body counts.

Survey: 25,000 civilians killed in Iraq war.

A few interesting things to note; these are only the deaths that are a direct result of the military conflict that are also verified by at least 3 sources.

If we include the number that have died as a result of lack of starvation and sickness due to the actions of the US and allies... the number balloons to well over 100,000 if not more.

Other things to note in particular:
Explosive devices figures in more than half of the civilian deaths with airstrikes causing 64 percent of such deaths.

(To clarify, that says that 34% of civilian deaths were the direct result of US led airstrikes. Put another way, airstrikes accounted for 64% of the deaths by explosive devices, which as a group accounted for 53% of all civilian deaths.)

That one is for someone in particular *cough* LISA *cough* who was trying to say that it was insurgents and suicide bombers who were killing all the women, children and civilians. Well, there you go Lisa. Like I said. Also, please note the bold item below:


Findings include:
Who was killed?

• 24,865 civilians were reported killed in the first two years.
• Women and children accounted for almost 20% of all civilian deaths.
• Baghdad alone recorded almost half of all deaths.

When did they die?

• 30% of civilian deaths occurred during the invasion phase before 1 May 2003.
• Post-invasion, the number of civilians killed was almost twice as high in year two (11,351) as in year one (6,215).

Who did the killing?

• US-led forces killed 37% of civilian victims.
• Anti-occupation forces/insurgents killed 9% of civilian victims.
• Post-invasion criminal violence accounted for 36% of all deaths.
• Killings by anti-occupation forces, crime and unknown agents have shown a steady rise over the entire period.

What was the most lethal weaponry?

• Over half (53%) of all civilian deaths involved explosive devices.
• Air strikes caused most (64%) of the explosives deaths.
• Children were disproportionately affected by all explosive devices but most severely by air strikes and unexploded ordnance (including cluster bomblets).

How many were injured?

• At least 42,500 civilians were reported wounded.
• The invasion phase caused 41% of all reported injuries.
• Explosive weaponry caused a higher ratio of injuries to deaths than small arms.
• The highest wounded-to-death ratio incidents occurred during the invasion phase.

Who provided the information?

• Mortuary officials and medics were the most frequently cited witnesses.
• Three press agencies provided over one third of the reports used.
• Iraqi journalists are increasingly central to the reporting work.

Speaking today at the launch of the report in London, Professor John Sloboda, FBA, one of the report's authors said: "The ever-mounting Iraqi death toll is the forgotten cost of the decision to go to war in Iraq. On average, 34 ordinary Iraqis have met violent deaths every day since the invasion of March 2003. Our data show that no sector of Iraqi society has escaped. We sincerely hope that this research will help to inform decision-makers around the world about the real needs of the Iraqi people as they struggle to rebuild their country. It remains a matter of the gravest concern that, nearly two and half years on, neither the US nor the UK governments have begun to systematically measure the impact of their actions in terms of human lives destroyed."

To clarify;

What you said:
In your post, you say specifically "what we've done in Iraq lately". Not what the US has done. It's what Iraqi suicide bombers have done.

and

My point is that you can easily blame the Americans for being there - but when it comes to harming innocent children, which that collage is supposed to demonstrate, that's the Iraqis doing that to themselves.

What I said:
notice the people with the burns on their chest and stomach, missing their hands and/or feet? those are generally the result of stepping on or picking up unxploded cluster bombs, which looks sort of like pop cans. there is also a large problem with "collateral damage" when bombing buildings in "surgical strikes" etc.

In short, I'm right, you're wrong. Like I said before. :)

Feel free to get mad and call me an asshole now, or actually go read the dossier [pdf] yourself and see if you can't bend the stats to make yourself look/feel better. Either way, it'll be a learning experience.