Britain’s frontline soldiers have 1 in 36 chance of dying on Afghan battlefield

timesonline ^ | 8.13.07 | Fran Yeoman

[Flavius]

tain’s frontline troops in Afghanistan are being killed at such a rate that, were it to continue, one in 36 would not survive a six-month tour of the country.

In Iraq, as many as one in 100 of all service personnel could die during a six-month stint if the death rate there continues as it has in the past month.

The Ministry of Defence confirmed that a serviceman from the 1st Battalion The Royal Anglian Regiment was killed on Saturday during an attack on a patrol base in Helmand province. His death brings to seven the number of British troops in Afghanistan killed in action or from wounds sustained in battle since July 12. This is compared with a monthly average of 0.7 since the conflict began in November 2001. All seven fatalities were members of a 1,500-strong frontline force primarily charged with fighting the Taleban.

If the death toll continued at this rate, 42 battle-group personnel would be killed in the next six months and a frontline soldier embarking on a typical tour of duty in the country would stand a one in 36 chance of being killed.

[MNJohnnie]

I see the Brits have their own people lying by using statistic. The key phrase to note here is :

if the death rate there continues as it has in the past month.

Not an analysis based on the past 4 years, oh no, just manufactured hysteria based on a carefully selected blip in the data line. Just another waste of ink from the Politically Corrupted media.

[MinuteGal]

"Three battalions have recently been disbanded and cuts mean that you have a smaller pool of men to send to do these very difficult tours."

Sounds like the anti-war peace monkeys in Britain are doing an effective job in getting the government to scale back troop numbers to the point the remaining ones are getting slaughtered.

The Left's traitorous law of intended consequences.

This is what the Dims/liberals/Left wants for our military after the September Iraq surge report. You can bet your life on it......and you may be doing just that.

Leni

[Thrownatbirth]

In my oparea, I would have slept a lot better knowing I had one-in-36 odds.

[Farmer Dean]

They’re all upset about a one percent loss in 6 months?Some units in the second world war suffered more than 50 percent losses in 6 months and held together.

[Red Dog #1]

I’ve never studied journalism, but shouldn’t a balance story mention the enemies’ chances? Oh never mind, I’m just talking crazy talk.

[Melinator]

I believe 1 in 4 died during the U.S. civil war. Of course, antibiotics had not yet been discovered.

[MNJohnnie]

Hard to believe this is the same nation that sent men into the meat grinder at Passendale, the Somme, El Alamen, around Caen and so many other places.

Now they hyperventilate about what is, from a strictly military stand point, an insignificant casualty rate like this?

Why do they even HAVE a military anymore then?

[uksupport1]

I don’t think the British military and the British people can be blemd for the statistical research of a newspaper. These casualty rates are higher that those of the US in Vietnam (1 in 46) and the British in Korea. Of course, thopse conflicts used far greater logistics trails.

Britain is also losing more troops proportionally in Iraq than the US.

[uksupport1]

*blamed*

[MNJohnnie]

Which is another way of misleading by statistics. Militarily if the UK cannot sustain this sort of casualty rate the British military may as well be disbanded.

The UK has taken a total of 168 casualties in Iraq

http://icasualties.org/oif/

Out of a total military strength of around 380,000 that is a casualty rate of .000442 in 4.5 YEARS of war.

Out of a total military age population available for service of around 23,500,000 that represents a total casualty rate of .00000714.

IF the UK cannot sustain this rate of casualties, it may as well disband it military since it is of utterly no practical use.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Armed_Forces

[uksupport1]

Who has said that the UK military can’t sustain these casualties?

I saw the piece as highlighting that the UK has suffered 240 dead (Rest in Peace) and many hundreds wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan (the only other Western Country after the US to be willing to shoulder these sorts of casualties). There has only been 1 year that Britain hasn’t lost troops in combat since 1968. You can’t exactly call the UK casualty shy.

[Mr Rogers]

You nailed it. ‘If one of our worst weeks was repeated ever week, life would suck!”

Golly. One wonders how stupid someone must be to get and keep a job in journalism.

[uksupport1]

Just a correction on previous post: Britain has only had one year in which it hasn’t lost troops in combat since WW2. I believe that year was 1968. I muddled my sentence up.

[batco-barry]

“They’re all upset about a one percent loss in 6 months?.......”

Who’s all upset???

[Farmer Dean]

Did you read the full story?

[batco-barry]

Yes I did, and in almost every British newspaper.
As I last heard, it is a projected statistic

[batco-barry]

“Sounds like the anti-war peace monkeys in Britain are doing an effective job in getting the government to scale back troop numbers to the point the remaining ones are getting slaughtered....”

How does that work, considering we’ve increased troop numbers in Afghanistan.