview with a reservist who serves in Iraq as a medic. I'd link it, but they're in the process of updating their articles area.

When asked, "What about Iraqi deaths and injuries?" he responded, "We don't care about Iraqi deaths. It's something that does not even count.The hospital was told not to keep count. The Iraqi infrastructure does not keep an account of the deaths anymore.

"Why?" he was asked.

"the American government told them not to. We do always keep a list of the Americans injured and the number that die. But here in America you don't see anything about these soldiers coming back. You don't read anything about the funeral. It's like a secret, like these people didn't exist."