----- Original Message ----- From: "Gautam Mukunda" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Killer Bs Discussion" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Monday, November 08, 2004 10:44 AM Subject: Re: Iraq civilian casualties.
> The report suggests that _100,000_ people were killed. If US forces were > _trying_ to kill that many people they'd probably have > real difficulty doing it. It would certainly have > been reported by the literally thousands of > journalists floating around Iraq. It would take an > enormous, dedicated effort to kill that many > civilians. It's not something that could happen by > accident. It's _certainly_ not something that could > happen without being reported on. Dismissals of the > report's methodology are all over the web. It's a > joke. It's only plausible if you really, really want > to believe that American soldiers are genocidal mass murderers. One quibble here, Gautam. I think that, since one of the most important goals of the US invasion was to improve life for the people of Iraq, a measure of the total effect on the people is reasonable. Thus, if the result of the US policy in Iraq is a chaotic state where people reasonably fear for their lives on a daily basis, then the US does bear some responsibility for that. Thus, all the excess deaths, not just the one's directly caused by the US, should be considered when one considers the question "have we improved the life of the average citizen of Iraq?" Right now, I think the answer is yes, but by a smaller margin than even I would have guessed 2 years ago. We still have the opportunity for things to degenerate. I have no doubt that the US can win any military battle. But, if the political fallout of Fallujah is an effective Sunni boycott of the election, and increased support for the insurgents, then Fallujah can be a political failure. If, in addition, the legitimacy of the winners is questioned because government composed mostly of exiles that received substantial backing from the US is thought to have won because of the tactical advantages provided by this backing, then things could deteriorate further. So, while you have convinced me that 100k is too high of a number, I don't think we should only consider those Iraqis who were killed by the US when we evaluate the effectiveness of our policy in Iraq. Certainly, the moral culpability of us killing thousands of civilians directly through lack of care in using force would be far greater than our moral culpability in making mistakes that lead to them being killed by insurgents. I'd argue that the latter culpability is at the same level as our culpability for those killed by Hussein between the wars because we didn't intervene. I'm guessing we don't really disagree on this, but your post only considered those directly killed by the US, so I thought I'd write what I considered a friendly amendment. :-) Dan M. _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
