How many innocent people have died in Iraq?

[Blemonds]

Speaking of violating resolutions, what do you think should be done about Israel?

What about Israel?

 

[Edge]

Blemonds, we covered this before. If I remember correctly, after 5 pages of you avoiding a very simple question: "What resolutions did Iraq violate and when?", you disappeared and never did answer my question.

And for all the participants in this happy discussion: UN resolution 678. You can determine whether it authorizes an explictly unsanctioned war a dozen years after the fact.

 

[Zoot]

What about Israel?

How much longer should we put up with it ignoring resolutions against the settlements inside the Palestinian territories?

 

[Blemonds]

Blemonds, we covered this before. If I remember correctly, after 5 pages of you avoiding a very simple question: "What resolutions did Iraq violate and when?", you disappeared and never did answer my question.

And for all the participants in this happy discussion: UN resolution 678. You can determine whether it authorizes an explictly unsanctioned war a dozen years after the fact.

Well, I went back and looked at that thread and I did indeed give you an answer. Just because you don't like the answer, doesn't mean you didn't get one.

 

[Blemonds]

How much longer should we put up with it ignoring resolutions against the settlements inside the Palestinian territories?

Which resolution?

 

[Edge]

Um, Zlex. An unsupported op-ed that makes up numbers doesn't cut it.

From your article:
"Probably 10,000 Iraqis died in the 1990-91 Gulf War, although estimates vary."
"The policies of Saddam's regimes have led to an average of perhaps 200,000 Iraqis dying per year..."

From reputable sources (1,2):
"In June 1991, the U.S. estimated that more than 100,000 Iraqi soldiers died, 300,000 were wounded, 150,000 deserted and 60,000 were taken prisoner."
"At least 300,000 people are believed to have been killed during his 23-year presidency, many of them buried in mass graves."

Blemonds: I didn't like your answer because it consisted of, as I said then, an inaccurate and unsupported history lesson that didn't actually address my question. You're welcome to try again.

 

[Risen Tree]

So it looks like that at the very worst, Iraqis are dying at a slightly lower rate than they were under the regime, and at that, this is the sticky transition period.

 

[Zoot]

Which resolution?

Resolutions 446, 452, 465.

 

[alonesoldier]

Well that all depends Rising Tree, no one could have predicted that Terrorist in an effort to kill us would target Iraqi Civilians in the name of Saddam Hussein. Are these deaths attributed to them or us? No matter what your answer the number is still lower and it will continue to become lower. When Iraq is a functioning democracy and model for the Middle East, I would like to copy all of the post on this board for prosperity, to show my grandchildren that the right thing is not always popular.

 

[Zlex]

Um, Zlex. An unsupported op-ed that makes up numbers doesn't cut it.

From your article:
"Probably 10,000 Iraqis died in the 1990-91 Gulf War, although estimates vary."
"The policies of Saddam's regimes have led to an average of perhaps 200,000 Iraqis dying per year..."

From reputable sources (1,2):
"In June 1991, the U.S. estimated that more than 100,000 Iraqi soldiers died, 300,000 were wounded, 150,000 deserted and 60,000 were taken prisoner."
"At least 300,000 people are believed to have been killed during his 23-year presidency, many of them buried in mass graves."

Blemonds: I didn't like your answer because it consisted of, as I said then, an inaccurate and unsupported history lesson that didn't actually address my question. You're welcome to try again.

Ok,

http://www.genocidewatch.org/IraqkilledJanuary26.htm states that Saddam is responsible for the deaths of roughly one million Iraqis.

Roughtly, 500,000 died in the war with Iran, and another 100,000 died in Gulf War I. That leaves 400,000 civilian Iraqis. So he's murdered roughtly 200k since the 91 Gulf.

Thats roughtly 20k deaths per year, or 1667 deaths per month.

We've been there 9 months, and 3200 have died. Under Saddams rule that number would have been almost 5 times as much.

 

[Edge]

Rising Tree: Um, kind of. The sole reason for the lower total number of Iraqi deaths is the cessation of sanctions and the flood of humanitarian aid into the country: something that could and should have happened a long time ago.

Zlex: I think you misread the article.

Casualties from Iraq's gulag are harder to estimate. Accounts collected by Western human rights groups from Iraqi émigrés and defectors have suggested that the number of those who have "disappeared" into the hands of the secret police, never to be heard from again, could be 200,000. As long as Mr. Hussein remains in power, figures like these will be uncheckable, but the huge toll is palpable nonetheless.

In any case, it is an unsupported op-ed, just like your other article. I'm sorry, but this doesn't cut it. Again, the US-led occupation authority estimates around 300,000 total, nowhere near "200,000 a year".

If I were you, I'd settle down and accept the painful truth: more Iraqis are dead because of the United States' efforts than Hussein's.

 

[alonesoldier]

Actually I believe that taking into account the number of deaths in the Sunni Triangle which we had never considered before the war raises the number closer to 400,000 according to the U.S and British Governments. Apparently the Kurds were not the only ones to suffer. However those are apparently the numbers of bodies in mass graves. Not the total number of victims of Saddam Hussein. Taking into account his self impossed starvation tactics (which he borrowed from Stalin) and the wars that he started, Saddam Hussein's regime claimed the lives of 3 million Iraqis. Which not only makes his reign particularly brutal for the last 50 years, but taking into account that only 22 million people live in Iraq his is one of the worst track records of all time.

 

[Zlex]

If I were you, I'd settle down and accept the painful truth: more Iraqis are dead because of the United States' efforts than Hussein's.

Ok, lets settle with the numbers from your article which state atleast 300,000. So giving you the largest possible benifit of the doubt 300,000 people have been killed by Saddam.

= 300,000 / 23
= 13043.478260869565217391304347826 (per year)

= 13043.478260869565217391304347826 / 12
= 1086.9565217391304347826086956522 (per month)

3200 have died since early March, almost 9 months ago.

Under Saddam almost 10,000 would have been killed.

 

[Edge]

alonesoldier: Personal assertion is nothing. Support is everything.

Zlex: Actually, more than 22,000 Iraqis would have died over the last nine months: nearly 10,000 because of Hussein and nearly 12,000 children because of US-led sanctions. Of course, the former number was and would remain much, much smaller, regardless of a US invasion, as Hussein hasn't gone genocidal in a decade or more, and the latter would be less, because the 350,000 figure includes casualties from the Gulf War.

Although only 3200 to 9000 Iraqi civilians have died as a direct result of the war: the humanitarian crisis that claimed the lives of 350,000 children continued unabated (assisted even by the destruction of power and water in a city of five million) thoughout the war.

 

[fungle]

What is happening in the sector controlled by the the british. Are there any casuality reports?

 

[revolutio]

When Iraq is a functioning democracy and model for the Middle East, I would like to copy all of the post on this board for prosperity, to show my grandchildren that the right thing is not always popular.

And then tell them we will find the WMDs any day now.

Hopefully though Bush will remember Afghanistan. Last time I checked that was still very far from a functioning democracy. Though I sincerely hope atleast Iraq goes right and becomes one.

 

[alonesoldier]

Edge where did you get 9000 Iraqi Civilians dead? So far AP has set the number at 3200 and said that it expects the number to be higher... but how you arrived at 9000... I smell a rat.. possibly either one called bush body count or Iraqi body count. And are you seriously saying that their is no humanitarian effort in Iraq right now?

 

[Ikaria]

What is happening in the sector controlled by the the british. Are there any casuality reports?

Here:


http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/spl/hi/uk/03/british_casualties/html/default.stm


Looks like they're doin alot better then us.

 

[Ikaria]

BTW, three of those deaths are listed as resulting from "friendly fire."

It would nice if we could have just one war in which we didn't kill half our allies.

 

[Ikaria]

Edge where did you get 9000 Iraqi Civilians dead? So far AP has set the number at 3200 and said that it expects the number to be higher... but how you arrived at 9000... I smell a rat.. possibly either one called bush body count or Iraqi body count. And are you seriously saying that their is no humanitarian effort in Iraq right now?

BAGHDAD – Evidence is mounting to suggest that between 5,000 and 10,000 Iraqi civilians may have died during the recent war, according to researchers involved in independent surveys of the country.

None of the local and foreign researchers were willing to speak for the record, however, until their tallies are complete.

Such a range would make the Iraq war the deadliest campaign for noncombatants that US forces have fought since Vietnam.

Though it is still too early for anything like a definitive estimate, the surveyors warn, preliminary reports from hospitals, morgues, mosques, and homes point to a level of civilian casualties far exceeding the Gulf War, when 3,500 civilians are thought to have died.

"Thousands are dead, thousands are missing, thousands are captured," says Haidar Taie, head of the tracing department for the Iraqi Red Crescent in Baghdad. "It is a big disaster."

...

There are no figures at all for Iraqi military casualties, which Iraqi officials kept secret. One factor that led to many civilian deaths, and which complicates the task of counting them accurately, is that irregular fedayeen militia hid in civilian homes as they fought advancing coalition troops, and dressed as civilians.

Nor are hospital records - kept in the heat of war under intense pressure on doctors and staff - necessarily accurate, some observers warn. That means they probably underestimate the real scale of civilian deaths, although at the same time they may have recorded some combatant casualties as civilian ones.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/0522/p01s02-woiq.html

Even allowing for a pretty generous margin of error, the figures are terribly high.