Iraq Violence, Military Deaths
Thursday August 16, 2007
On the same webpage, McClatchy has contradictory headlines, side-by-side: Despite violence drop, officers see bleak future for Iraq and Bombs kill 175, gunmen seize hostages as lull in Iraq violence ends. Maybe they aren't contradictory -- violence is down in Baghdad but up in the other parts of the country?
I do know that no one is talking about military deaths in Iraq -- in anything other than "violence is going down." Folks, that's not what the data suggest.
If our military personnel continue to die the last five months of this year at the rate they died the first seven ... then about 1,200 will die this year. Less than 900 died in 2004, 2005 and 2006; a little more than 500 died in the 10 months we were in Iraq in 2003. Check out the chart; if you don't like the projection, complain to either Microsoft (it's Excel's work) or the Pentagon.
Oh. More from McClatchy: "500 people probably died in a series of coordinated truck bombings that devastated two northern Iraqi villages Tuesday and set a record for mass carnage in war-torn Iraq."