[Peace-discuss] Is the U.S. Responsible for the Death of Nearly a Million Iraqis?

[Robert Naiman]

Is the U.S. Responsible for the Death of Nearly a Million Iraqis?
Robert Naiman, Just Foreign Policy, July 11, 2007
[version with links here:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-naiman/is-the-us-responsible-f_b_55752.html]

This week and next the Senate is considering amendments to the FY 2008
authorization for the Pentagon, an authorization that includes more
money for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Some of the proposed
amendments would try to force the Bush Administration to end the Iraq
war. A few more Senate Republicans have rhetorically broken ranks with
the Administration, and the question of the hour is whether they will
put their votes where their mouths are and vote for a timetable for
the withdrawal of U.S. troops or other measures that would force the
Administration to move towards ending the war.

This week, the Congressional Research Service put the financial cost
of the war in Iraq at $10 billion a month. The New York Times
editorialized that "It is time for the United States to leave Iraq,
without any more delay than the Pentagon needs to organize an orderly
exit."

A key question is missing from this debate. How many Iraqis have died
as a result of the U.S. invasion? The New York Times editorial is
silent on this matter.

In a scientific study published last fall in the prestigious medical
journal The Lancet, researchers from Johns Hopkins estimated that
650,000 Iraqis had died because of our government's invasion of their
country. The survey that produced that estimate was completed in July,
2006. That was a year ago.

Unfortunately, despite the calls of the Lancet authors for other
studies, there has been no systematic effort to update these results.

Just Foreign Policy has attempted to update the Lancet estimate in the
best way we know. We have extrapolated from the Lancet estimate, using
the trend provided by the tally of Iraqi deaths reported in Western
media compiled by Iraq Body Count. Our current estimate is that
974,000 Iraqis have died as a result of the U.S. invasion. The web
counter and fuller explanation are here.

The Iraqi death toll resulting from the U.S. invasion is a key fact.
We cannot make intelligent and moral choices about U.S. foreign policy
while ignoring such a key fact. It has implications for our choices in
Iraq, for our choices in dealing with Iran, for our choices about the
size of the U.S. military (for why do our leaders want to expand the
U.S. military, except to have the capacity to invade other countries?)

The exact toll will never be known. But this is no reason not to
attempt to know what the best estimate is. We also don't know many
other key facts with certainty. We don't know how many people live in
the U.S. The census department creates an estimate, and this estimate
is the basis of policy.

The Johns Hopkins researchers used the methods accepted all over the
world to estimate deaths in the wake of war and natural disasters. The
United Nations, for example, uses them to plan famine relief. Even the
Bush administration relies on them when it accuses Sudan of genocide
in Darfur. At present, this represents the best information we have.

As Congress considers legislative efforts to end the war, best
estimates of the Iraqi death toll must be part of the debate.