The Truth About American Deaths in Iraq
UPDATE June 15, 2007: All of the graphs related to American losses in Iraq and terrorist losses, including those related to the Surge, have been moved to their own site:
This post has become the all-time most viewed post on this blog. It has also set the record for comments. Thank you to all the bloggers who have linked here and all of you who have taken the time to read this post. -Chuck
Donations to support Terrorist Death Watch would be appreciated.
Data used for these graphs are found at my site, Terrorist Death Watch, and at the site Iraq Coalition Casualty Count.
I’m not just a “one-note” wonder. Here are some other recurring features on this blog:
Our Best: Babe Edition (women in the military)
Terrorist Death Watch (some of the stories behind the numbers and explanations of methodology)
America’s Girl Next Door - Sgt. Amanda Pinson
Subscribe
Christopher G Schroeder
First off, what’s with the name calling? Normally I don’t respond when people resort to that, but I’ll make a brief exception here.
OK, fine. Bush mentioned in one sentence that we weren’t going to just pack up and leave after ousting Saddam. I’ve listened to many of his pre-war speeches, actually, and he made that kind of statement a few times. So, yea, he said it. It’s certainly the understatement of the century, but he said it. The administration also said things like “greeted as liberators” too, absent any reason to believe that.
I’m guessing if they had started talking about permanent military bases, an olympic stadium sized embassy, millions of refugees, half a trillion dollars, the prospect of a civil war and/or destabilizing the region altogether, etc. , they probably wouldn’t have gotten us to go along with it.
[...] Lawyers calling war strategy?: Can we think of more ways to screw up in Iraq? Of course, not all is as one thinks. Or as easy as one might [...]
[...] some sobering graphs on U.S. KIA vs. Enemy KIA in [...]
I believe this ‘terrorist deaths’ graph to be misleading in several ways. Without getting into the old “Body count math: 5 guerillas plus three noncombatants plus a dozen pigs equals twenty enemy dead” argument, I would point out that the U.S. military press was notorious for grossly overestimating enemy casualties from artillery and air strikes in the Korean and Vietnam wars. While reporting on enemy casualties is doubtless more accurate now than in the past, gauging the number of dead enemies is an imprecise science at best. Without accusing our military of any intentional dishonesty, I can’t help but think they would be more inclined to overestimate than underestimate enemy casualties when in doubt.
Second, the number of confirmed enemy dead does not take into account their relative value. The ‘terrorists’ or insurgents who die in the greatest numbers tend to be those with the least training and experience. Disenchanted young muslim men eager to give their lives are pouring into Iraq from the enormous and largely overpopulated muslim world. The muslim world, enormous swathes of which could be brought into a fight against a perceived non-islamic agressor (like Iraq) easily. To the commanders, the organizers, the bomb-makers and other veteran terrorists, the lives of eager but untrained jihadis are valueless. While this obviously shows them to be amoral monsters, it must be understood that they would not spend the lives of their soldiers so freely if they did not have a nigh-limitless base of manpower. I see on the above graph that the ratio of IED/combat deaths to terrorist deaths is something like one to ten, or one to five at least favorable. When one considers the massive investment made in every single U.S. combat soldier, ten dime-a-dozen suicide jihadis for every ultra-expensive marine or soldier is not a good trade.
This brings me to my next point. If conservatives truly want to fight and defeat the vast and powerful ideology of islamic extremism, they must debase themselves of the illusion that American resources are limitless. Abundant, perhaps, but at the rate that military materiel is being destroyed and consumed in Iraq, the U.S. army will be a shadow of its former self in only a few years time. By measuring American losses only in the number of dead, conservatives disingenuously neglect the fact that American military might is based on our technological and materiel superiority. We are squandering, shamelessly, this power in Iraq. Insurgents and terrorists have often succeeded in attacking ammunition dumps and other high-value targets. Even if not one soldier dies, an entire ammo dump cooking off is a multi-million-dollar dagger in America’s side. Look at the weapons insurgents use; twenty-odd year old russian artillery shells for IEDs, AK-47s (still cheap, still effective) and similar, almost uniformly inadequate equipment. While it may be of low quality, the arab world has absolutely no shortage of the weapons they have been killing our men and destroying our equipment with.
I beleive Iraq has proved that the U.S. army, in its ultra-mechanized current form, is absolutely INCAPABLE of acting as a successful occupying force. Attempts to shore up our military’s inadequecies (chiefly, a shortage of ‘boots on the ground’) by quickly gearing up an Iraqi military have been dismal failures; these Iraqi army units, besides being shot through with infiltrators, are questionably loyal at best, and have often refused orders and sold their equipment to the black market (insurgents). Before the Iraq war began, I said that a protracted land-war in the middle east was the last thing the U.S. armed forces was prepared for. I hate to say I told you so, but I beleive I have been proven right.
Ten to one death ratio? Twenty, even thirty to one, would still be a net loss for us. Our economy and government is being drained and our military’s strength sapped by this insane adventure. I fully support confronting and defeating the forces of islamic extremism, but if we don’t fight smart and instead expect our glorious military to triumph whatever the odds, it is a fight we will not win.
As a final thought, I would point out that American deaths exceeded British in the revolutionary war, but look who won. I find it unendingly ironic that the pioneers of modern guerilla warfare are constantly stymied by it now that it is they who posess overwhelming firepower.
[Actually, you are wrong, wrong, wrong! As I have pointed out many times in America's North Shore Journal, my records are only picking up 1 out of 3 or 4 terrorists killed. The only reason that these graphs look as they do is that the military released actual numbers for the period of the Surge. The military is going out of its way to avoid announcing enemy deaths.
If you would follow the link to the Terrorist Death Watch site, you will see that every death has a citation. I have been very conservative, and not used figures from media sources.
Bill Clinton gutted our military. If you want boots, look for the half million or more troops that we no longer have a place for.
You will also note on this blog that I have noted the United Nation's definition of terrorism, and just about every dead guy on my list qualifies.
Four years is not a protracted war. Vietnam was a protracted war.
The Brits and Germans lost 5,800 plus to combat in the Revolution.
BTW, we won in Vietnam. The failure of the American government to reinforce the South when it was attack by Communist armor cost us SOutheast Asia, and is directly responsible for the Cambodian horrors.]
Body Count…
The Truth about American Deaths in
Iraq Apparently winning and losing a war is
measured by something other than body count these days. …
Hunter,
I disagree with most of your reasoning, but - unfortunately in my opinion -, there is an element of truth in what you say. The sentiment of support from the US public is truly not limitless (in fact, most Americans have the attention span of a half-hour sitcom).
As has been said above several times, the shame of the situations is that the MSM only reports US caualties. It’s like listening to a football game and the radio broadcaster only announces when the visiting team scores - as if our guys are sitting around waiting to be killed and are doing nothing positive.
I’m not a fan of kill ratios, necessarily, but this is one way to show that the activity is not all one sided.
FarOutWest…
Don’t confuse my “macho simpleton mindset” with a very focused eye on our enemy and what it will take to defeat them. Personally I’m not too fond of lying down and being eaten by the wolves, I much prefer to live in a democratic society without being forced into a Islamofascist Talibanesque dictatorship. If you think that this threat will merely go away if we just close our eyes then you are already dead. You need to read the writings/rants of OBL and every other Islamofascist terror group, including the government of Iran, and what their intentions are.
Feel free to pretend there’s no threat but there are plenty of us that will fight, even for you, before we lie down for these animals.
My family has shed blood and given lives in combat against AQ long before 9/11, the threat didn’t start with Iraq. Maybe you have forgotten about the Marine barracks in Beirut, the first WTC bombings, the Cole and hundreds of other attacks on Embassies, installations and citizens around the world. We didn’t start it but we damn sure better finish it.
Ah yes, Vietnam. The tragic, contentious conflict of yesteryear. I have no doubt that, if the United States had just poured enough materiel support into the South Vietnamese regime at the right time, it could have stayed afloat and, if not conquered the north, at least endured until it died a political death. What I would say in response to the old “stabbed in the back” refrain about why we ‘lost’ Vietnam is that that war was a defeat before the first American military advisor arrived.
Not to sound condescending, but it seems to me conservatives now and throughout history have had difficulty with the concept of the ‘Pyrrhic victory’ and why such a thing is never desirable. The mind boggles at the sheer volume of American war materiel sent to (and lost in) Vietnam. The communist Vietnamese guerillas were battle-hardened before even the French came to grips with them; they fought a hard, bloody insurgency against the Imperial Japanese during world war II. The failure of the French to reach a political solution with the nationalist wing of the Vietnamese political spectrum forced the nationalists into the arms of the communists, making almost the entire population hostile to western government. The failure of the French military should have impressed this upon American military planners; high-tech western weaponry and mechanized tactics do not provide a decisive advantage against a dedicated foe, with strong local support, in dense terrain. Therefore, unless extremely vital interests are at stake, that kind of battle should always be avoided by a mechanized, western military.
Put simply, while it may have been desirable to prevent a communist takeover in Vietnam (Pol Pot et al.), the fact that the ‘domino theory’ was bunk (ignoring as it did the uniqueness of the French Indochina situation) combined with the low strategic value of Vietnam compared to, say, the Middle East or the Balkans, means to me that in a world ‘beseiged’ by communism on many fronts, Vietnam was a lost cause. It cost us much, much more in terms of manpower and resources than it did the Soviets and communist Chinese. In addition to poisoning civillian support for anything to do with the Cold War, the Vietnam conflict depleted American resources at a much faster rate than the Soviets and Chinese, who hardly had to commit any of their soldiers at all, thus giving the United States a compound disadvantage in the arms race, hampering political support and depleting equipment at the same time.
Does this make me cold, inhuman, to consign so many to death and tyranny for the sake of strategic advantage? Perhaps, but a wise man once said “He who defends everything defends nothing”, and besides, we Americans cannot claim to have come charging to the rescue during every single humanitarian crisis of the 20th century (though we do try). Conservatives often accuse progressives of being naive or soft, but it is the height of arrogance to believe we can right every wrong.
The benign, good-natured interventionism of the post-WWII period is only a hairs breadth from imperialism in practice. This should give interventionists pause; not because imperialism is immoral, but because it is proven to be ineffective. America commands the industrialized world, but the rest of the world, the ‘third’ world, while not beyond our influence, is not within our power to control. I firmly believe that, had the South-Vietnamese government been sustained militarily, it would have fallen politically due to the unique social stresses which pushed Vietnam towards communism in the first place. Beyond Indochina, resentment to U.S. involvement in the politics of third-world nations almost always meets resentment and resistance. For every ‘dollar’ of American influence, two or more must be spent in a third-world nation for the same value one would hold in an industrialized nation.
Does this mean we should never, ever intervene in any way in the third world? No. But money does not grow on trees, and gutting all the social programs in the western world could not buy an army large enough to enforce our will over every last corner of the globe. And most importantly, a high-tech military can never lie down in one spot, forfeiting its formidable mobility and CnC advantages, and allow its low-tech adversaries to smother it.
Congress “Supports The Troops”…
Today America was once again reminded how very sincerely Congress supports our armed forces: Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid confirmed Thursday that he told liberal bloggers last week that he thinks outgoing Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Peter Pace…
Hunter,
I agree with you that, in retrospect, Vietnam turned out to be a geography of less political importance than was believed in 1960’s. But to suggest that this totally discredits the domino theory is wrong.
Please also realize that Vietnam was a war that began by Kennedy and was escalated by Johnson - neither of these two were considered “conservative.” They were, in fact, quite the liberal politicians.
Finally, in Vietnam, the biggest error, in my opinion, was that the politicians attempted to manage it from Washington, rather than letting the commanders in the field set the battle strategy. Very similar to what Pelosi and Reid are attempting to do with Iraq, now. During vietnam, the public outcry against the war was much, much more widespread then the current situation - just look at the relative size of the protests.
[...] the fact that the domino theory was bunk (ignoring as it did the uniqueness of the French Indochina situation) combined with the low strategic value of Vietnam compared to, say, the Middle East or the Balkans, means to me that in a … …READ MORE… [...]
Stevend-
I find it extremely disingenuous to suggest that because Kennedy and Johnson (who are indeed known for their liberal domestic policy) began the war in earnest that liberalism as an ideology and liberal politicians had as much to do with starting the Vietnam war as did conservative politicians. Lets be realistic. Support for the Vietnam war was almost exclusively the purview of conservatives. It was, after all, Ike Eisenhower who made the original commitment to French Indochina. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe then, as now, the further to the right one was politically, the more likely one was to support Vietnam.
Second: I believe the oft-repeated notion that politicians ruined the war with micromanagement to be, like the same ’stabbed in the back’ myth in post WWI Germany, a way to deflect blame from the basic inadequecies of the defeated military. There was nothing Germany’s politicians could have done or not done to avert their defeat; they were outmatched from the first day.
You cannot blame the ‘hippies’ and politicians for the U.S. military’s basic failings in Vietnam, the failings which turned the rest of the nation against that conflict: The U.S. military had no experience in counterinsurgency and was incapable of ‘winning hearts and minds’ as they put it. Furthermore, in actual combat with guerillas, the firepower and mobility focused U.S. army was at a fundamental disadvantage and often found itself fought to a standstill or stymied by poorly equipped indigenous fighters.
Though never defeated on the battlefield exactly, make no mistake; the U.S. military was beaten in Vietnam. They were defeated in the chronic underperformance of the well-equipped ARVN, they were defeated in the unquestioning willingness of any Vietnamese outside Saigon and a certain plateau to harm, hamper or confuse Americans whenever possible, they were defeated in the many emberassing setbacks dealt to the USAF by the comparatively tiny Vietnamese airforce. We were defeated in our inability to keep our soldiers under control and enforce discipline in a supremely chaotic environment (Mai Lai, et al.) Even if we held the battlefield at the end of the day, by simply facing us on our own terms and holding their own, the Vietnamese perceived a victory, and rightly so, for a narrow victory over a force with perhaps one tenth of your resources is nothing to be proud of.
To say that the U.S. military succeeded in everything it did, and that it was the politicians who caused defeat in Vietnam is to turn a blind eye to our military’s inabilities. The Army can beat any force in the world in the air or on open ground, but the same technology and doctrine which allows us to do so is more a hindrance than a help in a situation like Vietnam.
In summary,
1. We lost Vietnam.
2. Our military’s basic structure is a disadvantage in such a war.
3. The Soviets/Chinese got massive return for their investment in Vietnam. Our investment went right down the tubes.
4. Even if North Vietnam was finally assaulted and taken following the Tet offensive, we STILL lost Vietnam because of our proportional losses.
Hunter,
You seem to have a “defend liberals at any cost” attitude, which makes me think that you are missing the forest for the trees. Liberals or conservatives don’t win or lose wars. Democrats or Republicans don’t win or lose wars. Nations win or lose wars. In the case of Iraq, we had a united nation going into the fray. Then, as far as I can see, the dems put are putting their own political interests in front of the countries.
I did not blame hippies for anything and I’m not up-to-snuff on German Military tactics in WWI. So, I’ll agree with what you say there. That said, you reminded me that liberal Wilson led the US into WWI - and, just to throw fuel on the fire - liberal roosevel led the US into WWII. (If liberals hate war so much, they sure have a bad track record).
Regarding Vietnam, I believe Ike sent a hundred observers, which Kennedy turned into ten thousand trainers, which Johnson turned into a half a million soldiers, which Nixon - by congressional mandate - withdrew. Support for the Vietnam war, when it was popular, was as much a liberal as a conservative cause and villification when it was unpopular was also bi-partisan.
The US military in Vietnam, as has been pointed out many times on this thread previously, performed great - especially the soldiers in the field. Did they suceed at everything? No, of course not. Were there bad apples? Unfortunately, yes. But did they overall do what was needed/expected from them? Resoundingly yes. I find your criticism of them incorrect and incoherent.
I do blame the leadership (especially Johnson/MacNamara), for foolishly micromanaging the Vietnam conflict. We should never have had half a million soldiers. We should have had enough soldiers needed to secure the borders and then fought a battles against an insurgency (which is what Patreus is proposing in Iraq). Staying in concentrated masses and seek and destroy is a bad tactic. The army can fight either way (again, yur criticisim is incoherent).
As applied to the situation in Iraq, I think it would be a mistake for the govt. to apply timelines for withdrawal. It’s the worst idea possible. If we have to quit in a year, then let’s get the hell out ASAP and save our resources. Why? Because within 5 years of a premature withdrawal, there will be a lights-out, take no prisoners war and we will be sucked into it.
[...] Más: The Truth About American Deaths in Iraq [...]
I LOVE BUSH!!
Hunter you are wildly off mark.
Eisenhower sent advisors to many other countries as well as South Vietnam. As have every other president since.
It was JFK and LBJ that planned and executed that war. It should also be noted that the Democrats controlled both houses during those years.
Like the Democrats in March 2003 the Republicans were the loyal opposition, but the Bush Administration gets the credit with planning the liberation of Iraq (although the Dems controlled one of the houses, I dont remember which one). So lets put things in a proper perspective here.
Ironically it was the Democrats that sold out South Vietnam. However, I disagree with Steven about the conduct of U.S. troops in the war. While the French couldnt match the Communists outside of the Vietnamese cities, our troops successfully took the fight to the enemy’s own turf and bested them every time. The South Vietnamese guerillas (Vietcong) were effectively defeated and the North Vietnamese regulars resorted to disguising themselves as guerillas in order to maintain the appearance of a popular revolution.
After all, its all about “appearances” in guerilla/terrorist warfare.
So if we had honored our obligations to the South Vietnamese government after our troops pulled out the NVA invasion would have failed, but the Democratic Party (that planned the war in the first place) did everything they could to defeat our allies.
It was a pity and in that regard similar to the Iraq War.
“The insurgents aren’t discouraged because the Islamic radical imans of the world keep pushing the jihad to the front of all there sermons and speeches in the mosques, madrassas and 7/11’s.”
Exactly… and that has been going on for years.
While studying in Paris in the 70’s, I often had political discussions with several of my fellow students. One of the students, a Morrocan I came to know a bit better than others, had a really skewed view of life in the US(shaped, in part, by the good ole’ American film industry). I challenged him to come and study here, to experience first-hand life in the US. Of course, that wouldn’t do! It would be too dangerous for him, he wouldn’t be able to walk down the streets safely. He told me that the US must be destroyed, that it didn’t matter how long it took, the battle would continue. If one generation didn’t accomplish that goal, the next would continue the stuggle.
Radical Islam’s battle against the US/the West didn’t start with the war in Iraq, with 9-11 or even back in 1993 with the first WTC attack. It’s been going on for literally at least a couple of generations, now. It just took 9-11 for most Americans to become aware of it.
“The insurgents aren’t discouraged because the Islamic radical imans of the world keep pushing the jihad to the front of all there sermons and speeches in the mosques, madrassas and 7/11’s.”
“There’s a sucker born every minute.”
David Hannum (P.T. Barnum’s competitor)
Under Islamic law, a young man cannot have sex outside of marriage and he cannot take a wife unless he has a job. Since he only has a degree in Islam studies (if he has one at all), there is no job available except in religious circles. Islamist mosques typically are funded by individuals (sometimes well to do individuals, like Bin Laden or Muqtada al Sadre). If the young man doesn’t do things the way the check signers want it, then he has no job, and probably lose a limb in the process. So, he can’t have sex outside of marriage, and can’t have a marriage w/o a job, the prospect of 72 virgins and getting some Al Qaeda money to his family simply by blowing himself up starts to look pretty good.
This war cannot be won on the battlefield without the resolve of ALL Americans. The war will be won or lost in the media and they are doing a great job creating division in this country. Imagine the outcome if America was truly united. The politicians, the media and the people, in that order. We can not win until we ALL unite. The terrorists find new resolve every time an American politician, reporter or citizen speaks against the war effort, and they do this on a daily basis. The media and the politicians all have their own agendas. Unfortunately the first thing on their list is not winning this war.
Ask any solder returning from Iraq what they think of the American media.
God Bless George W. Bush for standing firm. Beware of Iran after his term because the Demos are worse than the French. Their heads will be in the sand until they loose it, then we will all have to pay the price to salvage what is left.
This was printed in the Orange County Register last year. Perhaps a bit off topic, but interesting.
Many Americans are too young to remember, but the history of terrorism against Americans (and our allies) may help us understand the reasoning for ““The War in Iraq””, and many others need to be reminded. See the web-site listed below if you want a history lesson or a reminder of the Americans and others who have been murdered in the name of Islam.
http://www.geocities.com/ktkris.geo/victims.html
Americans have been attacked by Islamic Extremist (terrorists) over four dozen times in the last 40 years before 9/11. Over 1200 Americans were killed and thousands injured (for non-Americans, you can almost triple these numbers). We have done virtually nothing about it. Why? Because they are cowards who strike and then hide. They are using the same strategy in Iraq, Afghanistan and many other places in the world. They hide in countries that will protect them or they are in regions of those countries that are very isolated with little or no government control. These terrorist groups were not Al Qaeda, so don’t be fooled into thinking this war is against them alone. Let’s not forget about Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Fatwa, Hezbollah, PFLP, PLC; and there are many, many more. They have all attacked and killed many Americans for decades. They hate what we are, not what we do, so don’t think that the war in Iraq is creating more terrorists; it is merely bringing them out of their hiding places, finally. We have waited for this opportunity for too many years. But there is a much larger problem. The terrorists know they can not defeat the American war machine. They can only hope to kill as many of us as possible to bolster their support in the Islamic world to win over more recruits while they wait for their ultimate strategy to succeed. You see, their only hope is to use the free western media against us, and its working. The terrorists remember how we lost in Viet Nam. It works like this. Just get the media to report all the soldiers dying, which will eventually outrage the American public, who in turn will protest against the war until the government gives in and brings all the soldiers home (so they can get re-elected). Then all the terrorist groups can claim victory and get even more powerful.
Wake up America, don’t let this happen. Their vision of the future is parallel with the Taliban government of pre-9/11 Afghanistan. But first they must KILL the infidels. That’s us. Think about the things we know about the terrorists: They have hated who we are (infidels) for half a century, they want us dead, they will commit suicide to kill us, they believe they will go to heaven if they do so. We have seized laptops and literature that proves they are trying to acquire a nuclear weapon or the technology to make one. It is inevitable that they will succeed one day if we don’t act now. North Korea, Iran or Pakistan could supply this technology one day. Another coup in Pakistan is possible in the next few years, Iran will soon have a nuclear reactor, and you know what they think of us. Will we wait for a nuclear explosion in a major US city before we understand what their goals are?
We are in Iraq not only to fight a long time enemy that has killed hundreds of our loved ones, but to change the face of the Middle East by opening their minds to religious and cultural tolerance. This can be done by giving them a taste of real freedom and financial security for their families. The region has the financial wealth to accomplish this with the right government in place. This is why a diverse, democratically elected, non-corrupt government is Iraq is critical. This is what changing the hearts and minds of the people is all about. And it will spread throughout the Middle East. They are hungry for freedom but many are afraid to express such ideas.
Open your eyes America, don’t let the media affect your good judgment. They have their own agendas which has priority over our National Security.
God Bless America and its Warriors
on 07 Jun 2007 at # Francis
“submandave–
I appreciate you making the distinction and I accept your caveat. For this very reason we (the U.S.) are negotiating with the insurgents to bring about whatever resolutions are possible. This must be done. To label the entire opposition as ‘terrorists’ is reductive and foolish. For on one reason it makes the U.S. absolute hypocrites ‘we do not negotiate with terrorists’—except for the ones we do? And that’s just for starters.”
See you lost the minute you started “talking” to the insurgents. They just want you dead. They don’t give a rats ass what you think or believe. It’s ALLAH all the time and ALLAH all the way.
Have all the Liberal turds out there lost their collective minds to think that we can “Talk” to these delusional Muslim Terorist? Just kissy kissy and find out what they want and all will be well?
God help this nation.
[...] Re: Terrorist death tolls I have been trying to get ANYTHING on this subject. The news reports numbers of terrorists killed in single engagements, but the labels vary quite a bit and NOBODY seems to make tallies, provide estimates or otherwise compare. This link makes an attempt and there’s the usual discussion attached, but it’s clearly an advocacy site, so who knows? Any help with this would add to the discussion. The big question is why the main stream doesn’t even seem to be interested? Americas North Shore Journal [...]
Enemy Body Count
The administration has recently changed their position on reporting enemy casualties. so here you go, try this link:
http://northshorejournal.org/index.php/2007/06/the-truth-about-american-deaths-in-iraq#comment-7576
[...] other news. 6.550 terrorists killed in Iraq since 1 Jan 2006. Such a waste. Just think if they were actually trying to make life better in Iraq, instead. The [...]