650,000 dead in Iraq

[strictlybroadband]

Oops.

[eroticartist]

Strictly,
I wonder if anyone is going to be charged with war crimes?
Mike.

[strictlybroadband]

eroticartist wrote:

> Strictly,
> I wonder if anyone is going to be charged with war crimes?

I think it depends on whether America wins its imperial war. If it does, Iraq will be brushed out of history. If not, Bush and Blair (and Hoon, Rumsfeld, Cheney) might find themselves in an uncomfortable position in 20 years time.

The amazing thing is that through the first gulf war, the 90s sanctions regime and the second gulf war, America has called more Iraqis than Saddam ever did. A guy from an Iraqi charity interviewed yesterday said that during Saddam's time, they had to deal with 30-40 unidentified dead bodies in Baghdad per month. Today it's 200-250.

Out of interest: is anyone brave enough to admit they supported the invasion back in 2003?

[strictlybroadband]

strictlybroadband wrote:

> America has called
> more Iraqis than Saddam ever did.

Sorry, I meant killed, not called, obviously... !whistle!

[Flat_Eric]

strictlybroadband wrote:

>>


The basic idea behind it was a good one - namely getting rid of one of the most brutal dictators the world has seen in modern times.

The problem was, they lied about WMD, not enough was done to try and get more moderate Arab countries on board (as happened in Gulf War I)and the long-term consequences of the whole venture weren't thought through properly at all.

You have to remember though, SBB, that a large proportion of the 650,000 dead (if that is in fact an accurate number) have in fact been killed by other Iraqis and foreigh Arab insurgents (setting off car bombs, blowing themselves up in crowded mosques and markets, stopping buses and shooting the occupants, targeted assasinations etc. etc.)

The way you're spinning it, it's as if you're trying to give the impression that they've all been killed by Coalition troops, which of course is patent nonsense.

[strictlybroadband]

Flat_Eric wrote:

> The basic idea behind it was a good one - namely getting rid of
> one of the most brutal dictators the world has seen in modern
> times.
>
> The problem was, they lied about WMD

Yes, but it was obvious they were lying at the time (congrats on your bravery for admitting you were suckered though).

> not enough was done to
> try and get more moderate Arab countries on board (as happened
> in Gulf War I)

They were never going to come on board because the whole thing was about increasing US control over Arab oil.

> You have to remember though, SBB, that a large proportion of
> the 650,000 dead (if that is in fact an accurate number) have
> in fact been killed by other Iraqis and foreigh Arab insurgents
> (setting off car bombs, blowing themselves up in crowded
> mosques and markets, stopping buses and shooting the occupants,
> targeted assasinations etc. etc.)

According to the study (which is the most accurate done to date) about a third (i.e. 200,000-odd) of these people were killed directly by the coalition forces. That's still a lot of people. But blaming the rest on "other Iraqis etc." is bullshit. People don't start civil wars for the hell of it. We and the US created the current civil war and we and the US will take the flak for it. Those 650,000 people would not be dead if it wasn't for Bush, Blair, and the suckers who believed them.

[Robches]

I find this figure hard to believe. If we look at the strategic bombing campaign against Germany, the RAF spent the period 1942-1945 basically sending thousands of bombers over to kill as many Germans as possible. The Americans bombing by day were a bit more discrete in trying to attack industrial targets, but caused a huge amount of collateral damage by modern standards. The upshot of this immense campaign was about 500,000 German civilian deaths.

I fully accept that many, though not all, parts of Iraq are very violent and dangerous, but I find it hard to accept that more Iraqis have been killed in the period 2003-6 than Germans in 1942-5, when we were sending bombers out night after night to rain bombs on their cities.

[Pervert]

To put things in perspective, there is the equivalent of an Omagh atrocity every day in Iraq. Sometimes, if they are really unlucky, two or three.

Bush being Bush still disputes the figures. Whatever, civilians were killed by the invading force's bombing and artillery fire initially; the various "insurgent" groups are killing troops, rivals and innocent civilians at an alarming rate; and people are being abducted, tortured in the most horrible way imaginable, and killed, again on a daily basis.

It would be nice to think that one day Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell, Rice and their UK lapdogs will be made to answer for the consequences of what they have done. But I can't see it happening. If the "intelligence" about WMD had been true, then an invasion was necessary. As it wasn't true, and those who wanted the war knew it wasn't true, those responsible should be brought to account.

I wonder if Kim Jong-Il would be testing his weapons quite so readily if there was a massive amount of oil beneath his feet.

[Sam Slater]

[quote]Out of interest: is anyone brave enough to admit they supported the invasion back in 2003?[/quote]

I did. I thought he had WMD's too. Why would I think otherwise?

From wikipedia:

[quote]The campaign of Iraqi government against Kurds in 1988 was called Anfal (Spoils of War). The Anfal attacks led to destruction of 2,000 villages and death of 300,000 Kurds[/quote]

Thats in 1 year btw. God knows how many Saddam has killed during his time in power. Since Saddam sent his airforce over to Iran during the first Gulf War, there's a good chance he sent his WMD's somewhere else for safe keeping before the inspectors came a'knockin.

Saddam would have got away with murdering 'millions' of people, and free to commit more murder, if it wasn't for the invasion, so I'm glad he's being brought to justice. The people of Iraq '-quite rightly- want the US & UK troops out, but we had no choice in staying did we? What would have been your opinion if we'd just left them powerless, with no army or policeforce, and left to murder eachother in a civil war, with Iran only next door?

Iran being a distinctly Islamic state would see Iraq as a jewel they couldn't resist. Not with all it's Islamic history. Leaving the people to their own devices would have been far more wrong, than the current situation.

I'm not saying America hasn't got a hidden aganda, and that it's right. But the facts are that Saddam was a multle mass murderer, and the troops are needed in Iraq until they get stability.

[Robches]

>To put things in perspective, there is the equivalent of an Omagh atrocity every day in Iraq

As it happens I think you are about right. 29 people were killed at Omagh, so 29 x 365 x 3 = 31,755, which is the sort of figure that the US government is estimating.

The figure of 600,000 plus just does not sound realistic to me, which is not to say that parts of Iraq aren't subject to immense amounts of violence. The methodology used here was based on interviewing 1800 households. Yet when they tried this last year, I think they came up with a figure of 100,000 deaths, so were they wrong then, or wrong now? A difference of 500,000 deaths is one hell of a discrepancy