BuzzFlash Reader Contribution

November 1, 2004

CONTRIBUTOR ARCHIVES  

A Mere 100,000 Dead Non-Christian, Non-White People. So What!

A BUZZFLASH READER CONTRIBUTION
by Donald L Feinberg

There is a new, well-researched study available today, which estimates Iraqi war-related deaths (of Iraqis) to be about 100,000 persons.

This study was designed and conducted by researchers at Johns Hopkins University, Columbia University and the Al-Mustansiriya University in Baghdad. It is being published today (Thursday, 28 Oct) on the website of The Lancet medical journal, and it is also being carried by The New Scientist.

Note that this is 33 times the number of Americans killed on 9/11, for which Iraq wasn't responsible. (There is a website keeping track of dead Iraqis: http://www.iraqbodycount.net/)

Several internet articles are available today, for example, by Emma Ross (AP), quoted on Yahoo. (There's also a similar article on by Nancy A Youssed on Knight-Ridder). In part:

LONDON - A survey of deaths in Iraqi households estimates that as many as 100,000 more people may have died throughout the country in the 18 months since the U.S.-led invasion than would be expected based on the death rate before the war.

There is no official figure for the number of Iraqis killed since the conflict began, but some non-governmental estimates range from 10,000 to 30,000. As of Wednesday, 1,081 U.S. servicemen had been killed, according to the U.S. Defense Department

The figure of 100,000 is based on "conservative assumptions", notes Les Roberts at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, US, who led the study

The survey indicated violence accounted for most of the extra deaths seen since the invasion, and airstrikes from coalition forces caused most of the violent deaths, the researchers wrote in the British-based journal.

"Most individuals reportedly killed by coalition forces were women and children," they said.

We estimate that there were 98,000 extra deaths during the postwar period in the 97 percent of Iraq represented by all the clusters except Fallujah," the researchers said in the journal.

This isn't about individual soldiers doing bad things. This appears to be a problem with the approach to occupation in Iraq," Roberts said.

"These findings raise questions for those far removed from Iraq - in the governments of the countries responsible for launching a pre-emptive war," writes Richard Horton, the editor of The Lancet in a commentary accompanying the paper.

"In planning this war, the coalition forces - especially those of the US and UK - must have considered the likely effects of their actions for civilians," he writes.

Roberts argues that, from a public health perspective, whatever "planning did take place was grievously in error".

"The invasion of Iraq, the displacement of a cruel dictator, and the attempt to impose a liberal democracy by force have, by themselves, been insufficient to bring peace and security to the civilian population. Democratic imperialism has led to more deaths, not fewer," he asserts.

To repeat: "...airstrikes from coalition forces caused most of the violent deaths..."

They wouldn't have died if we hadn't invaded. We caused all this chaos. It is blood on our hands. Every one of us in the good ole USA.

You know what? ONE DEATH is not acceptable, especially if it is your son, daughter, mother, father, sister, or brother.

At some point, we will be keeping pace with Saddam at his peak in killing Iraqis. We are now the Soviets, and Bush is Stalin.

Oh! Wait a minute: Iraqis, being poor and brown, barely register on the human scale. So silly of me to forget!

100,000 people dead in an illegal war is a massacre. It is a war crime on par few with others. If any other country did this, Americans would be up in arms, but because this is us, "its not so bad."

No small wonder George W Bush doesn't want the US to be part of the International Criminal Court. He doesn't want to be dragged there and put on trial for war crimes. And I see now what Bush means when he tells us what a tremendous success Iraq is! How the Iraqi people are just delighted with their new freedom! How happy the Iraqi people are now that the murdering thug Saddam Hussein is gone.

We can now unequivocally say that the Iraqis were, in fact, better off when Saddam Hussein was in power. There is no way Saddam would have killed as many Iraqis in the past year and a half as we have.

You know, it must be 'really hard work' to butcher that many people. And so we have a new Bushism: "death of brown people = freedom", perfectly designed to appeal to Bush's Christian Fundamentalist base.

I saw a bumper sticker today: "Support Terrorism! Vote for John Kerry".

How will this country ever be sorry enough? How will we ever atone?

I guess I'll be seeing you in the deserts of Iran after the draft.

Donald L Feinberg
Naperville, IL

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