War Deaths - American War Critics Read

[Ace-Ace]

Not starting another flame thread, just take some time to soak in these facts...

Check out the numbers blow (taken from infoplease.com, a property of the Family Education Network) We've lost 894468 people during these 12 major battles, about 74539 average per battle (lasting YEARS at a time). We're I believe twelve days into operation Iraqi Freedom and we've have WELL under 100 casualties (wounded or killed in battle). We're well into this war, arguably near the end of it...and we have less than 100 casualties (not even deaths, just injured/dead) in just TWELVE days. You guys do the math...but this is going amazingly fast. It's simply amazing. I think the skepticism comes from "embedded" reporters. We get live feedback about small, trivial setbacks, and the press is turning that into a major issue. If during WW2 we had these reporters, we wouldn't have won the war...people would have wanted to stop the chaos instantly.

Basically, pipe the hell down...this war is on an absolutely amazing pace as far as time and efficiency.

American Revolution (1775?1783)
- Battle deaths 4,435

War of 1812 (1812?1815)
- Battle deaths 2,260

Indian Wars (approx. 1817?1898)
- Battle deaths 1,0001

Mexican War (1846?1848)
- Battle deaths 1,733

Civil War (1861?1865)
- Battle deaths (Union) 140,414
- Other deaths in service (nontheater) (Union) 224,097
- Battle deaths (Conf.) 74,524
- Other deaths in service (nontheater) (Conf.) 59,2972

Spanish-American War (1898?1902)
- Battle deaths 385

World War I (1917?1918)
- Battle deaths 53,402
- Other deaths in service (nontheater) 63,114

World War II (1940?1945)
- Total servicemembers 16,112,566
- Battle deaths 291,557
- Other deaths in service (nontheater) 113,842

Korean War (1950?1953)
- Battle deaths 33,686
- Other deaths in service (theater) 2,830
- Other deaths in service (nontheater) 17,730

Vietnam War (1964?1975)
- Battle deaths 47,410
- Other deaths in service (theater) 10,788
- Other deaths in service (nontheater) 32,000

Gulf War (1990?1991)
- Battle deaths 148
- Other deaths in service (theater) 235
- Other deaths in service (nontheater) 914

America's Wars Total
- Battle deaths 650,954
- Other deaths in service (theater) 13,853
- Other deaths in service (nontheater) 229,661

[Joe Sixpack]

Where are you getting your statistics for this war?

[Rochard]

We did have these reporters in WWII and since then, and they were indeed "embedded" into battle. The general population knew about these deaths, although the US government toned them down.

There are huge differences here.....

For example, the civil war was fought with rifles that fired one shot a minute. In WWII, We had machine guns and dropped bombs - The US killed tens of thousands with two bombs dropped on Japan alone.

In the current war things are much more different.... We can not only target certain buildings, but certain rooms. We can see them from miles away before they even know we are there....

[Ace-Ace]

Originally posted by Joe Sixpack
Where are you getting your statistics for this war?

*sigh*

"Check out the numbers blow (taken from infoplease.com, a property of the Family Education Network)"

[Ace-Ace]

Originally posted by RocHard
We did have these reporters in WWII and since then, and they were indeed "embedded" into battle. The general population knew about these deaths, although the US government toned them down.

There are huge differences here.....

For example, the civil war was fought with rifles that fired one shot a minute. In WWII, We had machine guns and dropped bombs - The US killed tens of thousands with two bombs dropped on Japan alone.

In the current war things are much more different.... We can not only target certain buildings, but certain rooms. We can see them from miles away before they even know we are there....

Yeah, completely different types of warfare...for sure, so it's unfair to compare them directly. But, you can owe that to technology and other things. I'm talking about brute numbers and years here...it's amazing.

As far as embedded reporters go in WW2, I'm not so sure about that. If you could get me a link, I'd appreciate it. As far as I know, there were people with cameras...they filmed it and shipped films back (took like a week). I'd assume some used phones, but that's not quite the same effect.

[Ace-Ace]

On a side note...I found it amusing what General Myers said this morning. He said something about the media needing to do "fair and balanced coverage". That's Fox's slogan exactly...and they definitely didn't shy away from saying that all day to day.

That's a nice big slap in the face for MSNBC and CNN, compliments General Myers.

[jas1552]

Originally posted by Ace-Ace
On a side note...I found it amusing what General Myers said this morning. He said something about the media needing to do "fair and balanced coverage". That's Fox's slogan exactly...and they definitely didn't shy away from saying that all day to day.

That's a nice big slap in the face for MSNBC and CNN, compliments General Myers.

Yeah, I noticed that.

CNN and MSNBC did reports about Geraldo reporting for FOX giving away too much info and the possiblity of him being kicked out of Iraq. MSNBC really milked it. After their Geraldo report they cut away to a black screen with like a flag on the left and white text to the right saying something like: OUR PROMISE TO YOU. We will continue to work hard to bring you objective accurate news while never doing anything that could put our soldiers lives at risk.

[Ace-Ace]

Originally posted by jas1552

Yeah, I noticed that.

CNN and MSNBC did reports about Geraldo reporting for FOX giving away too much info and the possiblity of him being kicked out of Iraq. MSNBC really milked it. After their Geraldo report they cut away to a black screen with like a flag on the left and white text to the right saying something like: OUR PROMISE TO YOU. We will continue to work hard to bring you objective accurate news while never doing anything that could put our soldiers lives at risk.

Yah, saw that too. I don't think he's given anything away. On a side note, we could say "We have guys 1800 yards south of X Street, guys 3 miles west of X street...and it wouldn't make much of a difference at all.

If they can successfully cut off the Madena division from retreating back into Baghdad, this could come to an abrupt ending.