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FORT CAMPBELL, Kentucky — The highest-ranking military officer in the United States on Monday told soldiers, including many bound for Afghanistan, that he expects casualties to rise next year as additional U.S. troops pour into the war.

ABOARD USS NIMITZ IN THE INDIAN OCEAN, Nov. 16, 2009 – Two soldiers working deep inside this aircraft carrier serve as liaisons between the aviators of Carrier Air Wing 11 and coalition forces on the ground in Afghanistan. Army Maj. Johnnie Gallegos and Army Sgt. 1st Class Percy Patterson joined Nimitz Carrier Strike Group as ground liaison officers when Nimitz entered the U.S. 5th Fleet area of operations. Their work directly supports a tactical directive issued in July by Army Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, commander of coalition forces in Afghanistan, that places limitations on the use of force that could...

This sobering report comes from the Washington Post: More than 1,000 American troops have been wounded in battle over the past three months in Afghanistan, accounting for one-fourth of all those injured in combat since the U.S.-led invasion in 2001. The dramatic increase has filled military hospitals with more amputees and other seriously injured service members and comes as October marks the deadliest month for American troops in Afghanistan. How many were killed or lost a limb, I wonder, while the president dithered and delayed implementing the recommendations of his hand-picked general?

Late last week, in the dead of night. President Obama made an unannounced trip to Dover, Delaware, where he was photographed saluting some flag-covered coffins that were coming in from Afghanistan. There were 18 coffins on this day. And afterwards, Obama said that this experience “would influence his decision” on troop levels and future policies in the war in that Afghanistan. Well, first I fault the press. I’ve been saying for years that reporting on war casualties, in Iraq, Afghanistan, or wherever, is defective. The national importance of casualties should be gauged by relative casualties in other, American wars. It’s...

Alaska-based paratroopers are making considerable progress in counter-insurgency efforts aimed at protecting civilians in Afghanistan and developing the local economy in the three provinces in which they operate, their commander says. In the seventh month of their one-year deployment, the soldiers of the 4th Brigade Combat Team (Airborne) of the 25th Infantry Division, based at Fort Richardson, have cut civilian casualties from attacks by the Taliban and other insurgents by nearly 50 percent, said Col. Michael Howard. At the same time, despite an overall rise in U.S. combat deaths in Afghanistan over the last year, the number of soldiers killed...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 1, 2009 – Members of NATO’s International Security Assistance Force met with village elders today after reports that civilians, including women and children, had been killed in an engagement between ISAF forces and insurgents yesterday in the Nad Ali district of Afghanistan’s Helmand province. After extensive fighting with insurgents at a compound in Nad Ali district yesterday, ISAF aircraft dropped a single precision-guided bomb on the insurgents’ position. Following the engagement, ISAF officials received reports of civilian casualties, and a number of civilians with injuries reported to ISAF troops. They were given immediate medical attention or were transported...

Civilian causalities from NATO bombings in Afghanistan represent: Deliberate war crimes Inadvertent but avoidable An inevitable byproduct of a just war Overblown Click on "English" - upper left - scroll down a bit - on the right.

Asked about the problems Obama is facing in Afghanistan, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs went to his tried and anything-but-true playbook of demagoguery, saying: "You can't under-resource the most important part of our War on Terror - you can't under-resource that for five, or six, or seven years.....and hope to snap your fingers and have that turn around in a few months." It's all Bush's fault. That's pretty much all you have to know about the Obama administration's political strategy, in a nutshell. Gibb's by now completely expected demagoguery doesn't account for why Barack Obama has already lost more...

POTUS and his golf clubs departed the White House grounds at 12:05 and arrived at the Ft. Belvoir club house at 12:37. Motorcade artfully zig-zagged through near-standstill traffic and past several unyielding motorists for the last quarter mile on I-95 southbound. Pool holding at base food court, under a haze of Cinnabon fumes. Temperature 80 degrees under partly cloudy skies. Adriel Bettelheim CQ

A missile strike in Iraq Thursday killed three Minnesota soldiers, all members of the National Guard's 34th Red Bull Infantry Division, family and friends said Friday. One of those killed near Basra was Carlos Wilcox, 27, of Cottage Grove, whose mother said her son asked her to mail him books so he could study for a medical school entrance exam when he got home. "He knew that God had called him to be a soldier and a doctor," said Charlene Wilcox. Dan Drevnick, 22, a graduate of Woodbury High School, was also killed in the attack. The third soldier, James...

]-->Army Sgt. Jennifer Watson, non-commissioned officer-in-charge of the Casualty Liaison Team at Joint Base Balad, stands in Hero's Highway. Each patient brought via helicopter to the Air Force Theater Hospital passes through Hero's Highway. Watson, a native of Peru, Ind., is deployed here from Fort Campbell, Ky. Photo by Staff Sgt. Dilia Ayala, 332nd Air Expeditionary Wing. JOINT BASE BALAD — The emergency-room trauma call and the medical staff's immediate action upon his arrival is only a memory to her now; sitting quietly at the bedside of her brother-in-arms, she carefully takes his hand, thanking him for his service and...

WASHINGTON, July 8, 2009 – Bright blue skies above the National Mall today belied the solemnity of the ceremony commemorating the first two American combat casualties of the Vietnam War. U.S. Army Master Sgt. Chester Ovnand and Maj. Dale Buis were the first two U.S. servicemembers killed in the Vietnam War. Their sacrifice was honored in Washington, D.C., Jyly 8, 2009, in a ceremony commemorating the 50th Anniversary of their deaths. DoD photo by U.S. Army Sgt. 1st Class Michael J. Carden   (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. “On this date 50 years ago, two men lost their lives...

WASHINGTON, June 24, 2009 – A former commander of the District of Columbia National Guard and his wife were among the nine people killed in the June 22 collision of two Metro subway trains here, officials announced yesterday. Retired Air Force Maj. Gen. David F. Wherley Jr. and his wife, Ann, were among nine people killed in a train collision on Washington D.C.'s Metro subway system June 22, 2009. The general commanded the District of Columbia National Guard for five years. Photo courtesy of the District of Columbia National Guard   (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. Retired Air Force...

WASHINGTON, June 18, 2009 – The United States and NATO must do everything possible to prevent civilian casualties in Afghanistan, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said here today. Video Gates said NATO defense ministers stressed this point during meetings in Brussels last week. “It is clear that we need to do much more to overcome what I believe is one of our greatest strategic vulnerabilities,” Gates said during a Pentagon news conference. “The Afghan people must be reassured that U.S. and NATO forces are there as friends, partners and, along with Afghan security forces, they're protectors as well.” The...

Of the total of 91,358 Iraqi civilian deaths from armed violence recorded for this period, we excluded 10,027 deaths from prolonged violence (e.g., the two sieges of Fallujah and prolonged episodes of violence during the invasion of March 20, 2003, through April 30, 2003), and 20,850 deaths recorded only in aggregate reports from morgues and hospitals, since these deaths were not reliably linked to specific events of a weapon's use.

KABUL, Afghanistan, Feb. 21, 2009 – An investigation into a Feb. 17 coalition air strike in Afghanistan’s Heart province has confirmed that 13 noncombatants and three enemy fighters were killed, military officials reported. Army Brig. Gen. Michael A. Ryan of U.S. Forces Afghanistan offers his condolences Feb. 20, 2009, to families of those killed during an operation targeting insurgents three days earlier in Afghanistan’s Herat province. U.S. Army photo  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. A combined Afghan National Army and coalition forces investigation team, accompanied by international observers, inspected the site this week to determine the identities of...

In other cases, civilians are simply used as cannon fodder or human shields. Reports out of Gaza say residents who attempted to flee their homes in the northern area of the Strip were forced to go back at gunpoint, by Hamas men.

Mumbai: At least 15 people have been injured in gunfights between two groups in at least three places in Mumbai on Thursday night. Details are sketchy but it is believed that two gangs fired at each other at outside CST Railway Terminus, Hotel Oberoi and the popular Café Leopold restaurant in Mumbai. The first shooting took place near the CST police station

KABUL, Afghanistan, Nov. 9, 2008 – Afghan government officials and Afghan and coalition forces traveled Nov. 6 to the Shah Wali Kot district of Afghanistan’s Kandahar province to investigate claims of civilian casualties in recent operations. Results of the joint investigation to date indicate 37 civilians were killed and 35 others were wounded in a battle after a combined Afghan and coalition patrol was ambushed in the village. The combined forces met with village elders in Wech Baghtu to discuss the Nov. 3 battle. Village elders told the joint investigation team that insurgents who were not from their village came...

WASHINGTON, Nov. 6, 2008 – Coalition, NATO International Security Assistance Force and Afghan officials are investigating possible civilian casualties during incidents in Afghanistan yesterday and Nov. 3, military officials reported. The incident yesterday occurred while forces were responding to an insurgent ambush on a route-clearance patrol in the Ghormach district of Badghis province. "The coalition, ISAF and Afghan authorities are investigating reports of noncombatant casualties in the Ghormach district last night," said Army Col. Greg Julian, a U.S. Forces Afghanistan spokesman. "We do not know all the facts at this time, but we will investigate this situation to get to...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 8, 2008 – As a follow-on investigation into an operation by Afghan National Army and U.S. forces in western Afghanistan that claimed civilian lives nears completion, a senior defense official here emphasized the U.S. military’s strong record of accountability and follow-through. “No other military in the world goes to a greater extent to prevent civilian casualties,” said Bryan Whitman, deputy assistant secretary of defense for public affairs. “This is something that we take very seriously, and when we have allegations of loss of innocent life, we investigate it.” At issue is an Aug. 22 air strike against...

KABUL, Afghanistan, Sept. 17, 2008 – Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates today offered Afghan President Hamid Karzai condolences and his personal regrets for the recent loss of innocent lives as a result of coalition air strikes. "While no military has ever done more to prevent civilian casualties, it is clear that we have to work even harder," the secretary said during a news conference at the American embassy here. The secretary met with Karzai and other defense leaders at the Rose Palace. An air strike in Sindand, a town in Herat province, allegedly killed large numbers of innocent Afghans. U.S....

Forgotten But Not Gone by: Rachel Paulk, June 12, 2008 Afghanistan remains a country of significant U.S. involvement without receiving the critical coverage typical of American action in the Middle East. In actuality, the fledgling nation is transforming into arguably the only successful example of a democratizing country attributable to the Bush administration. Due to the 9/11 backlash, the war with Afghanistan began with relatively strong public support in October of 2001. Kabul fell by November 2001, effectively destroying the Taliban base of operations, though not eliminating the group in its entirety. By January of 2004, Afghanistan’s first constitution was...

The Iraq war American KIA are the lowest since the war began. 19 so far this month. Bear in mind that we still have 3 days left in the month. But the only month that even comes close is February, 2004 when there were 20 American KIA.

Details sketchy but massive tornadoes have it towns in IA this are reports from scanners and spotters..no link yet also north suburbs of Min-ST paul MN has taken tornado hits with lots of damage MN MIN| Washington County (Hugo)| Search & Rescue| | US-61 IAO 159th St|U/D: MSP on Fenway St w/2 kids full code, many other reports of entrapment, 5 city blocks wiped out| ILL113| 17:26 MIN| Washington County (Hugo)| Search & Rescue| | 170th St @ Manning Trail|Multiple houses struck by tornado, searches in progress, FD O/S| ILL113| 17:10 QUOTE MIN| Washington County (Hugo)| Search & Rescue| |...

Four thousand American soldiers have died in Iraq. This is the true story of how one of them came home.

The newspapers are predictably filled with articles about how 52 U.S. soldiers died in Iraq last month – the highest toll since September. Iraqi civilian casualties are also said to be at the highest level since August. These losses are being used to cast aspersions on claims of progress in Iraq. Even one death is too many and 52 deaths is tragedy multiplied 52-fold. But let's keep some perspective. As the icasualties.org website makes clear, for better or worse, April was still one of the lighter-casualty months during the long war in Iraq. More important, casualties cannot be looked at...

In mid-2006, the media was obsessed with the fact that the number of U.S. casualties in Iraq had reached 2,500, a number repeatedly referred to as a “grim milestone” and a “tragic benchmark.” By the end of that year, the casualty count had reached 3,000 and the headlines were once again full of catchphrases about the mounting cost in blood and treasure. Now, just about a quarter of the way through 2008, we have suffered our 4,000th casualty in Iraq. As expected, the media seized the opportunity to run headlines expressing shock and anger at the death toll, and some...

WASHINGTON, March 24, 2008 – The U.S. military passed a sad milestone today: the 4,000th U.S. death in operations in Iraq. “Every single loss of a soldier, sailor, airman or Marine is keenly felt by us in the department, by military commanders, by families and friends both in theater and at home,” Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said during an informal news conference today. Whitman stressed that no casualty is more significant than another. “Each soldier, Marine, sailor or airmen is equally precious, and each loss of life is equally tragic,” he said. Whitman called attention to the sacrifices by coalition...

WASHINGTON, March 23, 2008 – Afghan national security forces, assisted by coalition forces, killed more than a dozen insurgents March 21 when the combined force foiled a Taliban ambush in Afghanistan’s Oruzgan province, military officials said. “The combined force was conducting a security patrol north of the Deh Rahwood district to demonstrate the government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan’s commitment to secure remote areas in the province,” said Army Maj. Chris Belcher, coalition forces spokesman. Insurgents in concealed fighting positions attacked the patrol with rocket-propelled grenades and small-arms fire, officials said. Afghan national security forces and coalition forces returned...

I asked Col. Bruce T Smith for a legal opinion on what restrictions or laws Israel is subject to in its self defense and included the opinion in my post Bomb Gaza. Win the War.In sum: Israel is free to employ ALL munitions, tactics, equipment and personnel in her arsenal to defend herself against the outlaw Hamas terrorist organization. Short of the intentional targeting and murder of truly uninvolved and innocent civilians, Israel can (and should) operate as freely as she desires to protect her territorial sovereignty and the lives of her citizens. What could be clearer. Just the other...

In case someone tells you our casualties in Iraq are still high, because 2007 was the worst year, I put together the following two graphs. The first show US losses by month in terms of average lost per day. The second shows a rolling three-month average, smoothing out the variations somewhat. The three-month average is now lower than at any other time since the war began.

WASHINGTON - The U.S. death toll in Iraq increased in January, ending a four-month drop in casualties, and most of the deaths occurred outside Baghdad or the once-restive Al-Anbar province, according to military statistics. In all, 38 American service members had been reported killed in January by Thursday evening, compared with 23 in December. Of those, 33 died from hostile action, but only nine of them in Baghdad or Al-Anbar. A total of 3,942 American service members have been killed in Iraq as of Thursday, according to icasualties.org, an independent Web site that tracks the statistics. U.S. officials in Iraq...

BAGHDAD, Feb. 3, 2008 – Civilians and servicemembers gathered at Al Faw Palace here Feb. 1 to reflect on the cost of war and pay their last respects to fallen warriors during a Multinational Corps Iraq end-of-tour memorial ceremony. The ceremony honored those killed and wounded while the U.S. Army’s 3rd Corps was the maneuver command element from December 2006 to February 2008. Multinational Corps Iraq Commander Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno said the ceremony was a time to reflect on the bravery and selfless service of men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice in Iraq. “These individuals are...

Further survey work undertaken by ORB, in association with its research partner IIACSS, confirms our earlier estimate that over 1,000,000 Iraqi citizens have died as a result of the conflict which started in 2003. Following responses to ORB’s earlier work, which was based on survey work undertaken in primarily urban locations, we have conducted almost 600 additional interviews in rural communities. By and large the results are in line with the ‘urban results’ and we now estimate that the death toll between March 2003 and August 2007 is likely to have been of the order of 1,033,000. If one takes...

U.S. losses and breakdown are from the ICCC. Enemy losses are provided by MNF-I, as in the format provided to the USA Today. The only mistake most of the blogs and the media are making is to include non-hostile deaths in their totals. I don’t.

WASHINGTON, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- U.S. military deaths in Iraq declined for the seventh consecutive month in December, USA Today reported Monday. While 2007 has been the deadliest since the invasion in March 2003 with nearly 900 U.S. troops killed, the pace has slowed month by month since a peak in May, Pentagon statistics showed. As of Sunday, 14 U.S. troops were killed in combat this month and six died in non-combat-related incidents, the report said. U.S. Army Col. Steven Boylan, a spokesman for the U.S.-led forces in Iraq, said attacks and deaths were down 60 percent overall in the...

- Civilian deaths Iraq caused by war-related violence have dropped for a third straight month, according to November data compiled by Iraq's Interior Ministry. Last month, 538 Iraqi civilians were killed in the violence across the country, including 131 bodies recovered by Iraqi security forces in Baghdad, according to the ministry's figures. It is the lowest monthly civilian death toll since sectarian tensions heightened across Iraq, after the February 2006 bombing of the Askariya mosque in Samarra. The figure compares with 758 Iraqi civilians killed in October and 844 in September, according to the ministry. Prior to the last three...

The American military said Sunday that the weekly number of attacks in Iraq had fallen to the lowest level since just before the February 2006 bombing of the Shiite shrine in Samarra, an event commonly used as a benchmark for the country’s worst spasm of bloodletting after the American invasion nearly five years ago. Data released at a news conference in Baghdad showed that attacks had declined to the lowest level since January 2006. It is the third week in a row that attacks have been at this reduced level. The statistics on attack trends have long been a standard...

It would appear some at the major news networks are trying to play both sides of the fence, yet again. They want to appear to be "supporting the troops", yet their anti-war agenda keeps oozing through. I say this because I've always found the whole American-servicemember-bodycount thing repulsive. I find it repulsive because we hear about our casualties, that of the Iraqi citizens in the middle, but we never hear of the number of enemy dead. Why is that? Could it be that giving that number in contrast to our casualties may give an entirely different impression of how the...

Six American soldiers were killed in three separate attacks in Iraq on Monday, the military said Tuesday, taking the number of deaths this year to 852. The toll makes 2007 the deadliest year of the war for United States troops. Faces of the Dead Military officials announced the discovery of a mass grave holding 22 bodies in a rural area north of Falluja. They also said that nine Iranians being held in Iraq would soon be released, including two of the five who were detained during a January raid of a consulate office in Erbil. Five of the American soldiers...

IT is whispered about at the margins of meetings, and discussed in Washington parties where rumour is passed around with the wine and canapes. It even appears, fleetingly, to be fact. "The day nobody died from violence in Iraq"

WASHINGTON, Oct. 24, 2007 – The U.S. troop surge in Iraq continues to have positive effects, as violence and casualties are decreasing in many areas of the country, the Joint Staff’s director for operational planning said today. Army Maj. Gen. Richard Sherlock, Joint Staff director for operational planning, conducts a news conference at the Pentagon, Oct. 24, 2007. Photo by Petty Officer 2nd Class Molly A. Burgess, USN   (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. In and around Baghdad, terrorist operations are down by 59 percent; operations targeting Iraqi forces are down more than 60 percent; car bombs are...

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Violence in Iraq has dropped by 70 percent since the end of June, when U.S. forces completed their build-up of 30,000 extra troops to stabilize the war-torn country, the Interior Ministry said on Monday.

-- snip --Nevertheless, it's looking more and more as though those in and outside of Congress who last month were assailing Gen. Petraeus's credibility and insisting that there was no letup in Iraq's bloodshed were -- to put it simply -- wrong.

BAGHDAD - This year's U.S. troop buildup has succeeded in bringing violence in Baghdad down from peak levels, but the death toll from sectarian attacks around the country is running nearly double the pace from a year ago. -snip- Iraq is suffering about double the number of war-related deaths throughout the country compared with last year - an average daily toll of 33 in 2006, and 62 so far this year. -snip- So far this year, about 14,800 people have died in war-related attacks and sectarian murders. AP reporting accounted for 13,811 deaths in 2006.

KABUL, Afghanistan, July 18, 2007 – Reports of civilian casualties in Afghanistan often are exaggerated, and this can be due to the fog of war or because of deliberate deception to incite Afghans against NATO, the commander of NATO forces in the country said today. The coalition has caused civilian casualties, U.S. Army Gen. Dan K. McNeill, commander of NATO’s International Security Assistance Force here, said during an interview today. But, he added, the scale of casualties has been blown out of proportion, and the Taliban, al Qaeda and other groups are exploiting the issue by issuing false claims. “There...

In the popular mind, the American Revolution was mostly about liberty and the pursuit of happiness -- and the war that followed the Declaration of Independence wasn't much of a war. We imagine toy soldiers in red coats chasing picturesque rebels. Actually, the War of Independence was horrific, according to John Ferling, a leading historian of early America. It was a grinding conflict that rivaled, and in some ways exceeded, the Civil War in its toll on American fighters when looked at on a per-capita basis. Ferling chronicles the suffering in his new book, "Almost a Miracle: The American Victory...

There are two kinds of war, when you get right down to it, and the USA has had a little of both. First is the idealistic kind, evinced in that of the American Revolution and WWII, which were both fights to free a continent from despotism. Even Korea and Vietnam can be fitted into the idealistic category because the main goal with each was to stop the evils of communism from spreading further. Then there is the pessimistic kind, like ours with Mexico in the 1840s and most of our various Indian wars from Andrew Jackson's Seminole excursions in Georgia...

May's spike in the American death toll in Iraq is the result of the administration's new approach in Iraq – as much as it is the enemy's own "surge" of attacks against US forces. In strategic terms, it's called taking it to the enemy. But analysts warn that if the number of US casualties continues at their current high level through the summer, that could raise questions about whether the strategy is actually working. May has already been difficult – the third-deadliest month since the Iraq war began. In a candid briefing Thursday, Army Lt. Gen. Ray Odierno, commander of...