Casualty Figures

Casualty Figures - US combat deaths in Iraq passed 500 this month. That passing was noted with somnolent portent by many commentators - and shrill glee by many candidates.

Robert H Reid puts it in context:

Iraq casualty figures are small compared with the horrific bloodletting of some of America's past conflicts. About 19,000 American soldiers died in one month alone in the Battle of the Bulge in World War II, a conflict in which more than 290,000 soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines were killed in action.

An estimated 620,000 Americans - both northerners and southerners - died in the Civil War, America's bloodiest conflict. More than 58,000 U.S. troops lost their lives in Vietnam, both in combat and from non-battle causes.

Nevertheless, the rising death toll after 10 months of military operations in Iraq is significant, especially in a country whose public traditionally has little appetite for their sons and daughters dying in battle in distant, unfamiliar lands.

The United States aborted its participation in an international peacekeeping operation in Somalia after 18 U.S. troops were killed in a battle in the capital, Mogadishu, with forces loyal to warlord Mohamed Farah Aidid.

Former President Ronald Reagan pulled U.S. peacekeepers out of Lebanon after a suicide truck bomber killed 241 Marines and other service members at Beirut's airport in 1983.

After U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War ended in 1973, U.S. presidents were loathe to commit American forces to protracted struggles in foreign lands without clear objectives and overwhelming chances for success.

However, U.S. antipathy to foreign military operations receded after a series of quick and relatively painless operations in places like Grenada in 1983 - with only 16 battle and non-combat deaths - and Panama in 1989, when 21 troops were killed.

One can't trivialize 500 dead Americans.

I guess the central question is, do you think the sacrifice accomplished anything? Many (not all) Democrats say "no", or more comically, "if our guy was in charge, we'd have gotten the same results with fewer/no deaths".

Posted by Mitch at January 22, 2004 06:35 AM