Posted on 07/20/2005 1:08:09 PM PDT by neverdem
WHICH American communities pay the highest price for the war in Iraq? A look at the demographics of soldiers killed reveals that Iraq is not the war of any one race or region. Rather, it is rural America's war.
Altogether, a nearly equal percentage of Americans aged 18 to 54 live in counties with a million or more inhabitants as live in counties of 100,000 or fewer. And yet, of the soldiers who have died in Iraq, 342 came from densely populated counties while 536 came from smaller ones. Derived from Pentagon and census data, this chart shows the Iraqi war death rates for every 100,000 people ages 18 to 54 by the size of their county's population.
The difference is visible not just in the size of a soldier's county of origin, but also in its location. Counties disconnected from urban areas tend to have higher death rates, regardless of population size. Small rural counties have a death rate nearly twice that of counties that have the same population but happen to be part of metropolitan areas.
Why should this be? It's not that Iraqi insurgents are singling out rural soldiers, or that commanders are putting them at particular risk. Rather, the armed forces themselves must be disproportionately drawn from rural communities - a fact not immediately discernible from recruitment data, which report the race, age and education of recruits, but not their home counties.
This is above all an economics story. Military studies consistently find that a poor economy is a boon to recruiting. The higher rate of deaths from rural counties likely reflects sparse opportunities for young people in those places.
When the Iraq war memorials go up in years to come, these monuments to heroism and sacrifice will be found less often in thriving urban centers...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
It could be that urban soldiers tend to have more street smarts, and in a war that is being fought in the streets that is a material advantage to survival.
Neither are willing or able to step up and do the job of defending America.
I'm sure the New York Times really gives a damn that rural people are dying.
They are recycling this stuff again.
Could it be that rural counties are more conservative and patriotic?
I don't suppose they are seeking to balance things out by sending money out from NYC to sparsely populated counties, are they?
I hope the graph for total active duty personnel looks roughly the same as the death rate graph or they've drawn the wrong conclusion.
"Could it be that rural counties are more conservative and patriotic?"
Tell him what he wins, Johnny!
Utter nonsense. Read the Art of War by Machiavelli. The best soldiers come from the countryside. The worst from the city. When I was drafted, I met a hick from the hills of Kentucky. He wore coke bottle glasses which made him look helpless as any other four-eyed wimp I met growing up in the city. At the rifle range, I watch him constantly hit 300 meter targets. It turns out that hillbillies know how to shoot, hunt, and survive.
Good bet.
Granted it's not like you are talking to a New Yorker or anything, but I am a city dweller and so I do take offense to the comment you have made above.
Now, as for this whole issue of rural v urban
It's a NYT smokescreen to try and raise a sort of rural populism to their cause that the left assembled from 1880-1950
It ain't gonnna happen this time around though, so their efforts are being wasted.
This is nothing more than the usual bull@#%* way of trying to drive a wedge by using class warfare. This time it's thinnly disguised. Rural soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines have allways been the majority as long as I've been on active duty. So what?!!! Who cares?!!! That is just the way it is. We have an all volunteer force, these just happen to be the people that chose to volunteer and serve their country, and 99.9% of them do it honorably!!! The NY Times needs to STFU and fix itself!!
I'd say your answer is most probably correct.
JUST KIDDING!!!
Actually, rural recruits will tend to gravitate towards the army, for whatever reason, where recruits from more populated areas will gravitate towards the other branches.
Rural soldiers=White Boys that join the infantry to fight.
Urban soldiers=Minority kids that join the military to get out of the inner city hell hole.
Also, how many inner city utes are eligible for service with criminal records?
While the author feigns concern for rural communities, this statement shows his bias for urban areas.
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