Remember this: 100,000 Iraqi civilian deaths?

[Hard-Luck Henry]

I'm sure this was posted and widely discussed last year but, as we don't seem to be getting any new figures to go on, I thought I'd post it again:

A scientific study - published last year in The Lancet, a highly renowned medical journal - on post-war mortality rates in Iraq:

Making conservative assumptions, we think that about 100000 excess deaths, or more have happened since the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Violence accounted for most of the excess deaths and air strikes from coalition forces accounted for most violent deaths. We have shown that collection of public-health information is possible evenduring periods of extreme violence. Our results need further verification and should lead to changes to reduce non-combatant deaths from air strikes.

US General Tommy Franks is widely quoted as saying “we don’t do body counts”. The Geneva Conventions have clear guidance about the responsibilities of occupying armies to the civilian population they control. The fact that more than half the deaths reportedly caused by the occupying forces were women and children is cause for concern. In particular, Convention IV, Article 27 states that protected persons “. . . shall be at all times humanely treated, and shall be protected especially against acts of violence . . .”. It seems difficult to understand how a military force could monitor the extent to which civilians are protected against violence without systematically doing body counts or at least looking at the kinds of casualties they induce.

http://www.parliament-square.org.uk/lancetsurvey.pdf

 

[no1important]

RE: Remember this: 100,00

Well that Tommy Franks along with the whole Bush administration should be tried for murder.

100,000 deaths is unacceptable, outragous, disgraceful and should not be tolerated.

Civilians are to be protected under the Geneva convention. The US has violated so many parts of the Geneva Convention it ain't funny. I really wish the world governments would sanction the US and stop all trade with them until the smartened up. The US has had too much of a free hand in the world and it is time they are held accountable for their actions.

civilian immunity

Civilians have special protections under Convention IV, Protocol I, and Protocol II.

They must be treated humanely, without discrimination based on race, color, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or other similar criteria.

Violence to life and person including murder, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture are prohibited.

The taking of hostages is prohibited.

Outrages upon personal dignity, including humiliating and degrading treatment are prohibited.

Sentences and executions without a judgment from a regularly constituted court and without benefit of the standard judicial guarantees are prohibited. (Convention IV, Art. 3)

See civilian population, women, murder, rape, torture, discrimination, civilian property, places of worship, cultural objects, grave breaches, and indiscriminate bombing to start with.

civilian objects

Combatants must distinguish between civilian and military objects and attack only military targets. (Protocol I, Art. 48 )

See places of worship, indiscriminate attacks.

civilian

A civilian is any person who does not belong to any of the following categories: members of the armed forces, militias or volunteer corps, organized resistance movements, and residents of an occupied territory who spontaneously take up arms. If there is any doubt whether a person is civilian, then he or she is to be considered a civilian. (Protocol I, Art. 50, Sec. 1)

civilian population

The civilian population comprises all persons who are civilians. (Protocol I, Art. 50, Sec. 2)

The civilian population is protected under the Geneva Conventions and these protections are not affected by the presence of combatants in the population. (Protocol I, Art. 50, Sec. 3)

These protections include the right to be free from attacks, reprisals, acts meant to instill terror, and indiscriminate attacks. Civilian populations must not be used as civilian shields. (Protocol I, Art. 51)

civilian property

Combatants must distinguish between civilian and military property and attack only military property. (Protocol I, Art. 48 )

Geneva Conventions

 

[GL Schmitt]

Re: RE: Remember this: 100,00

. . . 100,000 deaths is unacceptable, outragous, disgraceful and should not be tolerated. . . .

Anyone who hasn't read the original Lancet survey sponsored by the International Emergency Disaster and Refugee Studies, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD, USA should at least read the article covering the
The Lancet Survey in the Wikipedia.

 

[Andygal]

RE: Remember this: 100,00

No doubt Nascar Nero will come along and whine about all those deaths being "collateral damage".

100,000 innocent lives lost is not "collateral damage".

There is no excuse whatshowever for it.

 

[PoisonPete2]

anyone who backs this senseless war has blood on their hands. People try to argue its merits in the abstract, but death by 500 pound bombs is murder when it is a civilian doing the dying.

 

[jimmoyer]

By that standard of not going to war if civilians get hurt, then Hitler, Mussolini and Tojo should have been left alone ?

But you all gave me a good education on that Lancet Survey.

"because of the relatively small sample sizes, the 95% confidence intervals for most statistics were very broad."

What are 95% confidence intervals ?

"The study's estimate of total deaths ranges from 8,000 to 194,000 at a 95% confidence interval. With the Fallujah data included, the estimate was 200,000 excess deaths, but the authors noted the substantial uncertainty of this figure. Under the study's conclusions of the confidence range, there is an 8.8% probability that the number of excess fatalities were between 95,000 and 105,000."

I don't feel it necessary to tear down the one good attempt at getting numbers so that we know some truth about this war, I just want to understand what the above paragraph means.

 

[#juan]

jimmoyer

The U.S. has tried to make this war respectable by calling it "Operation Iraq Freedom". Why on earth would anyone use "shock and awe" tactics on the people they are supposed to be liberating. Why would "daisey cutter" bombs be used in liberating the Iraqi People. Cluster bombs are essentually an anti-personal weapon. Why would they be used in liberation operation. DU weapons are toxic poison that is even killing American soldiers. Does this make any sense to anyone? Anyone but G.W.

 

[gopher]

And as I noted on this board previously, Johns Hopkins University is the most conservative college in the North East. Therefore, the report should have a great deal of credibility with the right wingers.

 

[damngrumpy]

There is a big difference between this situation and those who died under Hitler. Hitler invaded other countries and brought death and destruction to all or most of Europe. The only country that Iraq invaded was once a part of Iraq, that the British carved up from colonial times. And the fight with Iran was an all out war.
Nope the Americans cry about 2000 of their own troops killed, when in fact they have murdered over a hundred thousand people, while stealing their oil. You might say all the old men, women and kids died for Haliburton.
The country has now plunged itself into the beginning of a civil war that will begin in force once the Americans leave the country.
Bush and is Middle Eastern policy have proved to be a disaster.

 

[GL Schmitt]

Sorry!

Double Post.

 

[GL Schmitt]

Poor logic.

Hitler, Mussolini and Tojo were the first to drop bombs on civilian populations of their enemies.

Once they did, no one has ever said (that I have read,with the exception of in the Instruction Manual for Real Christians) that we should continue to sit there and take it.

In the 80's when Saddam was bombing Iran and gassing Kurds, American foreign policymakers could think of nothing better than to aid him.

Once Saddam had no air force and few, if any, rockets, America attacked the Iraqi population (military and civilian) with cluster bombs and incendiary munitions — how noble of them!



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jimmoyer,

If you are seriously interested in an explanation (in layman terms) about how the Lancet Survey was conducted, and how their findings have been read, I would like to recommend the following article.

100,000 Iraqis Dead: Should We Believe It?
by Stephen Soldz
Nov 03, 2004

It may only be my system, but I am experiencing difficulty getting links thru. If it is not just my problem, here is the unadorned URL.

http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=15&ItemID=6565

 

[damngrumpy]

Of course the Americans aided Saddam against Iran, and the Americans still don't support the Kurds having their own homeland in the region, why? Its all about oil. Should we believe the Americans killed a 100000 civillians? Of course they have, in fact that number is probably higher by now. The Americans are hated by everyone for going in there and now if they leave the crazies from that region will come to America. Bush has created Vietnam in the sand and it looks good on them. It's not who is to blame, but rather what is to blame for all of this. AMERICAN IGNORANCE.
The citizens of the great republic believed they could pound these people into the ground. The whole region has been fighting and killing each other for thousands of years, its all they know, and they are smarter than the Americans in this kind of war.
What is really bad is that America is killing its young people and going into debt like never before. In fact this war could bring down the whole American society. What most people don't understand in America, is that they are no longer a democracy, the extreme right has turned their nation into an empire, and if the Christians get their way it will be a right wing, fundamentalist empire.

 

[Jo Canadian]