US wounded in Iraq reaches 10,000

[ze_dscherman]

....
SNIP

The death toll is now more than 1,300, and the number of wounded is 10,200.

Nearly half of the wounded have been able to return to duty, but more than 5,000 have not.

Advances in military medicine and body armour mean that many have survived wounds that they would not have done in previous conflicts.

But the corollary of that - and the fact that a major threat in Iraq has been the blast effects of roadside bombs - is that many are left with serious injuries such as lost limbs and sight.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4147705.stm

[imenja]

1. It's unfortunate they don't announce numbers of wounded on TV

It might change people's views on the war. 10,000 is staggering.

[punpirate]

2. It might also be helpful...

... if they reported all deaths and injuries from combat and in-theater non-combat. The numbers would be much more meaningful--and accurate--the number of all casualties exceeded 10,000 months ago. Such parsing of details serves only one purpose--to make Bush look better.

[aikido15]

3. Yup, that's right...it's all about Bush's image..

:evilfrown:

[imenja]

4. Good point

True, and it's somehow "un-patriotic" to report on the deaths of Americans and Iraqis. What strange values people have.

Do you have a source for the numbers?

[punpirate]

5. Don't have a source...

... right at hand, but an NG doctor in Germany reported upwards of 13,000 many months ago, as I recall. This would include people affected by diseases, known and unknown, suicides, and other causes. This is from 9/15/04:

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000630846

Of course, there are virtually no good numbers on Iraqi civilian or military casualties, since the DoD makes no attempt to keep those numbers, for obvious reasons. Estimates of those range from 20,000 to 100,000 and more.

[Crunchy Frog]

6. The best overall source

for numbers and information on wounded and dead is this site.

http://www.icasualties.org/oif/

It's hard to get any accurate numbers on noncombat injured since the military stopped releasing that information.

[lebkuchen]

7. It's also unfortunate that the wounded get their pay cut in half

as soon as they return home to recuperate from these awful wounds. Once they are unable to do combat, they don't receive combat pay, just at the time when they need that money the most.

The US govt. ends up providing for its war wounded in similar fashion to the tsunami victims--doing as little as possible.

[imenja]

8. military demands wounded soldier pay $8,000

Did you hear about the guy who lost his army and the military tried to collect $8,000 in back wages and transportation fees from him? I mentioned this at the dinner table in front of my republican brother-in-law and got yelled at. If it's in the "liberal media" it's not true. He didn't ask about the source. The soldier and his wife appeared on CNN.

[lebkuchen]

9. If you're a RWer, you're in denial, by definition

I think I saw another piece, where the soldier was paralyzed from the waist down and had maxed out his credit card to pay for even the basics, such as having family members nearby while he was in rehab and making the first month's rent. Because he'd lost combat pay, his Leave and Earnings Statement was cut in half, as he said, just when the money would do the most good.