Iraq Occupation Casualties

If you examine the information on the website Iraq Coalition Casualty Count, you will see that the latest period of the Iraq occupation is the deadliest yet.

The number of troops killed in action is over 4 per day. There is a corresponding rise in deaths with the escalation of the occupation.

A recent Houston Chronicle article reveals that, "nearly 800 civilians working under contract to the Pentagon have been killed and more than 3,300 hurt."

excerpt: "Employees of defense contractors such as Halliburton, Blackwater and Wackenhut cook meals, do laundry, repair infrastructure, translate documents, analyze intelligence, guard prisoners, protect military convoys, deliver water in the heavily fortified Green Zone and stand sentry at buildings — often highly dangerous duties almost identical to those performed by many U.S. troops."

What is not clear, are the number of troops and "employees of defense contractors" that are sustaining horrific brain and other injuries that in another era would certainly have meant death. With battle field emergency measures and body armor improved they are not dying on the battlefield and are surviving. They must endure extreme loss of human function.

Also it is not clear how many troops and "employees of defense contractors" are dying after they are evacuated from the battlefield having sustained serious injury - people that are airlifted out of Iraq to hospitals in Europe and the USA and then eventually pass away or commit suicide.

It would appear that the numbers of people who are actually killed as a result of the occupation is not truly known. The numbers are distributed over several categories, a few of which are rarely even considered or known generally. One could assume that this is deliberately done in order to play down the death toll. We know that the American people do not actually see the coffins as they come off the military transport planes, but they also do not see the real number of those killed either.