The Iraq War & Other American Wars

It is interesting to compare the Iraq War to other American wars. I am not going to do all American wars just a good representative sample. All the deaths are American military deaths and the deaths per year are rounded.

The Iraq War which has lasted so far three years have killed 3,017 deaths. This comes out to be 1006 deaths per year.

The American revolutionary war caused 8000 deaths and lasted for eight years. The deaths per year for this war was 1000 deaths per year. Pretty close to deaths in Iraq. Historians say one-third was for American independence, one-third was against the war (Tories were probably thinking those Brits weren't that bad why do we have to fight them?), and one-third did not care either way.

The Civil War lasted four years. In those four years there were 204,070 deaths. That's a big chunk of the population. The deaths per year were 51,018. A much bigger rate than the Iraq War. Even this war had it's detractors. Some of the population thought President Lincoln should have let the south succeed--succeeding was in their constitutions.

Then there is World War I. That war which lasted two years was a cost of 116,708 American deaths. And the death rate per year? 58,354. Trade unions and pacifists were against this war. Trade unions were initially against this war because they thought it could only mean workers getting killed in the interest of their bosses.

Then there is World War II. The rate of death for that war is 135,767 per year (407,300 deaths / 3 years). The isolationists like Charles Lindbergh thought that war was none of our business. Hitler was not bothering us. That changed when Hirohito bombed Pearl Harbor and Hitler declared war on America.

As you can see The Iraq War has the lowest rate of death. For those of you who think it is a waste of time because it costs money well all wars cost money. After all it is because of the Civil War Americans have to pay a national income tax. That is how Lincoln paid for the war.

If this "civil" war was just between the Shi'ites and the Sunnis then we might get away with cut-and-running like we did in Vietnam and Somalia. Or we could get away with moving the troops away from the fighting but leaving them in the country to guard the border and infrastructure. But there is third element that the drive-by-cloned-media does not mention a lot and that is Al Qaeda. This is not a pure civil war like the American Civil War. Al Qaeda is involved in it. Iran have sent their terrorists in it to. If we withdraw too soon, Saudi Arabia said they would send their Sunnis into the country. The whole thing would be more of a mess than it is now. It is not so much about making Iraq our friend, but to make it a buffer against terrorism. American national security is the issue and will always be the issue (it is too bad President Bush does not mention that enough when he gives his TV speeches. He needs to remind the American public that over and over again.) As Clinton might have said during his campaign: It's National Security stupid! Here is something to consider about the enemy (the Islamofascists) are not afraid to die, are patient, don't care about polls, and thrive when countries are unstable like Iraq (remember Afghanistan? It was unstable before we got rid of the terrorists. And they still are trying to cause trouble.) I wish the United Nations would help out in the war on terror but they won't until it is too late like it was almost too late when Hitler was conquering nations.