Rubicon

Death in Iraq: Day 1,838

Let us call things by their right names, especially in Iraq. The surge was an escalation. The drawdown is a chimera. The embassy is a fortress. Iraq is a charnel house.

And every day, many more people die, young and old, innocent and guilty, soldiers and civilians, Americans and Iraqis. Five years after the invasion, with mortar shells falling in the Green Zone, chaos and danger are unabated, and the total number of dead can only be estimated:

• more than 1,000,000 Iraqis, who continue to perish by the thousands every week
• 4,011 American military personnel, including 145 who died of self-inflicted wounds
• 309 other coalition military personnel
• more than 1,000 coalition contractors
• at least 157 journalists

Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, perhaps egged on by his recent visitor Dick Cheney, last week attacked the Mahdi Army in Basra, the country's second-largest city. But his fellow Shiites refused to lay down their arms. So George Bush, proclaiming "a defining moment in the history of a free Iraq," sent in American warplanes to help his puppet ruler. It was in vain, and Maliki had to send envoys to Iran, seeking out Muqtada al-Sadr to plead for peace. After he acceded to al-Sadr's terms (supported by the Iranian government), fighting died down. A defining moment indeed: another success for Iran, another defeat for Bush.

The occupation of death continues.

Remembering

On Memorial Day, we remember those who perished in war. All the victims—the guilty and the innocent, the powerful and the downtrodden, the soldiers and the civilians. Especially, this year, we remember those who have died in Iraq:

• approximately 800,000 Iraqis, who continue to perish at a rate of about 3,700 per week
• 3,454 American military personnel, dying recently at a rate of more than 30 per week
• 276 other coalition military personnel, about 2 per week
• 916 coalition contractors, about 9 per week
• at least 132 journalists, an average of 1 per week

Since the first flash of shock and awe in March 2003, the firestorm in Iraq has continued for 1,529 days, consuming hundreds of thousands of people. On Saturday, two US soldiers were killed by roadside bombs, one in Diyala province north of Baghdad and the second in the west of the capital; they have not yet been identified. On Sunday, two earlier American casualties were named:

The Department of Defense announced today the death of two soldiers who were supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom. They died May 23 in Al Nahrawan, Iraq, of wounds suffered when an improvised explosive device detonated near their vehicle.

They were assigned to 3d Squadron, 1st Cavalry Regiment, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division (Mechanized), Fort Benning, Ga.

Killed were:

Cpl. Victor H. Toledo Pulido, 22, of Hanford, Calif.

Cpl. Jonathan D. Winterbottom, 21, of Falls Church, Va.

Let us remember Victor and Jonathan.

Yesterday morning, 44 bodies were found in Baghdad, all apparent victims of sectarian violence. One other Iraqi civilian was identified by name:

Gunmen dragged noted calligrapher Khalil al-Zahawi from a car near his house in the mostly Shi'ite New Baghdad district and killed him, police said. Condemning the killing, the Sunni Muslim Scholars' Association called him the "sheikh" of Iraqi calligraphers.

Let us remember Khalil.

Too many people have died in Iraq. Too many continue to die every day. It is time for George Bush to order the troops home now.

Note: The vast majority of casualties are Iraqis, almost all innocent civilians. A thorough cluster sample survey published last year in The Lancet estimated that by July 2006 about 655,000 Iraqis had died as a result of the war; the carnage has worsened since that time, and I estimate that the total is now likely to be about 800,000. The military data are precise, and information about journalists is a good estimate; both sets are drawn from the Iraq Coalition Casualty Count. Contractor deaths are counted by the US Labor Department, as reported recently by CNN.

[Cross-posted at Scholars & Rogues]

Blaming the victims: those bad Iraqis

Everyone's looking for someone to blame for Iraq. Republican warmakers are especially desperate: their latest scapegoat is those bad Iraqis and the incompetent government they foolishly chose after George Bush granted them the wonders of democracy. Ungrateful wretches! We may have to give up on them!

The odious Mitch McConnell, Senate minority leader, trotted out this new line yesterday on CNN:

The Iraqi government is a huge disappointment.…

So far, they've not been able to do anything they promised on the political side. The oil revenue bill, not passed. Local elections, not passed. The de-Baathification effort, not passed. It's a growing frustration.

Republicans overwhelmingly feel disappointed about the Iraqi government.…

I don't know what their problem is but this country has made an enormous investment in giving the Iraqis a chance to have a normal government after all of these years of Saddam Hussein and his atrocities.

McConnell certainly wouldn't want to point a finger at anyone who started the war or failed to provide security or tortured innocent victims or killed noncombatants. American atrocities? Does not compute. Cognitive dissonance. Oxymoron. So McConnell is paving the way for guiltless departure: "I want to assure you, if they vote to ask us to leave, we'll be glad to comply with their request." Bad, bad Iraqis.

The people of Iraq did not choose to be ruled by Saddam Hussein, and most of them were certainly happy when he was defeated. After that, not so much. Those fingers of blame should be pointing directly at the American leaders who ignited civil war and created chaos:

• 800,000 Iraqis killed. The Lancet cluster sample survey—published last year by researchers from Johns Hopkins and Baghdad's Al Mustansiriya University—estimated that about 655,000 Iraqis died as a result of the war from March 2003 to July 2006, an average of 533 per day. At the same rate of excess mortality (an optimistic assumption), the toll is now probably over 800,000.

• One in eight Iraqi children killed. The child mortality rate in Iraq has increased by 150 percent since 1990, as a result of two wars, intervening sanctions, and the occupation. Save the Children reports: "Some 122,000 Iraqi children died in 2005 before reaching their fifth birthday. More than half of these deaths were among newborn babies in the first month of life." Tony Blair actually justified the invasion on the basis of child deaths caused by sanctions. The statistics are now even worse.

• Two million refugees and 1.7 million internally displaced persons. The total population of Iraq is about 27 million; 7.4 percent have fled the country, and 6.3 percent have had to move within Iraq. Equivalent disruption in the United States would affect 40 million Americans. The middle class is especially affected: about 40 percent have left Iraq. The US has admitted a grand total of 68 Iraqi refugees in the last seven months.

Republicans like McConnell are so averse to accepting responsibility for these atrocities that they have begun to blame the victims. Burn down someone's house, take away his job, kill his first-born, and then accuse him of insufficient alacrity in creating a new life. That's the Republican bootstrap way.

Unfortunately, I hear hints of such displaced guilt in the statements of some Democrats too. There is no need for such moral calisthenics. It's time for all Americans to accept our share of the blame, pledge billions for real reconstruction, and leave Iraq. Now.

[Cross-posted at Scholars & Rogues]

Mass Murder: Virginia and Iraq

The murders at Virginia Tech are sad beyond words. The hostile outsider, the missed chances to stop him, the readily available weapons, the innocent victims gunned down methodically in cold blood. We all mourn the horrific loss and try to think of ways to keep it from ever happening again.

In Iraq, many people die every day, far more (day after day) than died on Monday in Blacksburg.

When George Bush spoke in Blacksburg on Tuesday, he allowed us a rare glimpse of his human feelings. He almost sounded as though he meant the words he said, and that's unusual lately, as he retreats more and more into an impermeable bubble.

When Harry Reid compared Iraq to Vietnam yesterday, Bush bristled as though he had never heard the comparison. And he promised that nothing would change.

In his Virginia Tech speech, Bush's sympathies were carefully modulated and tightly focused. It was all about comforting abstractions: "hearts full of sorrow" and "day of sadness" and "time of anguish." And, of course, "the grace and guidance of a loving God," imagined as an all-powerful being who somehow had no power to avert evil but remains available to provide "comfort" afterward. No wonder Bush is led to conclude, "It's impossible to make sense of such violence and suffering." He can't make any sense of it. The specific events and their possible causes are beyond him. Evil just rains down on us, and there's nothing we can do about it.

Except pray—and draw the wagons into a circle around a fearful "community." (Who's outside that circle, threatening us? Terrorists? Frenchmen? Liberals who want to limit our personal firepower? Koreans? Maybe it's those English majors.) Trust in God, trust in the president, who's a good "dad." Patriarchy and business as usual. In short: Don't worry, my little ones, but do be afraid.

Of course, it is good to mourn for the victims in Blacksburg. It's good to seek solace from friends. But it's also essential to make sense of the causes for violence; else we have no hope of  keeping it from happening again. The job of civil servants like the president is to search for reasons and propose remedies, but that's more than we can expect from Bush. There was something bathetic, unctuous, almost bizarrely narcissistic, about his speech Tuesday—particularly in contrast to his lack of sympathy for the hundreds of thousands of victims of the Iraq War. And that's one catastrophe we do know the reasons for, beginning with the misguided invasion and the feckless occupation.

The day after Bush's appearance, nearly ten times as many people died violently in Iraq as died on that terrible morning at Virginia Tech. And scores more, hundred more, die every day. Juan Cole summarized yesterday's toll:

Nearly 300 persons were killed or found dead in Iraq on Wednesday and hundreds were wounded.  Al-Hayat writes in Arabic that the smell of blood and gunpowder wafted through Baghdad on Wednesday. In the capital alone, Sunni Arab guerrillas carried out five horrific bombings in Shiite neighborhoods that, with some mortar attacks and shootings, killed around 200 persons and wounded many more.

The morning began with a guerrilla bombing of a police checkpoint at the gate to the Shiite slum of Sadr City, which killed 41.

Then the terrorists opened the gates of hell, carefully placing high explosives in a Shiite market and detonating them as workers gathered to take minibuses home after a hard day's work. The blast incinerated or tore apart some 140 persons and injured 150 more, according to Reuters.

Al-Hayat says: "Eyewitnesses said that furious citizens, who busied themselves with collecting bodies charred by the horrific explosion and gathering body parts spread over an area of fifty years, threw stones and the rubble produced by the explosion at a joint American/Iraqi force that came to the market, forcing it to withdraw before this demonstration of popular rage."

Peddlers in the market put their wooden trolleys to work as ambulances for the wounded.

There were reports of children being pulled alive from beneath the charred corpses of their relatives.

Let us, by all means, mourn the dead in Blacksburg. But let us mourn also the dead in Iraq, where the only meaningful "surge" is the surge in mass murder.

Bush's war of choice has now continued for 1,491 days—four months longer than the US fought in World War II. There is no end in sight. As of today, these are the numbers of the dead:

• more than 650,000 Iraqis
• 3,315 American military personnel
• 268 other coalition military personnel
• at least 393 coalition contractors
• at least 126 journalists

As long as American troops remain, this wholesale slaughter will continue. When they leave, there is some chance the civil war will begin to wind down.

Stop the mass murder in Iraq. Bring the troops home now.

[Cross-posted at Scholars & Rogues]

Death by Procrastination

The US has lost the Iraq War. But we do not know how long the defeat will be prolonged or how many more people will die.

If George Bush has his way, this war will drag on for many years. But Democrats have a plan to halt the carnage, and they passed it yesterday in the House, 218–212. Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her fellow representatives wrote a requirement into Bush's "emergency" military appropriations bill, requiring that occupying American troops begin to leave Iraq by March 2008 and complete their retreat by August 2008.

The Democratic timetable for withdrawal is unfortunately timid, but it seems to be the best the House can pass this month. As the war continues to claim more victims, week by week, opposition will certainly increase, and timetables will become more stringent. But for now, the Senate cannot even do as well as the House, and Bush (of course) will veto any withdrawal, even though it is what most Americans want.

Barbara Lee, the courageous member of Congress who represents Berkeley and Oakland, voted against the bill as insufficient, though she had agreed earlier in the week not to fight for its defeat. She released this statement:

While as a matter of conscience I cast my vote against the funding, I hope that this passage of this bill marks the beginning of the end of the Iraq war, but the real fight still lies ahead.  Congress will continue to have to confront the issue of this war and occupation, and I am committed to continuing to push to fully fund the safe withdrawal of our troops from Iraq at the earliest practicable date and for timelines for withdrawal that are backed up by the appropriations power that the Constitution grants to Congress.

The bill is a first step. Let us hope that stronger steps follow soon.

Bush's war of choice has now continued for 1,465 days, and these are the numbers of the dead:

• about 655,000 Iraqis
• 3,234 American military personnel
• 258 other coalition military personnel
• at least 389 coalition contractors
• at least 124 journalists

Let us imagine that the House bill were to be passed by the Senate and signed by Bush. We could then begin to estimate how many more deaths this procrastination might entail. If casualties were to continue at the current rate until March 1, 2008 (the date by which withdrawal must begin), then ramp downward until August 31, 2008 (the end date in the bill), and after that miraculously cease, additional deaths in Iraq would still be likely to exceed 200,000:

• about 195,000 Iraqis, for an estimated total of some 850,000
• 960 American military, for a total of about 4,200
• only a few dozen additional coalition military (since most of the coalition forces have already withdrawn or will do so soon), for a total of perhaps 300
• more than 100 contractors, for about 500
• 35 or so journalists, for a total of 160

These figures, unfortunately, are unrealistically low, because Republicans will keep the House bill from becoming law, because Bush is escalating to put more American troops in danger, and because the sectarian violence sparked in large part by the American presence is also escalating.

Impeach George Bush. Impeach Dick Cheney. Indict the murderers.

Death in Iraq, Day 1,365

As of today, the United States has been fighting the Iraq War as long as it fought World War II. From the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor December 7, 1941, to the formal surrender ceremony aboard the USS Missouri September 2, 1945, was 1,365 days, not quite 45 months. From the US attack on Iraq March 20, 2003, to today—December 14, 2006—is 1,365 days.

World War II ended in less than 4 years, but the Iraq War continues to intensify, and it may well continue for 5, 6, 7 years, or even longer. In 1945, the US and its many allies won World War II against the formidable Axis powers. In 2007 (or perhaps 2010), the US will be left almost completely alone by the time it finally pulls out of Iraq, defeated by the weakest member of the "Axis of Evil."

George Bush won't consider withdrawal, because that would constitute an admission he made a mistake in the most important decision of his presidency—that would mean he was unable to achieve victory. Bush's war is more like the quagmire of Vietnam than like "the good war." Richard Cohen puts it this way in the Washington Post:

As with Vietnam, the ending is inevitable. We will get out, and the only question that remains is whether we get out with 3,000 dead or 4,000 or 5,000. At some point the American people will not countenance, and Congress will not support, a war that cannot be won. Just how many lives will be wasted in what we all know is a wasted effort is about the only question still left on the table. Realism dictates as few as possible.

Every day Bush prolongs the war, more people die. Needlessly. As of today, these are the numbers of the dead:

• about 655,000 Iraqis
• 2,937 American military personnel
• 247 other coalition military personnel
• at least 376 coalition contractors
• at least 118 journalists

And in Afghanistan, 356 American soldiers, 158 other coalition soldiers, and tens of thousands of Afghans have died.

George Bush and Dick Cheney are responsible for every one of those deaths. They chose to lie to the American people, to ignore the United Nations, and to attack Iraq on false pretenses and without adequate planning. They are guilty of deceit, fraud, negligence, aggression, illegal detention, torture, and crimes against humanity. They should be impeached and removed from office. Without delay.

Death in Iraq: Day 1,321

How do you ask a man to be the last man to die in Vietnam? How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?
           —John Kerry, 1971

During October 2006, 103 American troops died in Iraq. Since George Bush invaded the country 44 months ago, only 3 other months saw more American fatalities. Four other coalition troops died this month, too. So far this year, 636 American military personnel and 38 other coalition forces have died, 22 of them from the United Kingdom. Today the Department of Defense released information about one Marine:

Lance Cpl. Troy D. Nealey, 24, of Eaton Rapids, Mich., died Oct. 29 while conducting combat operations in Al Anbar province, Iraq.  He was assigned to Marine Forces Reserve’s 1st Battalion, 24th Marine Regiment, 4th Marine Division, Lansing, Mich.

During October 2006, at least 7 and perhaps as many as 10 American troops died in Afghanistan. (Three coalition deaths were confirmed today, but their names and nationalities were not known.) At least 7 other coalition troops died this month too, 5 of them Canadians. So far this year, 87 American military personnel and 91 other coalition forces have died. Today the DoD released information about one soldier:

Staff Sgt. Kyu H. Chay, 34, of Fayetteville, N.C., died on Oct. 28 in the Oruzgan Province, Afghanistan, from injuries suffered when an improvised explosive device detonated near his combat patrol.  Chay was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 3rd Special Forces Group (Airborne), Fort Bragg, North Carolina.

During October 2006, no one knows how many Iraqis and Afghans died. Large sections of both countries are suffering from random violence, anarchy, and civil war. It is therefore impossible to determine with any accuracy the number of casualties, but the total is certainly several thousand every month. Reuters news service gathered these scattered reports of deaths in Iraq during a single day, October 31. It is far from comprehensive:

Oct 31 (Reuters) - Following are security and other developments in Iraq as of 1650 GMT on Tuesday.

FALLUJA - A roadside bomb killed one policeman and one civilian in the western city of Falluja, 50 km (30 miles) west of Baghdad, police said. Two civilians were also wounded.

TAL AFAR - Four "terrorists" and one Iraqi army lieutenant were killed during a raid on a building used by militants in the northern town of Tal Afar, about 420 km (260 miles) north of Baghdad, the Iraqi army said.…

BAGHDAD - A car bomb ripped through a wedding procession in the northeastern district of Ur in Baghdad, killing 15 people, including four children, Interior Ministry and police said.

TARMIYA - More than 40 people were missing after gunmen ambushed minibuses travelling to Baghdad near Tarmiya, 30 km (20 miles), north of the capital, a spokesman for the Joint Coordination Center for Iraqi and U.S. forces in the northern city of Tikrit said.

NEAR SUWAYRA - The bodies of five gunmen were found in an orchard which was the scene of clashes between gunmen and the police several days ago near the town of Suwayra, 40 km (25 miles) south of Baghdad, police said.

SUWAYRA - The bodies of three people were recovered from the Tigris river in Suwayra, police said.

BAQUBA - The bodies of eight people were found, bound and gagged, in Baquba, police said. All the victims were shot in the head.

BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb targeting a police patrol killed a policeman and wounded three others near the southern Doura district of Baghdad, an Interior Ministry source said.

BAQUBA - Clashes between gunmen and police left a policeman dead and three others wounded in Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.

BAQUBA - Gunmen suspected of belonging to a militia run by Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, shot and wounded the owners of two shops in Baquba, police said.

FALLUJA - An Iraqi army soldier died in clashes with gunmen in the Sunni city of Falluja, police said.

TAL AFAR - Four gunmen and an Iraqi army soldier were killed in clashes in the northern town of Tal Afar, police said.…

BAGHDAD - A car bomb killed three civilians and wounded 10 others in northeastern Baghdad, an Interior Ministry source said.

A recent study published in The Lancet determined that approximately 655,000 Iraqis have died as a result of the war. Bush and his apologists have expressed doubts about its accuracy. The BBC recently interviewed Les Roberts, a co-author of the study, and he addressed those doubts in great detail. The terrible carnage continues. Roberts estimates that in addition to the 300 deaths that occur each day in Iraq from natural causes, 500 "extra" deaths occur each day, mostly from violence.

George Bush opened this Pandora's Box, and he has no plan to close it. Brad DeLong has the appropriate response, and he backs it up with copious evidence:

Impeach George W. Bush. Impeach him now. Not after the election. Not after the situation deteriorates further. Impeach George W. Bush for failing to faithfully execute the laws. Impeach George W. Bush now for what he has done to Iraq. Impeach George W. Bush now so that we can have a chance of fixing this total disaster:

Evidence of Marie Colvin
Evidence of Anthony Shadid
Evidence of Steven D.
Evidence of Fareed Zakaria

As of today, these are the numbers of the dead:

• about 650,000 Iraqis
• 2,816 American military personnel
• 239 other coalition military personnel
• at least 367 coalition contractors
• at least 112 journalists

And in Afghanistan, 346 American soldiers, 157 other coalition soldiers, and tens of thousands of Afghans have died.

I'm sick and tired of a bunch of despicable Republicans who will not debate real policy, who won't take responsibility for their own mistakes, standing up and trying to make other people the butt of those mistakes. It disgusts me that a bunch of these Republican hacks who've never worn the uniform of our country are willing to lie about those who did.
           —John Kerry, 2006

Death in Iraq: Day 1,300

Six hundred thousand Iraqis died violently in the 40 months after the American invasion of March 2003, approximately 2.5% of the country's total population. This shockingly high estimate, much higher than any previous estimate, is based on a thorough, statistically rigorous "cluster sample" of 1,849 households scattered around Iraq, and it measures only those deaths that would not have occurred in peacetime. The complete study, conducted by Iraqi doctors this summer under the auspices of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, will be published in the British medical journal The Lancet on October 14. (Correction, 10/11: the study has now been published. This post is based principally on Neil King's report in the Wall Street Journal, via Brad DeLong.)

The 600,000 figure contrasts with George Bush's unscientific estimate last December that 30,000 had died (in 33 months) and also with the earlier Lancet study of November 2004 that 100,000 had died (in just 18 months). The Iraqi doctors collected information for the new survey over the 12 months before the invasion as well as the 40 months since, and they saw death certificates for 92% of reported deaths.

For statistical purposes, the sample size is very large, much larger (for example) than typical national voter polls in the US, which sample about 1,000 to 1,200 individual respondents. (Update, 10/11) The sample size for this study is 12,801 persons—in a country one-twelfth the population of the US. The data-gathering and estimation techniques are quite reliable; according to one of the lead researchers, Gilbert Burnham of Johns Hopkins, "This is a standard methodology that the U.S. government and others have encouraged groups to use in developing countries."

To put the 2.5% figure in perspective, 600,000 dead Iraqis is equivalent to 7.5 million dead Americans. That is very close to the total population of New York City (8 million). It is as though the 3,000 who died on 9/11/2001, killed spectacularly on that day by non-Iraqi terrorists, were but the beginning of a continuous slaughter of nearly every person in the city—picked off one by one and fifty by fifty—by snipers, IEDs, bombs, and all-out attacks over an excruciating three and a half years. Imagine such a horror, and you will have some inkling of what it is to live in Iraq today.

The US-led coalition forces were directly involved in 31% of the deaths, according to the survey. In response, Lt Col Mark Ballesteros, a Defense Department spokesman, protested that "the coalition takes enormous precautions to prevent civilian deaths and injuries." It is not surprising that the majority of Americans no longer trust their government.

The other 69%, of course, would not have occurred if the US had not invaded. Saddam Hussein was a ruthless dictator: over the course of 20 years, he killed perhaps as many as 290,000 people, according to a Human Rights Watch estimate—that's a rate of 1,200 deaths a month. The US invasion and consequent civil war have killed twice as many people in a much shorter period of time, at a rate of 15,000 deaths a month. It is not surprising that the majority of Iraqis want the American forces to leave.

Read the Journal article here, and read the complete Lancet study here.

As of today, these are the numbers of the dead:

• about 600,000 Iraqis
• 2,751 American military personnel
• 237 other coalition military personnel
• at least 355 coalition contractors
• at least 100 journalists

And in Afghanistan too, the carnage continues: 341 American soldiers, 150 other coalition soldiers, and uncounted thousands—perhaps tens of thousands—of Afghans have died.

Death in Iraq: Day 1,280

George Bush keeps saying that things are getting better in Iraq. He's lying.

General John Abizaid says there will be no US troop withdrawals before the middle of next year.

Over 6,000 people died in the civil war during July and August, a 13% increase over the previous two-month period. Today, about 50 people died, including two American soldiers.

The Pentagon has found that 75% of Sunnis in Iraq now support the insurgency. In 2003, it was 14%.

A New York Times/CBS News poll found that 84% of American respondents believe that Bush is either hiding something when he talks about how things are going in Iraq or that he is mostly lying.

As of today, these are the numbers of the dead:

• 2,691 American military personnel
• 233 other coalition military personnel
• at least 351 coalition contractors
• more than 100,000 Iraqi civilians—at least 43,269 deaths have been fully documented in online media reports
• about 9,000 Iraqi military (during the invasion)
• at least 100 journalists

And in Afghanistan, 339 American soldiers and 143 other coalition soldiers have died.

Death in Iraq: Day 1,246

The Iraq War has now lasted longer than the conflict between Germany and the United States in World War Two, which began with a declaration of war on December 11, 1941, and ended with the German surrender on V-E Day, May 8, 1945—a total of 1,245 inclusive days.

The Iraq War has been going on for 1,246 inclusive day, since the invasion began on March 20, 2003, and it is nowhere near a conclusion. Thanks to George Bush's delusional incompetence, it is now a full-scale civil war, and more Iraqis died last month than in any previous month of the war. It was madly conceived and abysmally executed, and Bush refuses to consider any significant change in his feckless policies. There will be many more deaths, Iraqi and American, before this war ends.

As of today, these are the numbers of the dead:

• 2,602 American military personnel
• 230 other coalition military personnel
• at least 344 coalition contractors
• more than 100,000 Iraqi civilians—at least 40,094 deaths have been fully documented in online media reports
• about 9,000 Iraqi military (during the invasion)
• at least 96 journalists

And in Afghanistan, 327 American soldiers and 108 other coalition soldiers have died.