Comments on: U.S. Deaths in Iraq vs. Vietnam: The Handoff

by: retok

Tue, 17 Jul 2007 22:05:36 +0000

Why are these people more important and heartwrenching when they die than any other Americans? We have a fetish for counting military casualties and ignoring all the other people we expend. Car crashes kill far more people (often as brutally) yet we accept (well “ignore”) them and press on.
When we become soldiers, sailors, and airmen (I’m a MSgt, retiring soon after 26 years of service) we accept that wars are a normal part of international interaction and that we are subject to being on the pointy end of the spear.
Mourning and grief at loss are appropriate, but be glad previous generations that took VASTLY more casualties weren’t too paralyzed by grief to keep up the fight.
The Iraq war casualties are unfortunate (don’t forget the severely wounded, who IMO sacrifice far more than those simply killed), and by all means available take care of the troops. That said, we are VOLUNTEERS, who freely chose to serve.
Current casualties are NOT “so bad” as the bloodbaths of the Civil War or the World Wars.
Note:
Roughly a quarter of our Iraq casualties are from ACCIDENTS, not hostile fire!
Un-screw the Army safety “culture” if you want to do some lasting good. How many of you know that the DRIVER in an Army vehicle (any of them) is normally the most junior person???
Add that to the stress of war, unstable wheeled trucks (HMMWVs when uparmored handle poorly), poor visibility, and you get the least skilled coping with the some of the toughest problems.

by: beterwas » Year-End Wrap-Up

Tue, 02 Jan 2007 08:13:26 +0000

[…] 3,000 Soldiers, RIP - I make a point to read the names aloud, whenever I come across them in the paper. So many, so young and so sad to think of the fathers, mothers, sons and daughters that have their worst fears realized. Especially when I hear people comparing to previous wars, and saying that it “isn’t so bad.” It is both fallacious and heartless. […]

by: jbc

Fri, 10 Nov 2006 13:26:10 +0000

I’ve seen figures for total US deaths for those conflicts, I believe, but not month-by-month breakdowns. As I recall, WWII had about 400,000 US deaths, and the Civil War had something like 800,000, compared to the roughly 58,000 for the Vietnam War, or the roughly 3,000 so far in Iraq.

by: shogungt

Thu, 09 Nov 2006 19:48:50 +0000

It’d be interesting to see this same chart with more conflicts included. Do you have access to figures from WWII, Korean War, Civil War, WWI, etc?