U.S. Iraq Casualties Surpass WTC Deaths
By Keith Boykin, in politics
Tuesday, September 12 2006, 11:16AM
"Our immediate strategy is to eliminate terrorist threats abroad," said President Bush, "so we do not have to face them here at home." For the past two years, that's been the mantra of the Bush Administration in justifying the war in Iraq. "We face an enemy determined to bring death and suffering into our homes," the president said last night in his televised address. It's been such effective spin that ordinary citizens have started to repeat the talking points. "If we don’t fight them there, we are going to be fighting them over here," a voter in Colorado was quoted in the New York Times today.
But there's one big problem. Our enemies are fighting us at home, and our enemies are winning. If you buy into the notion that the war in Iraq is being waged by the same terrorists that we are trying to keep on defense so they can't kill Americans, then you have to conclude that the enemy is winning. In fact, as of today, they've killed more Americans in Iraq (2671) than were killed in the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center (2602).
"America did not ask for this war, and every American wishes it were over," President Bush said last night. Well, that depends on what war he's talking about. Although America certainly didn't ask to be attacked on September 11, we (or at least the Administration) certainly did ask for the war in Iraq. And that's the problem.
The president almost acknowledged that Iraq was a war of choice last night when he tried to explain why we were at war there. "I'm often asked why we're in Iraq when Saddam Hussein was not responsible for the 9/11 attacks. The answer is that the regime of Saddam Hussein was a clear threat. My administration, the Congress, and the United Nations saw the threat -- and after 9/11, Saddam's regime posed a risk that the world could not afford to take." If only that were true.
"In the first days after the 9/11 attacks I promised to use every element of national power to fight the terrorists, wherever we find them," Bush said yesterday. But the problem is that we didn't fight the terrorists in Iraq. Instead we found Saddam Hussein, who the Republican-controlled U.S. Senate acknowledged in a report released last Friday, had no ties with Osama Bin Laden and the terrorists. In fact, Hussein distrusted Bin Laden, fearing that the terrorists could destabilize his regime. But rather than telling the truth, Bush chose the same lie and deny strategy he's employed so often in the past.
In his 17-minute speech, Bush mentioned "weapons of mass destruction" only once, and he did so in describing the fear that "terrorists" might one day get their hands on them. But nowhere did he acknowledge that his Administration misled the Congress, the American people and the international community into thinking that Saddam Hussein had those weapons. Now we are paying the price for the president's mistakes.
Finally, President Bush and his team have chosen a perilous strategy to make the case to stay the course. "Five years after 9/11, our enemies have not succeeded in launching another attack on our soil, but they've not been idle," Bush said last night. That's a dangerous argument. To assume that American soil has not been attacked because of White House efforts is simplistic. It fails to take into account the possibility that the terrorists may be regrouping or plotting their next attack for some time in the future. After all, it was 8 years from the first World Trade Center attack before the terrorists struck there again.
But more importantly, the president's measure of success ignores the American casualties that have been suffered in the past few years. If the goal of the enemy was simply to kill Americans, they've done it. They haven't had the dramatic television impact of knocking over two skyscrapers, but they've managed to kill more Americans since that time than they could kill in attacking the World Trade Center. Yes, the war in Iraq has now become more deadly to Americans than the World Trade Center attack.
Comments conceal
Rockinrob
September 12 2006, 1:34PM
Another point:
Not only has "the war become more deadly to Americans than the World Trade Center attack", it appears the cost of this war will also surpass the cost of replacing those towers. Not to make lite of the situation, but at least with replacing the towers, there's an estimated "cost" to do so.
An ever-disturbing question that I have is: "What's going to be the final cost to Americans for an unnecessary war that's going on for years...with no end in sight?!"
Brezh
September 12 2006, 4:39PM
I'm not sure what significance this 'milestone' is supposed to have -- other than being yet another reminder to be grateful to those who are willing to die to preserve our freedom.
2,388 Americans died at Pearl Harbor, yet 407,000 died over the following 3.5 years to eradicate the threat to our way of life and spread freedom to our former foes. (see http://www.cwc.lsu.edu/other/stats/warcost.htm) for a summary of casualties from other American wars.
The MidEast status quo before the Iraq war was autocracy and repression, generally supported by the US/West. That brought us 9/11.
Though reasonable people can have reservations about the wisdom of the Iraq war, 2,904 Coalition deaths (2,671 of them American) have enabled 26,000,000 Iraqis to take their first tentative steps toward self-governance. That's a MidEast novelty. If it succeeds and spreads it will have been well worth the sacrifice.
Rockinrob
September 12 2006, 5:47PM
@Brezh:
While I respect your position, I totally disagree with "If it succeeds and spreads it will have been well worth the sacrifice."
Well worth it to whom? Ask the mother of her dead, 21-years-old only child if she feels the same way? All behind someone else's (Bush) lies and bullshit...I think not.
In fact, knowing the "real" reasons behind the start/cause of this war, I feel that losing one (1) American life has been too big a price to pay.
I thank God everyday that it wasn't my brother (ex-military) or isn't my uncle who currently serves with our armed forces. Again, sacrificing their lives behind somebody's bullshit? I don't think so. But to have them in a foreign land to truly fight to protect the rights and freedoms of our country behind something LEGIT
... ABSOLUTELY!
Keep in mind, I understand that we can't just up-and-leave at this point. And why? Because we have started some shit we had no plan on how to finish!
Just my opinion. PEACE.
cmoney
September 12 2006, 7:10PM
Let's not forget the 100,000 Iraqis who have been killed in this war based on Bush's bullshit and the stupidity of the American people for going along with it. Don't you think they would rather have lived, even if under Saddam Hussein? Giving people democracy even if it kills them is not a Mideast novelty. It's an American atrocity.
Nhlanhla
September 12 2006, 7:42PM
Brezh, that’s quite paternalistic of your views. You almost sound like a 1700 Missionary in the New World. I really don’t believe that democracy is a universal good for everyone and everywhere. Its imposition, mismatched to cultural institutions, has mostly caused great instabilities and sufferings, see Africa. It is a western and foreign value to billions in the world. I believe in democracy for my own life, but acknowledge its limitations as well as its inappropriateness elsewheres. You could never say that the Iraqi war will ever be worth it based on its exportation. Worth what and to whom? People/s are different, and its not only with regard to sexuality or race or religion. With respect
ka-os
September 12 2006, 8:54PM
"Iraq Casualties Surpass WTC Deaths." Gee, you don't say? More people have died in a war that's been going on for a few years now, than in a single event that lasted a couple of hours. Shock, horror. I'm sure the total deaths from motor vehicle accidents in that time also exceeds the death toll on 9/11, or death as a result of homicide. You're a rocket scientist Keith - keep up the stirring... er, I mean, good work!
Rockinrob
September 13 2006, 10:47AM
@ka-os:
I don't have to defend Keith's headline because I have every confidence in his ability to handle that himself, but, to me, it sounds like you're trying to "cook-a-pot" with him and my question is why? Where is your portal of information dissemination? I'd like to express my views there...if "there" even exists!
See, it's not hard to be nasty. PEACE.
Brezh
September 13 2006, 11:10AM
Regardless of how we got there, the war is a reality. It's quite true that not all cultures are well-suited to democracy. We are also up against over 1,000 years of animosity between Muslim East and Christian West and a bunch of boundaries drawn in the sand, by the West, that created states that purposely ignore and divide the nations they contain. Iraq is a perfect example - it probably should be Kurdistan and two Arab countries.
For the last 60 years the US has been the dominant Western power. We supported the autocracies to fend off Soviet expansion and to maintain access to oil. Our intervention in the region was based on strategic, if short-sighted, self-interest, rather than on promotion of our ideals as a society.
This war offers the long-shot possibility of something different. If the Iraqis can transform their society into one governed by the rule-of-law, rather than by tyrants they will be immensely better off. Hopefully that means we would be too.
Rockinrob
September 13 2006, 11:53AM
@ Brezh:
Stick a fork in me. I am done! You are OUTthere.
PEACE
cmoney
September 13 2006, 5:15PM
If only this country respected the rule of law and wasn't ruled by tyrants!
Fully Disgusted
September 14 2006, 1:01AM
What a ghoulish man you are!
You were just counting down the deaths weren't you? You people have no morals at all--just NASTY, NASTY, NASTY.
Your behavior of laste has caused me to question your integrity (or lack thereof).
Slow down and check your moral compass if you have one.
I think your paternalistic lording over your political opponents has blinded you to your own shortcomings--and you're coming undone.
Don't you feel a tiny bit bad for this?
Brezh
September 14 2006, 9:08AM
Work with me here, Rockinrob. The Middle East has given us lemons. We need to figure out how to give them lemonade.
ka-os
September 14 2006, 5:32PM
@Rockinrob
I'm not trying to "cook-a-pot" with anyone. My issue is with sloppy journalism. The headline is cheap and nasty: it insults my intelligence, and that of everyone else (not the first time Keith Boykin has used lowest-common-denominator headlines). You can't compare the deaths of victims of terrorist atrocities with those of the casualites of war. It's like comparing an ice cube with lipstick. And it's clear Mr. Boykin is using the 9/11 atrocity for political mudslinging. How cynical. How ugly. How low.
Kenneth Winfrey![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.keithboykin.com/blog2/nav-commenters.gif)
September 15 2006, 5:48PM
I have responded to this in greater length than is allowed here on the Message Board.
nhlanhla
September 16 2006, 7:06AM
Well Brezh, I am anti WAR period. That's my bias. And if you are really Pro-Democratic solutions, you should also be, as matter of principle. Two standards perhaps?
Kaos, I think you have a point. It's however interesting how you began on more sarcastic tone on your 1st posting, as though you were more amused than really concerned, but then almost exploded on your 2nd taking. I think that you have a keen mind for ironies. And in ONE perspective it is quite ironic that Keith compared casualties of a singular event to those from an on going war. However, I don't really think the comparison was based on numbers over time. But more on the effectiveness or meaningfullness or lack thereof of a WAR solution to save life-even in SOME quantitative-comparative perspective. I suspect that was the intended irony. Was war the solution?? Cheap journalism, here & elswhere? That's quite extreme, don't you think? Coming from you as well-otherwise you'd not be reading & responding at this point? Right?