U.S. military acknowledged killing 23 civilians

[Oberon]

Originally Posted by OneToughHerring

And how many civilians have died because of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, this incident included?

MIDDLE EAST

Iraq body count:
96,394 – 105,130

Afghan body count:
13,372 - 32,969

Total:
109,766 - 138,099

(sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilia...n_of_estimates

http://www.iraqbodycount.org/ )


DPRK

• Rummel estimates that the Communist regime of North Korea committed 1,663,000 democides between 1948 and 1987
  • North Korean victims: 1,293,000
  • South Korean victims: 363,000
• Courtois, Stephane, Le Livre Noir du Communism: 2,000,000
  • In Party purges: 100,000
  • In concentration camps: 1.5M
• 23 June 2003 US News & WR: 400,000 died in gulags in past 3 decades.
• The Center for the Advancement of North Korean Human Rights estimates that some 400,000 prisoners have died in labor camps since 1972. [http://www.nkhumanrights.or.kr/oldnkhuman/eng/nk/nknews12_01.html]
• Famine, 1995-98
  • 13 March 1999, Agence France Presse: (citing N. Korean defector) 3,500,000 deaths as of 12/98
  • 19 Oct. 2000 Guardian: 3M
  • MSF: 3.5M [http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/publications/other/deadly_2001.shtml]
  • 19 Oct. 2003 NY Times: 2M died in preventable famine.
  • 10 May 1999, AP:
    • The North Korean govt. estimates 220,000 famine-related deaths, 1995-98
    • US Congressional delegation: 2M
    • South Korean intelligence estimates that the population of North Korea fell from 25M to 22M.

(source: http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/warstat2.htm )

Any questions?

The Iraq Body Count is a US organisation. I'm not sure if I fully trust them to tell me the truth about a war the US is waging as the aggressor, sorry.

[Dowly]

Originally Posted by OneToughHerring

The Iraq Body Count is a US organisation. I'm not sure if I fully trust them to tell me the truth about a war the US is waging as the aggressor, sorry.

So in other words, no matter what figures we show you, your not going to believe them?

[tater]

As a reality check Rummel cites the US for ~650,000 democides in WW2, most all due to the bombing campaign (not all deaths to bombing are counted, BTW, just those he considers "excessive." The total number killed was considerably higher, but if you are in a combat zone as a civilian...

As for the Iraq body count website, it's hardly an apologist site for the US military, it's very purpose is to paint the military in a bad light for killing too many—so that's likely a high estimate (though it seems a plausible high, unlike that idiotic lancet "study" that was published (and later discredited).

Originally Posted by Dowly

So in other words, no matter what figures we show you, your not going to believe them?

Are you saying that only US is counting the bodies of the wars? That's a bit worrying, isn't it?

Well anyway, here's some other figures. You'll see how the Iraq Body Count is the most, should I say optimistic of the bunch.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War

[Oberon]

Originally Posted by OneToughHerring

Well anyway, here's some other figures. You'll see how the Iraq Body Count is the most, should I say optimistic of the bunch.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War

Is it three and a half million though?

[Jimbuna]

Originally Posted by Oberon

Is it three and a half million though?

I wouldn't be putting too much faith in Wikipedia....could have been updated by a monkey for all anybody knows

[Oberon]

Originally Posted by jimbuna

I wouldn't be putting too much faith in Wikipedia....could have been updated by a monkey for all anybody knows

Well, it's more reliable than what Pyongyang puts out, sometimes
But even at the worse case scenario on those wikipedia figures, they don't come close to the worse case scenario DPRK figures.

[Dowly]

@OTH

No, I'm not saying anything, I'm asking. Looking at your previous posts, it seems that you only have one truth you believe in and that's your own.

[Sailor Steve]

Originally Posted by Dowly

So in other words, no matter what figures we show you, your not going to believe them?

Dowly, you have to realize that in this particular type of thread there is only one truth: USA bad, everybody who opposes us good.

Period.

Facts don't matter, especially the fact that there is good and bad in every person and every country. All that counts is the bad things America did.

[GoldenRivet]

Originally Posted by OneToughHerring

The Iraq Body Count is a US organisation. I'm not sure if I fully trust them to tell me the truth about a war the US is waging as the aggressor, sorry.

Get yourself a notepad and a few pens, and go do a body count on behalf of finland.

Im sure the margin of error between your count and "ours" will be less than 5 to 10 thousand.

Im so glad peace loving pacifists like you exist OTH without you the world would surely lose its direction.

OTH... i dare you to go join the Peace Corps or something instead of sitting there typing about how the world should be changed - go change it.

Originally Posted by GoldenRivet

Get yourself a notepad and a few pens, and go do a body count on behalf of finland.

Im sure the margin of error between your count and "ours" will be less than 5 to 10 thousand.

Im so glad peace loving pacifists like you exist OTH without you the world would surely lose its direction.

OTH... i dare you to go join the Peace Corps or something instead of sitting there typing about how the world should be changed - go change it.

Now that the US troops are largely off the streets in Iraq the fighting has died down considerably. Wish they'd done that earlier so they wouldn't have had to deliver so many US dead and wounded back home, eh? Time to do the same in Afghanistan and sieze the mindless killing of civilians which has been going on for about a decade now.

[Bubblehead1980]

War is hell, things happen.The US went into Afganistan because the Taliban were harboring terrorists, that is the truth, no spin.Now, the war was mismanaged under Bush since he was sidetracked with Iraq.The focus is on Aghanistan now and hopefully it will work out.The US was not the aggressor, terrorists had a home in Afghanistan and the Taliban was aiding Bin Laden and his bunch, so they were accessories to 9/11 in a sense, thus they were the aggressors.People who argue the US was the aggressor are usually the great thinkers who say Japan was not the aggressor in the Pacific, that America provoked Japan.

No matter what there will always be a segment of Afghanistan that is unhappy with the US being there and the change due to their ignorance and backwards way of thinking heavily influenced by the great
pestilence nown as Islam.However, the US and Allies in the country have done a lot of good by building schools, hospitals etc and setting up a government to build a better nation where women and girls can learn to read and have choices.That government is much perfect, but no government is.

Bottom line, it is sad that some civs died but it was an accident and these things happen in war but things are getting better there and great care is taken to prevent civ casualties but it happened and will most likely happen again at some point, part of war and building a decent society in Afghanistan.

Even if you're in favour of the war there is still the many questions of how the war is actually being fought. Now I'm sure a lot of people here in Subsim know a thing or two about warfare etc. and also understand that even in a war there should be an attempt being made to mitigate civilian losses, right?

There are many tactics the US military is using that are causing civilian casualties and the inaccurate drone bombings are just one of these tactics. Whenever the US causes civilian casualties there are people, usually Americans, saying that "it's just how war is".

Well that's not the case, troops from other countries are managing without killing civilians in Afghanistan, now how can this be? And it's not just a question of smaller area of responsibility, they just are not killing civilians. It's called being carefull and going after hearts & minds. The US is waging the war as if the Afghan civilians are the enemy. No wonder Karzai has been saying "US troops out" for a long time.

[tater]

Originally Posted by OneToughHerring

Even if you're in favour of the war there is still the many questions of how the war is actually being fought. Now I'm sure a lot of people here in Subsim know a thing or two about warfare etc. and also understand that even in a war there should be an attempt being made to mitigate civilian losses, right?

There are many tactics the US military is using that are causing civilian casualties and the inaccurate drone bombings are just one of these tactics. Whenever the US causes civilian casualties there are people, usually Americans, saying that "it's just how war is".

Well that's not the case, troops from other countries are managing without killing civilians in Afghanistan, now how can this be? And it's not just a question of smaller area of responsibility, they just are not killing civilians. It's called being carefull and going after hearts & minds. The US is waging the war as if the Afghan civilians are the enemy. No wonder Karzai has been saying "US troops out" for a long time.

The US does as much as possible to mitigate civilian deaths, period.

It's not US tactics that cause needless deaths, it's the enemy not following the rules of war, and operating out of uniform in areas mixed with civilians.

If the US wished to cause civilian deaths, there'd be MANY MANY more of them. We could in fact virtually wipe out all the civilians, but we chose not to.

Setting unrealistic expectations—say, zero casualties—helps no one. We continually work to minimize the number. Another way to look at it is to imagine how many we could cause if we wished to kill civilians, then look at how many fewer we actually do. So if the number was 25,000 killed in 10 years, and we could have killed 25 million, then we're killing 1% of the number we could if we wished to.