Iraq Death Toll Rivals Rwanda Genocide, Cambodian Killing Fields

Don't ya love that headline or are you liberal/Democratic?

How many are enough? Give us a number so we know when we've "won".

According to a new study, 1.2 million Iraqis have met violent deaths since the 2003 invasion, the highest estimate of war-related fatalities yet. The study was done by the British polling firm ORB, which conducted face-to-face interviews with a sample of over 1,700 Iraqi adults in 15 of Iraq's 18 provinces. Two provinces -- al-Anbar and Karbala -- were too dangerous to canvas, and officials in a third, Irbil, didn't give the researchers a permit to do their work. The study's margin of error was plus-minus 2.4 percent.

Field workers asked residents how many members of their own household had been killed since the invasion. More than one in five respondents said that at least one person in their home had been murdered since March of 2003. One in three Iraqis also said that at least some neighbors "actually living on [their] street" had fled the carnage, with around half of those having left the country.

In Baghdad, almost half of those interviewed reported at least one violent death in their household.

Oh yeah, Anbar is so fucking safe. Hahaha.

Via AlterNet.

Iraqi civilian deaths rise in countryside

Sometimes you really do wish you're wrong, but then reality strikes.

We were warned.

Newly released statistics for Iraqi civilian deaths in August reflect the strikingly mixed security picture that has emerged from a gradual six-month increase in U.S. troop strength here: The number of deaths across the country rose by about 20 percent since July, but in the capital itself, the number dropped sharply.

The figures, provided by Iraqi Interior Ministry officials Saturday, appeared to mirror the geographic pattern of the troop increase, which is focused on Baghdad. The national rise in mortality is partly a result of the enormous death toll in a truck bomb attack in August north of the capital, outside the areas directly affected by the additional troops.

More than 500 members of a small religious minority called the Yazidis died in the Aug. 14 bombing in the north, according to figures collected by the Iraqi Red Crescent Society, which paid compensation to victims' families.

As Ryan C. Crocker, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, and Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top commander of military forces here, prepare to brief Congress on the progress of the troop increase, Iraqi politicians, recognizing what is at stake, view the new figures through the lens of how their parties hope Congress will assess the situation in Iraq.

"We were hoping the figures would go down, but what happened was expected," said Haidar al-Ebadi, who sits in parliament as a senior member of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's Dawa Party. The troop
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increase had made it harder for insurgent groups to operate in Baghdad, he said, so they had pushed outward to easier targets.

"I believe that we should not read these numbers as an assessment of the security plan," Ebadi said. "The security plan was a success so far." [emphasis mine]

Oh yeah, a success? Tell that to the surviving friends and families of those killed. What a tool.

Via Mercury News.

In what alternative universe do these people live?

The Headline:

Iraq Deaths Don't Mean Failure, Pace Says

The recent rise in U.S. troop deaths in Iraq is the "wrong metric" to use in assessing the effectiveness of the new security strategy for Baghdad, Marine Gen. Peter Pace, the outgoing chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said yesterday in a news conference with Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates.

To my mind, dead human beings is exactly the right fucking metric. I guess if one of the bodies doesn't belong to Pace, he can overlook them.

What's the right metric? Munitions exploded? Buildings destroyed? Iraqi children killed? Families torn apart? I'll bet you have an answer.

Then, to add insult to injury he adds:

"If you had zero violence and people were not feeling good about their future, where are you?" said Pace, emphasizing that the sentiment of the Iraqi people is a much better measurement than the number of attacks.

Pace you asshole, at least they have a future. Dead Iraqis are pretty much hopeless worm food.


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