Now I am dangerous I have found out how to post graphics.
Posted on 02/03/2004 6:22:24 PM PST by RJCogburn
American soldiers are dying at a rate of more than one a day in Iraq, despite some commanders' recent claims to have broken the back of the insurgency.
The toll in January was 45 - five more than in December - despite hopes that deposed President Saddam Hussein's capture would stop the killings from roadside bombs and other attacks.
The number of deaths in January will rise to 47 when the Pentagon changes the status of two soldiers who are missing and believed to have died in the Tigris River on Jan. 25. That would make the second highest monthly total since last April when daily combat from the U.S.-led invasion was under way.
All told, 528 U.S. troops have died in the war, including three so far this month. The worst month was November, when 82 died. In October there were 43, September had 30, August 35.
Of 39 deaths in January that the Army attributed to hostile action, 23 involved attacks with homemade bombs, which the military calls "improvised explosive devices," and which have been the insurgents' weapon of choice, according to a review of Pentagon casualty reports.
The Army has put great emphasis on defeating the threat from homemade bombs, often detonated along roadways used by Army convoys. Usually a remotely transmitted signal sets them off.
To counter the threat, more soldiers are using Humvee utility vehicles with extra armor, and troops are wearing an improved version of body armor that provides more protection against bomb shrapnel. Some vehicles also are equipped now with devices that jam the electronic signal used to detonate the bombs.
Most of the attackers are thought to be remnants of the Baath Party that ruled Iraq under Saddam for more than three decades, although some may be foreign terrorists.
When U.S. troops captured Saddam near his hometown of Tikrit on Dec. 13, some thought that would take the punch out of the resistance. By early January, U.S. commanders were publicly emphasizing that the number of attacks on U.S. troops had declined, as had hostile deaths.
Maj. Gen. Charles H. Swannack Jr., commander of the 82nd Airborne Division, told reporters on Jan. 6 that "we've turned the corner" in the counterinsurgency effort in his area of responsibility, the western part of Iraq, which includes a part of the "Sunni Triangle" west of Baghdad.
The number of attacks on his forces had declined by almost 60 percent in the past month, he said then.
Two weeks later, Maj. Gen. Raymond Odierno, commander of the 4th Infantry Division, said, "The former regime elements we've been combating have been brought to their knees." His troops operate in an area north of Baghdad that includes Tikrit, a focus of anti-U.S. violence.
But in fact, many of the fatal attacks against U.S. forces in January were in Swannack's and Odierno's areas. On Jan. 24, for example, three soldiers from Swannack's force were killed in an improvised explosive device attack in the town of Khalidiyah, east of Ramadi, in the Sunni Triangle. Three days later, another such attack near the same town killed three more soldiers. Still another who was severely wounded in the same attack died in a hospital two days later.
On Jan. 31, three soldiers from Odierno's 4th Infantry Division were killed when their vehicle was hit by an improvised explosive device while traveling in a convoy in the city of Kirkuk.
The depth and effectiveness of the insurgency is difficult to measure with only statistics, which tend to fluctuate over time. It appeared a few weeks ago that many U.S. commanders had hoped the dropoff in guerrilla action would usher in a less violent period for U.S. troops.
That has not happened.
In an eight-day span, Jan. 9 to Jan. 16, only three American soldiers died, and two from nonhostile causes.
But in the two weeks after that, 26 died - all but three in hostile action.
L. Paul Bremer, U.S. civilian administrator of Iraq, said Tuesday he still believes security has improved.
"I think the situation has improved importantly since the capture of Saddam Hussein," he said.
In the four weeks after Saddam's capture, the number of insurgent attacks against American troops throughout Iraq did fall to an average of 18 per day from 23 per day in the preceding four weeks.
But on Tuesday, Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, deputy chief of operations for the U.S. military in Baghdad, told reporters that the daily average had climbed back to 23 in the past week.
Attacks against Iraqis also are on the rise, although it is not clear that all those are related directly to the insurgency. The two near-simultaneous suicide bombings in the northern city of Irbil on Sunday, for example, killed 101 people, U.S. military officials said Tuesday, including top Kurdish political figures.
If we were fighting a traditional enemy its back would be broken by now. But when fanatical suicide/homicide bombers are part of the equation, all bets are off.
He also counters statements like "we've turned the corner" by pointing to individual attacks - a general says we've turned the corner, the writers says "but some attacks occurred in that area". Um, so what. The fact that this, that, and the other attack occurred doesn't mean they haven't "turned the corner". "Turned the corner" does not mean "zeroed out all attacks from now until posterity".
Finally he states something flat-out wrong which is that a predicted less violent period "has not happened". It has happened and this is clear if you look at the statistics. The rate of death went way up in November and since then has been slowly but steadily falling. What jumps out even more from the graphs (I keep track of this stuff with graphs) is that the gap-between-deadly-attacks (in days) is climbing. A falling death rate - and longer gaps between attacks - certainly sounds to me like a "less violent period".
Now I am dangerous I have found out how to post graphics.
Compare that to the 3,000 that died on one day in September, 2001 in America.
One thing to keep in mind (which may or may not be relevant) is that it's highly difficult to find someone who has been blown to bits, and not really worth spending much time trying.
he had to pick on the crippled kid down the street.
If Saddam was a "crippled kid down the street" why did we have troops in Saudi Arabia protecting that regime, and why did we spent tons of time and resources patrolling his airspace and occasionally bombing his country?
Contrary to popular belief the war against Iraq never actually ended and it was about damn time to finish it. We can't blockade some country halfway around the world for decades and decades and it was a bizarre thing to even try, when the alternative (ousting Saddam) was so obviously the right thing to do. I will never understand why people think "just blockade the country for decades on end" was a preferable and more moral solution than invade-and-oust.
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