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2,500 US Deaths In Iraq As Of Today ...
Today, Thursday 15th June 2006 is a landmark; a lamentable landmark, by any civilised standard.
For the Pentagon has announced that [ at the time of releasing the information] the number of American lives lost fighting in [ the illegal invasion and ongoing occupation of ] Iraq, as conceived, commanded and continued regardless by George W. Bush, has now reached 2,500.
That is, in case some people still haven't realised it, a higher US fatality figure than the number of the American victims of the catastrophic W.T.C. carnage of 11th September 2001.
And even as we sit here and write this, that number has very likely already increased.
By the time you are sitting reading this, the odds are that that total has grown even higher.
As for the number of [mainly innocent civilian] Iraqi people who have been killed, are still being killed and are destined yet to be killed -- that's simply anybody's guess.
Since, as a certain brass slimeball bare-facedly said so early on in this shameful shock and awe show -- nobody counts Iraqi deaths.
Educated estimates made by some concerned souls, well yes, maybe. But as for any official figures -- we're afraid we'd all better just forget it. Forever.
So, upon such a solemn subject we've decide we shouldn't say too much.
The truth is that we shouldn't need to.
Surely such sombre facts and figures speak -- so succinctly -- for themselves.
Here's what BBC online had to say earlier today.
But from This Old Brit, that is all.
May you and yours sleep the sleep of the innocent; peacefully, safely and soundly.
Have a good night.
*
posted by Richard at Thursday, June 15, 2006
21 Comments:
What was it LBJ said about the flower of America's youth, during Nam ?
Sheesh. Can everyone say "same old, same old"?
I dread to think about the wounded and maimed - in mind as well as body.
And of the DU victims still to come. And of their already cursed and condemned as yet unborn children.
The same applies to British troops too, on those scores.
Richard:
Thanks for your kind words over at mine: you were spot on.
It seems to me that on the American Right, they are willing to absorb far more casualties, if it secures "victory". This is the gamble they'll have to take: nobody knows really what the best strategy, in the best interest of Iraq, really is right now. I certainly don't.
We shouldn't have gone in: Saddam was a paper tiger after Kuwait and two decades of isolation. A carrot and stick approach could very well have worked, instead the cowboys went in all guns blazing and not a shred of post-war strategy. This is the price we pay for unmitigated stupidity.
My hope is that the US will learn something: there are tentative signs of this...
In some ways the dead are more fortunate than the badly wounded ~ be their wounds physical or mental.
Look at how most of the wounded Nam vets were treated. By their government - and by most of those fellow citizens they were supposed to 'saving' from the communism 'terror'. Many of those vets are still suffering to this day, as they have every single day since being 'dumped' back home.
I hope America has learned, gert. Learned a lot of things.
Thank you Richard for bringing this to light. I have to agree with anonymous and mention the countless horribly maimed service people who return in the dark and are forgotten. Needless to say no mention of the hundreds and thousands of Iraqi civilians who have been killed. Gert, I don't think the US will ever learn - since we 'got' No. 1 Baddie last week popular belief is that we are 'winning'. Oh dear God it's time for the cheap gin.
Graniab,
Meet the new No.1 Baddie, same as the old No. 1 Baddie:
http://tinyurl.com/fd8k9
Graniab:
I believe in redemption. The US is a great place but with so much unchecked fire-power anyone could start behaving lunatically. This is what's been happening, now more than during the cold war where the US at least faced stiff military competition.
I know quite a lot of people in the Middle East and elsewhere who are actively hoping that the US exits Iraq via Iran because as a formerly pro-US Iraqi friend of mine expressed it the other night:
"That way they'll get their other leg blown off"
There's been some stuff saying more or less the same thing on Juan Cole's site of late. Ditto on a forum I run.
Iraq was indeed as gert puts it a "paper tiger" defeating a fifth rate military power in conventional warfare isn't much of a feat for the US to brag about. Iran is another matter altogether.
I also agree with gert btw that what we're seeing now is the result of one of the hazards of unipolarity;
"Mulipolarity redivivans"
My slogan of the day :-)
"Mulipolarity redivivans"
Heck Mark, what the hell does that mean?
The biggest difference between these American deaths is that the loss of those lives was unavoidable - every single death in Iraq WAS avoidable. There was no need for any of the victims to be there. No need at all.
gert--
Well, we learned an important lesson in Vietnam: stay out of Vietnam.
Maybe the US will have to invade and occupy every country on earth before learning the real lesson.
Mark--
It looks to me like the Bush administration may finally be figuring out the fact most Americans do not want war with Iran, so we may be able to get out of Iraq with one leg still attached.
I think the US will leave Iraq between 2008 and 2010. That's a long time away, but I think that the next president will jump at the chance to fold up the occupation and end this nightmare.
I'd like to believe that Gordo but I don't. The Us government IMO sees the Iranian government as a subject for regime change and not as what it is - a regional power.
It means whether the USA likes it or not we're moving back from a unipolar world where the US could do as it liked because they were the only superpower to a multipolar world where the are other centres of power to whom the US must on some occasions defer and on other occasions with whom they must negotiate Kiwi :-)
markfromireland:
The European tragedy is that it is unlikely to ever play an important role in restoring the world's balance of power.
The fledgling political union of the EU, without which Europe can never become militarily significant again, remains weak and fragile. It seems we want to continue squabbling over divisions dating back to time immemorial, without seeing that this means we will forever remain impotent in the eyes of the US.
Perhaps others will indeed become the players in a more multipolar world, but don't we risk getting caught in the crossfire?
We should really get our act together but there are very little signs of this happening.
Pete Seeger said it best:
Where have all the flowers gone, long time passing?
Where have all the flowers gone, long time ago?
Where have all the flowers gone?
Young girls have picked them everyone.
Oh, when will they ever learn?
Oh, when will they ever learn?
Where have all the young girls gone, long time passing?
Where have all the young girls gone, long time ago?
Where have all the young girls gone?
Gone for husbands everyone.
Oh, when will they ever learn?
Oh, when will they ever learn?
Where have all the husbands gone, long time passing?
Where have all the husbands gone, long time ago?
Where have all the husbands gone?
Gone for soldiers everyone
Oh, when will they ever learn?
Oh, when will they ever learn?
Where have all the soldiers gone, long time passing?
Where have all the soldiers gone, long time ago?
Where have all the soldiers gone?
Gone to graveyards, everyone.
Oh, when will they ever learn?
Oh, when will they ever learn?
Where have all the graveyards gone, long time passing?
Where have all the graveyards gone, long time ago?
Where have all the graveyards gone?
Gone to flowers, everyone.
Oh, when will they ever learn?
Oh, when will they ever learn?
Where have all the flowers gone, long time passing?
Where have all the flowers gone, long time ago?
Where have all the flowers gone?
Young girls have picked them everyone.
Oh, when will they ever learn?
Oh, when will they ever learn?
Maybe your soldiers are beginning to catch on, eh, Richard?
http://tinyurl.com/g9vpg
Who says our British cousins don't have a sense of humor? (Oops; I guess that should be "humour," in this context.) ;-)
Granted, it's "gallows humour," but still . . .
Gert,
I don't think dad was talking about the EU. (In this particular instance.)
du
Maybe your soldiers are beginning to catch on, eh, Richard
Begining to Michael? Duh. They must be stupid :}
dubaltach:
Your dad was referring I believe to possible Sino-Russian-Iranian alliances (or similar).
It's my firm belief the EU must play its own part, though. Fat chance...
Pete Seeger DID say it well, max.
And so has everyone else posting here, be it by way of linking, enlightening, explaining, sharing and/or opining.
Btw, no thanks are needed Gert and Graniab, as always, it's my pleasure.
Oh, and thanks for the laugh, Michael. We don't see/hear from you often enough, mate.
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