Update on July Iraq Casualty Figures
Charles Amico reports at We the People that the Pentagon appears to be playing games with the much vaunted July U.S. casualty numbers in Iraq – much vaunted because it made a big deal out of its assertion that there were 78 casualties in July, the lowest number this year.
Oops!
DoD has now quietly added three more deaths that it must have overlooked or something, bringing the July total to 81. This is the same as February and March, which makes for a far less sexy talking point at the old daily press briefing.
Oh well.
Note further that the 81 July fatalities were by far the highest in that month since the war began:
81 — July 2007
43 — July 2006
54 — July 2005
54 — July 2004
While fewer American deaths than the previous month — be they 81 or 78, as opposed to 101 in June — are certainly a welcome development, the number obscures another fact of life: With daytime temperatures in insurgent strongholds spiking at 120-plus degrees, the baddies tend to lay low and it is not surprising that there was a downtick in encounters with coalition troops in July.
There was not, however, a downtick in Iraqi civilian deaths. Quite the contrary, they rose from 1,342 in June to 1,688 in July. Wasn’t this what the surge was supposed to keep from happening?
Just asking.
15 Responses to “Update on July Iraq Casualty Figures”
Shaun,
What’s your source for the civilian casualties? I saw one AFP sourced article with numbers like the ones you are quoting, but that contradicts the Brookings Iraq index I think.
CS:
Please go to the link.
Uh, I only see data about troop casualties there, not the civilian deaths. Am I missing something?
Shaun,
Don’t worry. General Petraeus will tell us in September that signficant progress has been made, that things will continue to be tough, and that he needs at least another year before we’ll know for sure if we should leave. Rinse and repeat.
CS:
For civilian deaths, go here and scroll down to “Iraqi Security Forces and Civilian Deaths.”
Thanks, Shaun.
The source of the U.S Fatalities is i-Casualties.org which is a respectable source, as they get their numbers from D.O.D. and are the numbers you will find quoted by the major media outlets.
Shaun,
The statistics on US casualties linked to are misleading in a number of ways. First of all, we have about 20-30k more troops in Iraq than we had in February or March and and 30-40k more troops than previous year’s Julys. I have written icasualties.org and asked them to add a column that shows a per-capita casualty rate based on the number of troops in country, but they did not reply and have not done so.
On a per-capita basis, the casualty rate is actually lower than the months you picked – Feb and March, and significantly lower than April, May, and June – this despite the fundamentally different strategy the surge represents. The previous two years, for example, had our forces ensconced on large bases and therefore more protected. Troops are now living in small outposts among the locals and so are more exposed. General Petreaus and his aides have previous discussed how the new strategy would expose our troops to greater risk – so far the casualty figures are mixed.
Of course those numbers are not just civilians but included Iraqi forces as well. You indicated this in your comment, but not in your original post. The civilian numbers with the ISF removed are 1148 for June and 1458 for July. There was an uptick from June, but it’s still significantly less than at any time since last fall.
You are smarter than this Shaun, and it disappoints me that you’d make so many elementary mistakes with such simple statistical measures. You seem to conveniently compare different numbers between whatever months most suit your argument (June-July for civilian casualties, July-Feb/Mar for US). I would think one could make an honest case the “surge” is meeting expectations without cherry-picking figures to bolster the argument.
The last line should read:
I would think one could make an honest case the “surge†is NOT meeting expectations without cherry-picking figures to bolster the argument.
Entropy:
This is not cherry picking. As I have said at some length previously, casualty stats are what they are. Stats, and they don’t fully explain the situation on the ground.
As I also said earlier this week, crunching these numbers on a per capita basis is a good idea and we’re working on that once we can dislodge troop level figures from DoD.
Again, like I already wrote in another thread, since the surge began, the US has allowed Sunni insurgent groups to take over the security task in some regions (in order to free US troops for Bagdad deployment). Now these Sunni gangs are on the rampage (against Shiites, of course), and this probably is the explanation for civilian deaths going up. So, instead of repacifying the country, the surge is actually putting oil into the fires of civil war. In another Friendman or two, even the most irresponsible optimists here will see that here has been absolutely no progress made towards a secure Iraq, but quite the contrary.
Just look at Afghanistan: The government only controls the capital (if at all). This is what the surge might accomplish. Does anybody here really thinks this would be a satisfying result?
|-(
Gray,
Not satisfying from the perspective of our initial goals, but it might be the best we can do to salvage something of the situation. A more stable Baghdad would be preferrable to chaos throughout the whole country, and might persuade the international community to begin assisting with further pacification and restructuring of the Iraqi government.
“it might be the best we can do to salvage something of the situation”
Uh huh .Ok, honest enough, C. Here’s just wishing Bush and his crooks would be as honest as you are.
totally OT, but if I was in the Us, I’d wish to date you. You’re the cutest (female) republican that I ever virtually met…
:-*
P.S.: Ok, I’ve had four beer and some kind of italian vermouth this evening, but really, send me a picture…
Uh, Gray….thanks, I guess, but I’m about to celebrate my 16th wedding anniversary and I’m busy getting my two kids ready to start school soon, so I’m afraid that dating is not an option.
Hope you can find someone closer to home and single, though!