July 5, 2007
A state-of-the-art research study published
in October 12, 2006 issue of The Lancet (the most prestigious
British medical journal) concluded that--as of a year ago--600,000
Iraqis had died violently due to the war in Iraq. That is, the
Iraqi death rate for the first 39 months of the war was just
about 15,000 per month.
That wasn't the worst of it,
because the death rate was increasing precipitously, and during
the first half of 2006 the monthly rate was approximately 30,000
per month, a rate that no doubt has increased further during
the ferocious fighting associated with the current American surge.
The U.S. and British governments
quickly dismissed these results as "methodologically flawed,"
even though the researchers used standard procedures for measuring
mortality in war and disaster zones. (They visited a random set
of homes and asked the residents if anyone in their household
had died in the last few years, recording the details, and inspecting
death certificates in the vast majority of cases.) The two belligerent
governments offered no concrete reasons for rejecting the study's
findings, and they ignored the fact that they had sponsored identical
studies (conducted by some of the same researchers) in other
disaster areas, including Darfur and Kosovo. The reasons for
this rejection were, however, clear enough: the results were
simply too devastating for the culpable governments to acknowledge.
(Secretly the British government later admitted that it was "a
tried and tested way to measuring mortality in conflict zones";
but it has never publicly admitted its validity).
Reputable researchers have
accepted the Lancet study's results as valid with virtually no
dissent. Juan Cole, the most visible American Middle East scholar,
summarized it in a particularly vivid comment: "the US misadventure
in Iraq is responsible [in a little over three years] for setting
off the killing of twice as many civilians as Saddam managed
to polish off in 25 years."
Despite the scholarly consensus,
the governments' denials have been quite effective from a public
education point of view, and the few news items that mention
the Lancet stody bracket it with official rebuttals. One BBC
report, for example, mentioned the figure in an article headlined
"Huge Rise in Iraqi Death Tolls," and quoted at length
from President Bush's public rebuttal, in which he said that
the methodology was "pretty well discredited," adding
that "six-hundred thousand or whatever they guessed at is
just... it's not credible." As a consequence of this sort
of coverage, most Americans probably believe that Bush's December
2005 figure of 30,000 Iraqi civilian deaths (less than 10% of
the actual total) is the best estimate of Iraqi deaths up to
that time.
COUNTING
HOW MANY IRAQIS THE OCCUPATION HAS KILLED
These shocking statistics are
made all the more horrific when we realize that among the 600,000
or so victims of Iraqi war violence, the largest portion have
been killed by the American military, not by carbombings or death
squads, or violent criminals--or even all these groups combined.
The Lancet interviewers asked
their Iraqi respondents how their loved ones died and who was
responsible. The families were very good at the cause of death,
telling the reporters that over half (56%) were due to gunshots,
with an eighth due each to car bombs(13%), air strikes (13%)
and other ordinance (14%). Only 4% were due to unknown causes.
The families were not as good
at identifying who was responsible. Although they knew, for example,
that air strike victims were killed by the occupation, and that
carbomb victims were killed by insurgents, the gunshot and ordinance
fatalities often occurred in firefights or in circumstances with
no witnesses. Many times, therefore, they could not tell for
sure who was responsible. Only were certain, and the interviewers
did not record the responsible party if "households had
any uncertainly" as to who fired the death shot.
The results are nevertheless
staggering for those of us who read the American press: for the
deaths that the victims families knew for sure who the perpetrator
was, U.S. forces (or their "Coalition of the Willing"
allies) were responsible for 56%. That is, we can be very confident
that the Coalition had killed at least 180,000 Iraqis by the
middle of 2006. Moreover, we have every reason to believe that
the U.S. is responsible for its pro rata share (or more) of the
unattributed deaths. That means that the U.S. and its allies
may well have killed upwards of 330,000 Iraqis by the middle
of 2006.
The remainder can be attributed
to the insurgents, criminals, and to Iraqi forces. And let's
be very clear here: car bombs, the one source that was most easy
for victims' families to identify, was responsible for 13% of
the deaths, about 80,000 people, or about 2000 per month. This
is horrendous, but it is far less than half of the confirmed
American total, and less than a quarter of the probable American
total.
Even if we work with the lower,
confirmed, figured of 180,000 Iraqi deaths caused by the occupation
firepower, which yields an average of just over 5,000 Iraqis
killed every month by U.S. forces and our allies since the beginning
of the war. And we have to remember that the rate of fatalities
was twice as high in 2006 as the overall average, meaning that
the American average in 2006 was well over 10,000 per month,
or something over 300 Iraqis every day, including Sundays. With
the surge that began in 2007, the current figure is likely even
higher.
HOW COME WE DON'T KNOW ABOUT THIS?
These figures sound impossible
to most Americans. Certainly 300 Iraqis killed by Americans each
day would be headline news, over and over again. And yet, the
electronic and print media simply do not tell us that the U.S.
is killing all these people. We hear plenty about car bombers
and death squads, but little about Americans killing Iraqis,
except the occasional terrorist, and the even more occasional
atrocity story.
How, then, is the US accomplishing
this carnage, and why is it not newsworthy? The answer lies in
another amazing statistic: this one released by the U.S. military
and reported by the highly respectable Brookings Institution:
for the past four years, the American military sends out something
over 1000 patrols each day into hostile neighborhoods, looking
to capture or kill insurgents and terrorists. (Since February,
the number has increased to nearly 5,000 patrols a day, if we
include the Iraqi troops participating in the American surge.)
These thousands of patrols
regularly turn into thousands of Iraqi deaths because these patrols
are not the "walk in the sun" that they appear to be
in our mind's eye. Actually, as independent journalist Nir Rosen
described vividly and agonizingly in his indispensable book,
In
the Belly of the Green Bird, they involve a kind of energetic
brutality that is only occasionally reported by an embedded American
mainstream journalist.
This brutality is all very
logical, once we understand the purpose and process of these
patrols. American soldiers and marines are sent into hostile
communities where virtually the entire population is supports
the insurgency. They often have a list of suspects' addresses;
and their job is to interrorgate or arrest or kill the suspect;
and search the house for incriminating evidence, particularly
arms and ammunition, but also literature, video equipment, and
other items that the insurgency depends upon for its political
and military activities. When they don't have lists of suspects,
they conduct "house-to-house" searches, looking for
suspicious behavior, individuals or evidence.
In this context, any fighting
age man is not just a suspect, but a potentially lethal adversary.
Our soldiers are told not to take any chances: in many instances,
for example, knocking on doors could invite gunshots through
the doors. Their instructions are therefore to use the element
of surprise whenever the situation appears to be dangerous"to
break down doors, shoot at anything suspicious, and throw grenades
into rooms or homes where there is any chance of resistance.
If they encounter tangible resistance, they can call in artillery
and/or air power rather than try to invade a building.
Here is how two Iraqi civilians
described these patrols to Asia Times reporter Pepe Escobar:
"Hussein and Hasan confirm
that the Americans usually come at night, sometimes by day, always
protected by helicopters.' They "sometimes bomb houses,
sometimes arrest people, sometimes throw missiles'"
If they encounter no resistance,
these patrols can track down 30 or so suspects, or inspect several
dozen homes, in a days work. That is, our 1000 or so patrols
can invade 30,000 homes in a single day. But if an IED explodes
under their Humvee or a sniper shoots at them from nearby, then
their job is transformed into finding, capturing, or killing
the perpetrator of the attack. Iraqi insurgents often set off
IEDs and invite these firefights, in order to stall the patrols
prevent the soldiers from forcibly entering 30 or so homes, violently
accosting their residents, and perhaps beating, arresting, or
simply humiliating the residents.
The battles triggered by IEDs
and sniper attacks almost always involve the buildings surrounding
the incident, since that is where the insurgents take cover to
avoid the American counter-attack. Americans, therefore, regular
shoot into these buildings where the perpetrators are suspected
of hiding, with all the attendant dangers of killing other people.
The rules of engagement for American soldiers include efforts
to avoid killing civilians, and there are many accounts of restraint
because civilians are visibly in the line of fire. But if they
are in hot pursuit of a perpetrator, their rules of engagement
make it clear that capturing or killing the insurgent takes precedent
over civilian safety.
This sounds pretty tame, and
not capable of generating the statistics that the Lancet study
documented. But the sheer quantity of American patrols"1000
each day"and the sheer quantity of the confrontations inside
people's homes, the responses to sniper and IED attacks, and
the ensuring firefights add up to mass slaughter.
The cumulative brutality of
these thousands of patrols can be culled from the recent inquest
into the suspected war crimes committed in the city of Haditha
back in November 19, 2005. The investigation seeks to ascertain
whether American marines deliberately murdered 24 civilians including
executing with point blank head shots nineteen unarmed women,
children and older men in a single room, apparently in retribution
for the death of one of their comrades earlier in the day. These
horrific charges have made the incident newsworthy and propelled
the investigation.
But it is the defense's version
of the story that makes the Haditha useful in understanding the
translation of American patrols into hundreds of thousands of
Iraqi deaths. First Lt. William T. Kallop, the highest ranking
officer in Haditha that day, told the military hearing that he
had ordered a patrol "to clear' an Iraqi home in Haditha
after a roadside bomb had killed a Marine" earlier in the
day. Later, after the firefight that this action generated, he
went to inspect the home and was shocked to discover that only
civilians had been killed:
"He inspected one of the
homes with a Marine corporal, Hector Salinas, and found women,
children and older men who had been killed when marines threw
a grenade into the room.
"What the hell happened,
why aren't there any insurgents here?' Lieutenant Kallop testified
that he asked aloud. I looked at Corporal Salinas, and he looked
just as shocked as I did."
It is important to keep in
mind that Lt. Kallop would not have been shocked if there had
been one or more insurgents among the dead. What made the situation
problematic was that all the fatalities were clearly civilians,
and it led to the possibility that they had not been in hot pursuit
of an enemy combatant.
Later, however, Lt. Kallop
decided that even this situation involved no misbehavior on the
part of his troops, after questioning Staff Sgt. Frank D. Wuterich,
who had led the patrol and commanded the military action:
"Sergeant Wuterich had
told him that they had killed people [in that house] after approaching
a door to it and hearing the distinct metallic sound of an AK-47
being prepared to fire.
"I thought that was within
the rules of engagement because the squad leader thought that
he was about to kick in the door and walk into a machine gun,'
Lieutenant Kallop said."
According to Kallop, the soldiers
were thus following the rules of engagement because if the squad
leader "thought" that he was going to be attacked (based
on recognizing a noise through a closed door), he was authorized
and justified to use the full lethal force of the patrol (in
this case a hand grenade), enough to kill all the people huddled
within the apartment.
The critical distinction has
to do with intentionality. First Lieutenant Max D. Frank, sent
to investigate the incident somewhat later, explained this logic:
"It was unfortunate what happened, sir," Lieutenant
Frank told the Marine prosecutor, Lt. Col. Sean Sullivan, "but
I didn't have any reason to believe that what they had done was
on purpose."
Translated, this means that
as long as the soldiers sincerely believed that their attack
might capture or kill an armed insurgent who could attack them,
the rules of engagement justified their action and they were
therefore not culpable of any crime.
Note here that other alternatives
were not considered. The soldiers could have decided that there
was a good chance of hurting civilians in this situation, and
therefore retreated without pursuing the suspected insurgent.
This would have allowed him to get away, but it would have protected
the residents of the house. This option was not considered, even
though many of us might feel that letting one or two or three
insurgents escape (in a town filled with insurgents) might be
acceptable instead of risking (and ultimately ending) the lives
of 19 civilians.
Later in the hearing, Major
General Richard Huck, the commanding officer in charge of the
Marines in Haditha, underscored these rules of engagement in
more general terms, "and also ignored the unthinkable option
of letting the insurgents get away"when he explained why
he had not ordered an investigation of the deaths:
"They had occurred during
a combat operation and it was not uncommon for civilians to die
in such circumstances. In my mind's eye, I saw insurgent fire,
I saw Kilo Company fire,' Huck testified, via video link from
the Pentagon, where he is assistant deputy commandant for plans,
policies and operations. I could see how 15 neutrals in those
circumstances could be killed.'"
For General Huck, and for other
commanders in Iraq, once "insurgent fire""or even
the threat of insurgent fire"entered the picture (and it
certainly had earlier, when the American soldier was killed),
then the actions reported by the Marines in that Haditha home
were not just legitimate(if they reported them honestly), but
exemplary. They were responding appropriately in a battlefield
situation, and the death of "15 neutrals" is "not
uncommon" in those circumstances.
Let's keep in mind, then, that
the United States undertakes something over 1000 patrols each
day, and lately this number has surged to over 5000 (if we also
count patrols by the Iraqi military). According to U.S. military
statistics, again reported by the Brookings Institute, these
patrols patrols currently result in just under 3000 firefights
every month, or just under an average of 100 per day (not counting
the additional 25 or so involving our Iraqi allies). Most of
them do not produce 24 Iraqi deaths, but the rules of engagement
our soldiers are given"throwing hand grenades into buildings
holding suspected insurgents, using maximum firepower against
snipers, and calling in artillery and air power against stubborn
resistance"guarantee a regular drumbeat of mortality.
It is worth recording how these
events are reported in the American press, when they are noted
at all. Here, for example, is an Associated Press account of
American/British patrols in Maysan province, a stronghold of
the Mahdi army:
Well to the south, Iraqi officials
reported as many as 36 people were killed in fierce overnight
fighting that began as British and Iraqi forces conducted house-to-house
searches in Amarah, a stronghold of the Shiite Mahdi Army militia.
This brief description was
part of a five paragraph account of fighting all over Iraq, part
of a review under the headline "U.S. and Iraqi forces Move
on Insurgents." It contained brief accounts of several different
operations, none of them presented as major events. There were
100 or so engagements that day, and many of them produced deaths.
How many? Based on the Lancet article, we could guess that on
that day"and most days"the incident in Amarah represented
perhaps one-tenth of all the Iraqis killed by Americans that
day. Over the course of June, the accumulated total probably
came to something over 10,000.
During the hearing about Haditha
one of the investigators addressed the larger question that emerges
from the sacrifice of so many civilians to the cause of chasing
and catching insurgents in Iraq. Lieutenant Max D. Frank, the
first officer to investigate the deaths, characterized is an
"unfortunate and unintended result of local residents' allowing
insurgent fighters to use family homes to shoot at passing American
patrols." Using a similar logic, First Lt. Adam P. Mathes,
the executive office of the company involved, argued against
issuing an apology to local residents for the incident. Mathes
advocated that instead they should issue a warning to Haditha
residents, that the incident was "an unfortunate thing that
happens when you let terrorists use your house to attack our
troops."
The Merriam Webster dictionary
defines terror as "violent or destructive acts (as bombing)
committed by groups in order to intimidate a population."
The incident at Haditha was just such a violent act, and was
one of about 100 that day that Lt. Mathes hoped would intimidate
the population of Haditha and other towns in Iraq from continuing
to support insurgents.