THE COST OF WAR, CAUSALITIES! ©

Today, numbers were released. According to a survey conducted by a non-governmental United Sates-British group the war in Iraq has taken a large toll. This study does not take into account the earlier Afghanistan war effort. Nevertheless. This investigation considers civilian causalities in Iraq between March 2003 and March 2005; obviously, there have been more, many more since.

From the time the Iraq war began in 2003, insurgents, criminal gangs, and US led forces have slaughtered nearly 25,000 civilians, police, and Army recruits. Nearly half of the murders, intentional and accidental, occurred in Baghdad, a city that houses one fifth of the Iraq population. The total population of Iraq is, or was, reported to be 25 million. Iraq Body Count supplied the total population statistic; this organization has worked to calculate casualties since 2003.

American led forces can claim 37 percent of these killings.

Lieutenant Colonel Steve Boylan, a spokesman in Baghdad offered this, "We do everything we can to avoid civilian casualties in all of our operations." This author asks; might we consider not fighting this war, a war that was instigated on false pretenses.

This recent report mirrors a United Nations funded survey conducted a year ago. That examination found that close to “24,000 conflict-related deaths” occurred since the unilateral United States invasion.

In October 2004, a British Lancet medical journal concluded there were 100,000 deaths inflicted during the first eighteen months of this war.

The invaders and the insurgents profess a love of nation, people, and God, and yet, each acts, reacts, violently. Vengeance is their joint mantra; and yet, it violates the idea of concern.

However, the voices professing care continue. On the American side, our President muses, United States and coalition troops “are defeating the terrorists in Iraq, so we don't have to face them in our country." This is conservative compassion; attention is given to our country, only!

Vice President Dick Cheney chimes in, “We are aggressively striking the terrorists in Iraq, defeating them there, so we do not have to face them on the streets of our own cities."

These are the remarks of the self-proclaimed sympathetic. These “traditionalists” show their supportive stance selectively. For them it is “me,” my chums, and my countrymen that count. Only persons that the President and his pals care for personally are important; others be damned!

In truth, even Americans do not count. If they are not Bush Buds, they are tools; tools of the neoconservative war effort. Soldiers make it possible to “spread democracy,” that is their purpose, their mission, nothing more.

In These Times offers an opinion piece, Bush’s War Against the Military, by Ian Williams. You might think this an interesting read.

American armed forces do not accurately count their own causalities! Numbers are distorted, photographs are hidden, the populace must not know. The Whitehouse and the Pentagon fear the “Dover effect.” President Bush does not attend funerals of the fallen soldiers; nor does he formally receive the remains as they land on home soil. Injuries are also veiled. The wounded are flown in during the dark of night.

Please read and reflect upon“The Invisible Wounded,” a Salon.com piece published on March 8, 2005. journalist Mark Benjamin and war correspondent wrote of the Pentagon, its practices, policies, and the manner in which it calculates war casualties. He offered that the numbers are “deceptively low” and he explained why this is.

Please also refer to previous posts, SUPPORT OUR TROOPS, TENTATIVELY ©, and STILL TENTATIVE SUPPORT; PHOTOGRAPHS OF THE FALLEN ©.

The Pentagon affirms, the public must be insulated and isolated. If they are aware, if they know the true cost of war, support will fall. Remember Viet Nam.

The administration and the Department of Defense insist, war must not be seen on screens; sounds of demolition must be suppressed. Daniel A. Weiner, SeatllePI.com, offers his commentary. Administration hides reality of war. It must appear that all is well; we will tell them that it is. Vice President Dick Cheney sings this song. He definitively declared the insurgency in Iraq is "in the last throes.” Cheney, a man that voluntarily took six deferments during the Viet Nam war, and has yet served his country in battle, predicts the fighting will end before the Bush administration leaves office.

Yet, the death and destruction continue. The numbers maimed and murdered increase each day. It matters not, that the injuries and deaths of Iraqi or Afghani civilians, people of Middle Eastern decent are not calculated by American armed forces. After all, gentle and kindhearted neoconservatives consider these causalities essential! They are collateral damage!

Coalition policy dictates that citizens in the Western world must not see the faces or fatalities of war. The wars, those in Iraq and Afghanistan, the war against the terrorists, must remain on distant shores and far from the minds of Americans. The people must not hear the cries of civilians. The general public need not know of the children that die daily. Causality counts cannot be the focus; the sacrifice of our soldiers, “Support Our Troops” must be the message.

Therefore, people are reminded that these causalities are those of our enemies! These persons are “evil;” our President tells us so, continuously. President Bush often retorts, "My administration has a job to do and we're going to do it. We will rid the world of the evil-doers.”

This is why United Sates and British officials contest the claims reported in this study; they must. What would happen if they did not? It is said, “Knowledge is power!” My own expansion of that sentiment has long been, “Knowing is empowering.” What those that rule have long feared is the ubiquitous cry, “Power to the People!” Power to the people, right-on!

Saturday, May 21, 2005, the Los Angeles Times published a thoughtful piece titled, UNSEEN PICTURES, UNTOLD STORIES, by James Rainey. The subheading, “U.S. newspapers and magazines print few photos of American dead and wounded, a Times review finds. The reasons are many -- access, logistics, ethics -- but the result is an obscured view of the cost of war.” I found it a brilliant piece and thought that I would share it here with you.

Please read and reflect upon, Plutonium Page, Daily Kos, The rising civilian death toll in Iraq