New Scientist: 100,000 Civilians Dead in Iraq

http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99996596

The invasion of Iraq in March 2003 by coalition forces has lead to the death of at least 100,000 civilians, reveals the first scientific study to examine the issue.

The majority of these deaths, which are in addition those normally expected from natural causes, illness and accidents, have been among women and children, finds the study, released early by The Lancet on Thursday.

The most common cause of death is as a direct result of violence, mostly caused by coalition air strikes, reveals the study of almost 1000 households scattered across Iraq. And the risk of violent death just after the invasion was 58 times greater than before the war. The overall risk of death was 1.5 times more after the invasion than before.

The figure of 100,000 – estimated by extrapolating the surveyed households’ death toll to the whole population - is based on "conservative assumptions", notes Les Roberts at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, US, who led the study.

That estimate excludes Falluja, a hotspot for violence. If the data from this town is included, the study points to about 200,000 excess deaths since the outbreak of war.

Read more...

~Ulrika~

That is really fucked up. Reading those numbers hurts my soul.

This is just a small sample of what Saddam Hussein did in his reign and no telling what his insane son would have done once he got power.

Post Gulf War
Eyewitness accounts, documents seized from Iraqi security organs during the post-1991 Gulf War uprising and information gathered by international human rights groups indicate that up to 182,000 people were killed.

Gassing Kurds in Halabja in 1988

In August 1988, during the Anfal campaign, Iraqi forces attacked the Kurdish town of Halabja with bombs containing a mixture of mustard and nerve gases.

An estimated 5,000 civilians, including women, children and babies, were killed in a single day.

Gen Majid ordered the attack, earning the notorious epithet Chemical Ali.

Killing political activists over 30 years
Evidence has emerged of 270 mass graves across Iraq which are believed to hold the remains of possibly tens of thousands of people.


Massacre of members of the Kurdish Barzani tribe in 1983

In July 1983, Iraqi security forces arrested about 8,000 male members of the Barzani clan in the northern province of Arbil. They were transported to southern Iraq and have not been heard of since.

Alot of those 100000 killed in this war were not killed by US forces but by the Iraqi army and the terrorists since then.


http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3320293.stm


Removing Saddam from power no matter what the motivation was a good thing for this world. Now we just need to go to the Sudan, N. Korea, and Iran. I believe if we are gonna do this do it all the way. Not help some and leave others to suffer.

Saddam and his sons never would have stepped down peacfully and with the death grip they had on the people they never would have been overthrown. The shame of this is that we didn't do it in the first gulf war. Then we might have saved a few hundred thousand.

Where did he get all the materials to gas the Kurds like that?

We really need to expand our offensive and go after his suppliers.

It's just like drugs. We shouldn't be wasting our time on the small dealers.

http://www2.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB82/

This is an immoral utilitarian argument followed by immoral rule utilitarianism.

Utilitarianism is a suggested theoretical framework for morality, based on quantitative maximisation of some definition of "utility" for society or humanity. In this case you are arguing that the number of people we have murdered is less than the number of people he murdered and is therefore justified. Unfortunately, this is inherently immoral as it violates the freedom (autonomy) of citizens of that country (by killing them) and some citizens of our country (by using their tax money without consent to kill people).

This type of immoral utilitarian argument is commonly employed to justify such things as war, slavery, or torture. If slavery provides a benefit to society that exceeds its costs, it is justified by utilitarianism. If the torture and murder of a few people saves a few lives, it is justified by utilitarianism.

The solution for an immoral utilitarian argument is simply to find one which is moral. For instance, could a plan of action be formulated which doesn't require the death of 200,000 innocent women and children? Are there alternatives to slavery or apartheid which can provide a similar benefit to a society? Are there alternate forms of intelligence that don't require the rape, electrocution, or sexual humiliation of prisoners? Of course there are.


Finally, you finish with a statement that this immoral utilitarian argument should be applied again and again using the moral imperative that we are obligated to end suffering of all people. (I agree with your moral imperative.) The act of applying this action as a rule to similar situations is what is known as rule utilitarianism. Unfortunately, the rule, as discussed above, is immoral and should not be applied.

To illustrate, consider the example, where a doctor has four patients, one needs a heart, one needs a liver, and one needs a kidney. The fourth just came in to have his appendix removed. Should the surgeon kill the fourth man and give his organs to the others? This would obviously violate the rights of the fourth man, but utilitarianism implies, given a choice between killing the man and distributing his organs or not doing so and the other three dying, violating his rights is the correct solution. If it is the correct solution, then this should become a rule, to which doctors must always adhere, in order to maximize the number of lives saved.


In summary, while your utilitarian arguments are sound, they are inherently immoral as they violate the autonomy of your fellow humans. Immoral utilitarian arguments are often used to justify truly grotesque human behavior (war, slavery, torture). It is important to recognize when a utilitarian argument is immoral and to reformulate it such that it is not.

~Ulrika~

He got a lot of those materials from the united states...specifically the gas.

During the time of the Iran/Iraqu war the United States was in the process of destroying thousands of tons of mustard gas and other gasses that had been around as long as the second world war. A portion of those gasses and other weapons were shipped to Iraq to help their effort against our mutual enemy at the time, Iran.

This movie trailer might interest those following this thread
http://realestate-visalia.com/

The war on drugs is easy. Just give all the drugs to me.

Well... and Darko. I'll share.

Ulrika,

Good argument.

*impressed*

Ulrika? Are you really a woman? Straight? Single? Got anything against Portugal?
Marry me!

Oh hellz ya.

Ulrika that is a well stated argument. I appreciate you taking the time to write it. Keep bringing the straight dope!

I don't know how it's possible to do a "scientific" study of the population of Iraq. There were very few records of it kept by Saddam's killing machine, some of the populace is nomadic, tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands were murdered in the desert by Saddam's killing machine -- those mass graves are being discovered every week and I bet those weren't recorded anywhere by Mr. Benevolent Dictator Saddam.

You don't keep records of your population's size when you may decide to kill 5-10% of it on a whim.

Aaron hit the nail right on the head there.

An inaccurate "scientific study" that says 100,000 civilians have died is a poor piece of information to use as an argument. What if one of those "civilians" had a gun in his hand and was threatening troops? He wouldn't still be a civilian? What if a "civilian" had a grenade, or an RPG? You can't just take a close-minded decision that every one of those 100,000 civilians were innocent and didn't pose any threat.

I am immoral lol.

The Middle East has shown no ability to govern or control themselves. So we are giving them a crash course.

If anybody who thinks we shouldn't be there can give me a VIABLE alternative solution. That would be wonderful, but since everybody who spends all their time bashing the war have not once provided one decent alternative. Lets keep those tanks rollin.

I hope the draft will include women !

Nor can you ride both sides of the fence and assume they were hateful terrorists waiting to attack us.

This type of argument is absurd. When we want to be liberators, they are poor innocent Iraqis that we are saving. When we bomb the hell out of them, they are potential terrorists with guns and grenades.

Be on whatever side you want, but pick a side and stick with it for crying out loud.