Idiotic WaPo article: "Service in Iraq-just how risky is it?"

[nam78_two]

I suppose this is to counter declining no.s of volunteer


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/25/AR2006082500940.html

The consequences of Operation Iraqi Freedom for U.S. forces are being documented by the Defense Department with an exceptional degree of openness and transparency.

Yeah whatever.......

Between March 21, 2003, when the first military death was recorded in Iraq, and March 31, 2006, there were 2,321 deaths among American troops in Iraq. Seventy-nine percent were a result of action by hostile forces. Troops spent a total of 592,002 "person-years" in Iraq during this period. The ratio of deaths to person-years, .00392, or 3.92 deaths per 1,000 person-years, is the death rate of military personnel in Iraq.How does this rate compare with that in other groups? One meaningful comparison is to the civilian population of the United States. That rate was 8.42 per 1,000 in 2003, more than twice that for military personnel in Iraq.

The comparison is imperfect, of course, because a much higher fraction of the American population is elderly and subject to higher death rates from degenerative diseases. The death rate for U.S. men ages 18 to 39 in 2003 was 1.53 per 1,000 -- 39 percent of that of troops in Iraq. But one can also find something equivalent to combat conditions on home soil. The death rate for African American men ages 20 to 34 in Philadelphia was 4.37 per 1,000 in 2002, 11 percent higher than among troops in Iraq. Slightly more than half the Philadelphia deaths were homicides.


Great "analysis" :eyes:
See its all peaches and cream in Iraq :sarcasm:
Like all the CNN specials "what risks do you face every single day" have been attempting to prove for years, you are just at as much risk of dying in your own backyard as if you go to Iraq apparently..:eyes:

[soothsayer]

1. better to go as a highly paid contractor than a warfighter, imho

[lgn19087]

2. I live in Philly

and believe me, there are neighborhoods here that make Iraq look like Pebble Beach.

[creeksneakers2]

6. We should have sent our troops there instead of Iraq n/t

[lgn19087]

9. They'd need bigger guns n/t

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[Jim__]

3. What is the death rate for Iraqis?

How does that compare to the death rate before the invasion of Iraq?

[FredScuttle]

4. Ahem.....

where are the fucking casualty rates? I mean, not just the fatalities, but the maimed, the handicapped, etc?

What a bullshit article.

[creeksneakers2]

5. I think the numbers are cooked

They fuzzy them up by including all deaths instead of comparing troops killed in action with death by homicide in the US. The murder rate in 2004 was 5.5 per 100,000. Throw out the Pentagon's 592,000 person years in Iraq over a three year period because for that to be the figure we'd have to have had almost 200,000 troops there the whole time. The number is generally around 135,000 going up to about 150,000 or 160,000 during election months. Lets call it 140,000 troops on average per year. Deaths are about 800 per year but I'll take the word of the Pentagon that only 80% are from hostile attacks and call the number of deaths per year 640. 640/140,000 = 457/100,000. That means one of our troops has 83 times the chance of being killed in combat in Iraq than they have of being murdered in the US.

Of course, some places in the US are more dangerous than others and some groups are more likely to be murder victims. The article puts the death rate of 20-34 year old blacks in Philadelphia at 437 per 100,000. But only slightly over half of those deaths were homicides so take 55% of 437 and we have 240. So it still almost twice as dangerous in Iraq as it is for the persons in about the most danger in the US.

I heard the claim about Iraq being safer on Rash Limbaugh and of all the bits or RW propaganda I've heard this one offended me the most. According to the right, no mention should be allowed of any of the problems in Iraq because the troops might hear it and their morale would drop. What would it feel like to be facing all the danger our troops face and being told that the people back in the US and even the Pentagon believe that the troops are sacrificing nothing. Such a terrible insult to the troops! If a lefty had come up with this, he'd be smeared for weeks by the right wing. I'd like to see the propagandists who cooked this up take a cruise through Baghdad.

[Contrary1]

7. There goes that damn Liberal media again...n/t

[Jacobin]

8. This is straight up Limbaugh propaganda

If things are so rosy, why doesn't WaPo open a fucking office there and man it with, oh, about 50 of its finest crack journalists.

:eyes: