Iraq's Shocking Human Toll In Iraq: About 1 Million Killed, 4.5 Million Displaced, 1-2 Million Widows, 5 Million Orphans

[Terry]

We are now able to estimate the number of Iraqis who have died in the war instigated by the Bush administration. Looking at the empirical evidence of Bush's war legacy will put his claims of victory in perspective. Of course, even by his standards -- "stability" -- the jury is out. Most independent analysts would say it's too soon to judge the political outcome. Nearly six years after the invasion, the country remains riven by sectarian politics and major unresolved issues, like the status of Kirkuk.

We have a better grasp of the human costs of the war. For example, the United Nations estimates that there are about 4.5 million displaced Iraqis -- more than half of them refugees -- or about one in every six citizens. Only 5 percent have chosen to return to their homes over the past year, a period of reduced violence from the high levels of 2005-07. The availability of healthcare, clean water, functioning schools, jobs and so forth remains elusive. According to Unicef, many provinces report that less than 40 percent of households have access to clean water. More than 40 percent of children in Basra, and more than 70 percent in Baghdad, cannot attend school.

The mortality caused by the war is also high. Several household surveys were conducted between 2004 and 2007. While there are differences among them, the range suggests a congruence of estimates. But none have been conducted for eighteen months, and the two most reliable surveys were completed in mid-2006. The higher of those found 650,000 "excess deaths" (mortality attributable to war); the other yielded 400,000. The war remained ferocious for twelve to fifteen months after those surveys were finished and then began to subside. Iraq Body Count, a London NGO that uses English-language press reports from Iraq to count civilian deaths, provides a means to update the 2006 estimates. While it is known to be an undercount, because press reports are incomplete and Baghdad-centric, IBC nonetheless provides useful trends, which are striking. Its estimates are nearing 100,000, more than double its June 2006 figure of 45,000. (It does not count nonviolent excess deaths -- from health emergencies, for example -- or insurgent deaths.) If this is an acceptable marker, a plausible estimate of total deaths can be calculated by doubling the totals of the 2006 household surveys, which used a much more reliable and sophisticated method for estimates that draws on long experience in epidemiology. So we have, at present, between 800,000 and 1.3 million "excess deaths" as we approach the six-year anniversary of this war.

This gruesome figure makes sense when reading of claims by Iraqi officials that there are 1-2 million war widows and 5 million orphans. This constitutes direct empirical evidence of total excess mortality and indirect, though confirming, evidence of the displaced and the bereaved and of general insecurity. The overall figures are stunning: 4.5 million displaced, 1-2 million widows, 5 million orphans, about 1 million dead -- in one way or another, affecting nearly one in two Iraqis.

By any sensible measure, it would be difficult to describe this as a victory of any kind. It speaks volumes about the repair work we must do for Iraqis, and it should caution us against the savage wars we are prone to. Now that Bush is gone, perhaps the United States can honestly face the damage we have wrought and the responsibilities we must accept from it.


February 7, 2009

[Hank E. Panky]

This for the idiots that still insisit in parroting the "we brought freedom to them" and/or "we liberated them" and "they're better now than under Sadam" - Sick, sick, sick, truly sick stuff!

[Maggie]

I have to ask myself when did we become so cruel to not just oureselves but to one another. I wonder?
Is this who we are as a country only wishing good to oureselves but to not any of our fellow citizens of this earth?
So self involved how did this become a country I have no hope for.
I see this president trying to make healthcare available to all and yet I see people fighting against their best interests.
I see republicans voting against the peoples best interests.So sad all our people go for this. Is this because all the news ouitlets have become corporatised? Is it because a long time ago the owners of this country decided us the people should have no education?
We fought a long time ago for the separation of church and state. Education is the ability to question. When they destroyed all the schools and questioning was not on the curriculum then I guess all we have left here is peseants. Welcome to America.

[Maggie]

Thank you for this post. I am so ashamed of being an American while we sat by and allowed our home prices to go through the roof. Never looking at the damage others were doing in oure name. We were fat and happy was this the fix was in?
We the people were so stupid, while this fire was burning in Iraq we all just went on a spending spree because oure houses were making us so much money Now what is left for us? I guess stupidity, now as we walk away from this then we have to ask oureselves this question who are we?

[Maggie]

Yes I think it never changes

[Maggie]

thank you for feeling just like I do. If we do not care then I wonder what is left for us? We can place it anyway we wish to do
But all of these people made us nothing we were and in the meantime they put oure young people into this mix of killing in different lands they made them kill others and when that thing was so wrong they came back home and killed themselves, they oure soldiers hung themselves from the rafters of oure houses. Now oure soldiers are commiting suicide in record droves.
I have to ask you this question for a war so wrong. how do you not expect our soldiers to not have post traumatic stress syndrome? How do you not expect this after a whole bunch of people you never educated took a chance to be special, how did you think that? All the folks in the heartland after you destroyed all their farms and nothing was left for them except all the meth labs you left behind. What was left behind for these people? Except the millitary You fooled them of course you did this you used the less fortunate for youre money making war machine You used oure people and I fucking hate you because I just thought if I voted I might change things. Now I realise nothing changes.

[Hank E. Panky]

I couldn't agree with you more and feel sorry for you because y'all thought that Obama was the real thing. The only reason why he is where he is today is because he's part of the problem, not the solution. It was the corporations that run this country that put him where he is - you and those that voted for him helped. However, the voting process has nothing to do with anything as Bush demonstrated to us in 2000 and then 2004. This country has gone to the dogs and there ain't nothing or no one that can bring it back!

RIP America!

[Terry]

I guess you think John McCain and Sa Rah Palin could have done a better job. Is this what you are telling me? Sarah 'I can see Russia from my house" can do better that what we have now?? Man you have got to be off your rocker or off your meds one. This country would have plumeted into a depression not a ressesion if the Republicans had won the White House. Get a Grip.

[Hank E. Panky]

Is that what I said or is that what you want me to say?

Please go back over my post and tell me exactly where I said what you are claiming I said. If you can't find anything to that effect, then I suggest it is you who take the meds.

FYI, this country IS in a depression. If you can't see that, there you go, more meds for you...plus a pair of glasses! Also, you may want to do a few anger management classes while you're it. Sounds like you need them!

[Maggie]

First of all those folks that decry the socialist method have no experience of it. I do and worked in England as a midwife.
For many years. We have both lower maternal and neonatal death rates... No mater. But I wonder how did the corporations of this country get you’re fellow citizens to hate one another?

Was it with lack of education? When I see all those folks in the most depressed states try to deny all those others without healthcare I never see the lawyers there and I wonder when none of their own made a million dollars in bonuses last year the people standing with the placards are poor. Of course they are all the poor the uneducated. A people so scared and so easy to manipulate.

But what I see is an aging population without any education so frightened that there might be no safety net for them. What I see is the failure of you as country to not educate its people...
Want to talk about population control either you do it with communism or you do it with debt. We did it with debt. The Chinese learnt something. Pity we never learnt anything. I so stupid saw this long time but see I had no special interest group to support me.

How did the corporatists become so adept to make us the people turn against one another, How did they do this? People in this country fighting against one another? Not ever fighting against the corporatists of America. Wake up did they do it with no education in our schools with no ability to question,

Use the poor uneducated get them so scared. Of course they are with no socialist safety net they let us destroy oureselves.
And now I have to ask you why are all of our prisons packed so full of the poor. Black or white it means nothing all of our prisons are full of poor folks. But you know why most of our prisons are packed with black people because most of our black folks are poor people. Prisons so full of poor people,

I am so ashamed of this country that I felt was my home

I will fight for my President Obama.
For someone trying to change things against all odds I will fight for a wrong. Just like he does..

[Hank E. Panky]

Maggie:

I too have first-hand experience with socialized programs and know their pro and cons well - I lived in a country with such programs for 21 years of life, nobody can tell me stories, particularly, not some brainwashed, dumb right wing nutjob American who's just spewing crap off a scrip prepared for them by the corporate lobbyists.

This country is lost, completely and utterly gone with no hope of every getting back. To do so, would entail for the entire working class to pull together, take to the streets, kick the corrupt politicians and their corporate sponsors out and take over completely. It will never happen! And you know why as you described it. The corporations have the power, the resources and the means, they know that to conquer they must divide and they also know how to do that thru fear-mongerings, lies and propaganda. They never underestimate stupid people in large groups and, rather, use their stupidity to their advantage.

[Hank E. Panky]

Sadly, Obama is the same as Bush, just another sold out politician put in place by the corporations and looking after their own interests only. The only difference between him and Bush is that he knows how to say it better. Again, I feel very sorry for those of you who voted for him thinking he was the Messiah. If you're paying attention, he's already shown his true colors, going forward, nothing will change.

They have won and we have lost. The worst is yet to come!

[Maggie]

I have to disagree I do not think Obama is the same as Bush. I think Obama wants to change things. I think Bush was and always will be a useless piece of dogshit. I think Bush used his family connection to
get out of service I think he was an idiot and I think his dad ole Bush knew he was useless and now that fucking demon Cheyney his dad asked Cheyney to help him. But you know what this miserable piece of dogshit Cheyney did that he used this idiot to to destroy a people we never knew in Iraq.. For money and what else for? And now I have to ask you you Americans so hell bent on fighting against oneanother for a single payer healthcare system, Make sure you love one another, make sure. you do the right thing.