Iraqi Deaths Estimated at 655,000 According to Johns-Hopkins

[MadeUpName27]

I believe that this is called "Sowing the Wind."

The Christian Soldiers among us should know what comes next...

 

[Kulindahr]

You know, for all Bush's bullshit talk about how Iraq is better off today than it was prior to invasion, it's hard to square that assertion with these numbers. The last estimate I heard was that Saddam killed 450,000 Iraqis. Seems Bush is now officially the greatest mass murderer in Iraqi history.

I read that three times, and have come to the conclusion that you don't even read the things you post!
You-re so rabidly anti-Bush that you aren't even rational about it.

 

[smelter]

You know, for all Bush's bullshit talk about how Iraq is better off today than it was prior to invasion, it's hard to square that assertion with these numbers. The last estimate I heard was that Saddam killed 450,000 Iraqis. Seems Bush is now officially the greatest mass murderer in Iraqi history.

According to the World Factbook, the July 2006 estimate of Iraq's population is 26.8 million. If the estimate of 655,000 deaths is correct, that is over 2.4 percent of the total population ..... a simply staggering figure!

 

[BoSoxFanVa]

That number is very, very disturbing. I've touched on the death toll in a couple of threads, but nobody wants to talk about it. Why doesn't the press ask the President or our politicians about this?

Can the news out of Iraq get any worse?

 

[smelter]

It can: Organizers in Iraq announced today that Clay Aiken will be in Iraq for Thanksgiving to sing songs from his latest hit album....

Oh the humanity.

LOL, that's what happens when you have an open-ended torture policy. Given the choice between Aiken singing and water boarding, I'd choose the latter.

 

[Kulindahr]

It was the calling Bush a "mass murderer" that's irrational in Alfie's post -- the knee-jerk reaction of blaming all those deaths on Bush, as if the man ordered them... which is what "mass murderer" sort of requires.

"Botched" is a VERY good word for the occupation! Iraq was accustomed to a very firm hand, and they should have kept one -- basic common sense (as well as history, anthropology, and probably several other disciplines). Disbanding the army was foolishness, because it made all those people available to the insurrection, dumped them into the unemployed population, and removed a very handy tool for keeping that firm hand. Rumsfeld's argument that Iraqi soldiers would have passed munitions to the terrorists was sound as far as it went, but has he no imagination, or simple reasoning powers? Even high school students I know could foresee that the alternative was worse!
And so it has become: I have little doubt that massive death toll can be traced to former soldiers, as both killers and a large portion of the killed, and very likely the weapons walked off with the soldiers when they were turned loose. Thanks to a couple of friends who are doctors, I have my suspicions about the JH figure, but even the most skeptical doesn't think it's more than 20% too high -- but even that leaves the death toll under Bush's coalition some four times per day what Saddam ever did.

If we're going to label anyone "mass murderer" on account of these deaths, it would be more appropriate to stick that on Rumsfeld, who has made the decisions that led to the violence. But properly speaking the blame has to go on those who decided to do the killing, not those who merely, by their bumbling (Bush) and outright stupidity (Rumsfeld) made it probable.

 

[turtle]

It was the calling Bush a "mass murderer" that's irrational in Alfie's post -- the knee-jerk reaction of blaming all those deaths on Bush, as if the man ordered them... which is what "mass murderer" sort of requires.

Of course we cannot blame all those deaths on Bush alone.

Yes, "mass murderer" does have the wrong tone. Murder is illegal in a way which the mass killings of authorized war are not.

So how about "mass killer" instead?

A case can sometimes be made for the need for even such massive death and destruction.

If it were up to me, I would deal out a significant amount of death in the South Sahara. I would save a significant number of lives by doing so.

It's a terrible algorithm.

George Bush does in fact carry the primary responsibility for a great number of deaths which turn out to have been worse than unnecessary.

-D

 

[turtle]

Could you elaborate?

There is a forthright power and land grab being perpetrated in the Sudan right now, which threatens the entire region.

This land grab is being accompanied by open acts of genocide, grand and gross atrocities, and an unwritten official policy of ethnic cleansing.

There is no question who is right and who is wrong, and it is a situation in which it is quite easy to make such distinctions on the ground.

There are a lot of really bad guys there, ones we really could effectively remove.

-D

 

[Kulindahr]

George Bush does in fact carry the primary responsibility for a great number of deaths which turn out to have been worse than unnecessary.

-D

Remove the word "primary", and I agree heartily. The PRIMARY responsibility always rests on the guy who pulls the trigger, or set off the bomb, or whatever.
I wouldn't call Bush either a mass murderer or a mass killer, he's more like the guy who walked out the door of the dog kennel and didn't latch it, forgetting that the dogs were both (a) trained to kill and (b) hungry. I know his IQ isn't low, in spite of the urban legend, but he has yet to show he even has the creative capacity to rise to the level of mass murderer -- he's too much of a non-starter. He almost reminds me of one of the idiot Roman emperors who let their advisors run things so long as they got to play with their toy soldiers or such... but the record shows he isn't that feeble-minded.

Maybe... we have "negligent homicide" to cover killing when you didn't mean to; is there such a thing as "negligent mass homicide"?

 

[turtle]

Remove the word "primary", and I agree heartily. The PRIMARY responsibility always rests on the guy who pulls the trigger, or set off the bomb, or whatever.

If the trigger-puller is both dependent and under orders, his is a far lesser responsiblity than that of the person ordering him.

I am not using "primary" in a sequential sense, though an argument could be made that to give the order is the same as to do the act yourself, and that the order, coming before its execution, is primary sequentially as well as in import.

Maybe... we have "negligent homicide" to cover killing when you didn't mean to; is there such a thing as "negligent mass homicide"?

Exactly so.

 

[Andreus]

truly disturbing

I was there a year ago and i was soundly yelled down by the conservatives at JUb for even suggesting that such a thing was occuring even though I was witnessing it with my own eyes.

of course, i was painted as unpatriotic for questioning the official numbers being released.

I don't expect that there will be much of a change in the behavior of the rigid right... and yes, I know there are moderate repubs here and as I, a modesrate muslim, hate being lumped into the same calssification as the fundamentalists of my kind, I do see the difference.

but its time for the moderate repubs to do the same thing I have been doing... you guys need to try to affect a change from within.

 

[apt125]

Iraqi deaths estimated at 655,000 according to the emey. Have any of you been in the military. Have any of you been in a war zone. If called I would go to war again to defind your right to be an AMERICAN. If we just turn Iraqi back over, we will see another 911.

War is hell

 

[smelter]

I listened to Bush's press conference today where one of the questions was about the JH figure of 655,000 deaths. He dismissed the number as being wrong without much in the way of explanation. As part of the question, he was asked if he is sticking by his earlier 30,000 more or less estimate. He hedged by saying that he believes the numbers provided by his generals in the field.

The old saying that 'wishing doesn't make it true' apparently is lost on the King George mentality!

 

[Andreus]

Iraqi deaths estimated at 655,000 according to the emey. Have any of you been in the military. Have any of you been in a war zone. If called I would go to war again to defind your right to be an AMERICAN. If we just turn Iraqi back over, we will see another 911.

War is hell

i was there

i was shot

i am an american

i have the right to disagree with those that are in power in america, and i would even if i had not been there and had been injured.

I have the utmost respect for the men of the american service. my issue is not with them. It is with the men in suits in washington who sit in bunkers safe from the death and anarchy they create.

have YOU ever been in a war zone? have YOU ever gone to war to defend your counry and your rights?

 

[smelter]

Here is Bush's actual remarks, not exactly as I remembered but close enough for government work.

Video: Bush disputes Iraq study

 

[unclaimedblessing]

Either way, all those statistics are horrible.
Watching the network Sunday morning newsprograms last week I saw a gentlemen speaking about the Iraq War. I can't recall his name or what he said. What I do remember were the "factoids" popping up over his head.
In the original Gulf War American losses were approx 1 in 100.
In the current Iraq war American losses are 1 in 10.
The earth of Iraq has sopped up too much blood on all sides. Parents, spouses, children around the world grieve.
We need to hold our leaders responsible for this deadly debacle and insist on policy or staff changes.

 

[turtle]

Iraqi deaths estimated at 655,000 according to the emey. Have any of you been in the military. Have any of you been in a war zone. If called I would go to war again to defind your right to be an AMERICAN. If we just turn Iraqi back over, we will see another 911.

War is hell

I volunteered on the 20th of September, 1971 and served three years.

Though I was not in a war zone, I was directly affected by Terrorism.

Does anyone remember American GI's being blown up in discos?

My buddy lost half his face.

9/11 was no big surprise to me.

-D

 

[unclaimedblessing]

This can't be true.
My MSN homepage says Bush disputes the figures. We all know he'd never lie to us.
But then, after he runs out of fingers and toes, counting gets pretty hard for him.

 

[Kulindahr]

If the trigger-puller is both dependent and under orders, his is a far lesser responsiblity than that of the person ordering him.

1. That argument was disallowed at the Nuremberg war crimes trials.
2. That gets Bush off the hook for most of the violence; the vast majority of those deaths weren't by his orders.

The trigger-puller is always 100% responsible for his/her action, unless being physically manipulated or drugged. The option of saying, "I won't" may be unpalatable, but it is nevertheless an option, and since even before WW II the civilized world has accepted that; it is foundational to prosecution of war crimes.

The application of some Aristotelian thought here might help; I'm thinking of his "four causes" of any event. At the moment my mind is too blurry to even recall more than "formal" and "material" causes, but it's easy enough to say that while these trigger pullers were 100% responsible, and were not under Bush's orders, this does not leave Bush off the hook, because there are three other "causes" that someone is responsible for.

 

[Kulindahr]

This can't be true.
My MSN homepage says Bush disputes the figures. We all know he'd never lie to us.
But then, after he runs out of fingers and toes, counting gets pretty hard for him.

No, he just pulls out his Texas Instruments calculator.