"Iraq policy is a catastrophic success"

well its official: "Bush has killed twice as many people in 3 years as Saddam Hussein did in 20"

"A new study asserts that roughly 600,000 Iraqis have died from violence since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003, a figure many times higher than any previous estimate. Human Rights Watch has estimated Saddam Hussein’s regime killed 250,000 to 290,000 people over 20 years."

more information here:: www.discuss-it.net...

-DG724

I am interested in knowing how many of those deaths were caused by the U.S. military and how many were caused by the insurgents.

Originally posted by slink
I am interested in knowing how many of those deaths were caused by the U.S. military and how many were caused by the insurgents.

It was still a US-led disaster, that to me falls under the bloody hands of the administration.

-DG724

Originally posted by dragongirl724
It was still a US-led disaster, that to me falls under the bloody hands of the administration.-DG724

I agree that the U.S. government is responsible for starting all the blood shed. I also think that the strategy in Iraq is to blame. There are clearly ethnic divisions in the country and instead of trying to unite Iraq, the U.S. government should seperate the three main factions that are fighting.

Originally posted by slink
I am interested in knowing how many of those deaths were caused by the U.S. military and how many were caused by the insurgents.

Why is there a difference?

If the US was not present in Iraq, there would be no insurgents. The Occupation has caused Insurgancy.

Thus, the US created and is responcible for the insurgency and the death toll they have inflicted.

The bottom line is that the people of Iraq were better off under the rule of Sadam than they are under US occupation. It's now impossible to argue otherwise.

Originally posted by BitRaiser
Why is there a difference?

If the US was not present in Iraq, there would be no insurgents. The Occupation has caused Insurgancy.

Thus, the US created and is responcible for the insurgency and the death toll they have inflicted.

The bottom line is that the people of Iraq were better off under the rule of Sadam than they are under US occupation. It's now impossible to argue otherwise.

Try saying that to a Kurd who lives in Iraq. I personally don't know any Kurds from Iraq but I'm sure their position in Iraq has improved since the U.S. invasion.

The insurgency is the cause of the deaths and that's why I was suggesting that Iraq be split into three countries for each of the major factions in the country. The country appears to be going through a civil war, considering Iraqi citizens are killing other Iraqi citizens and this was bound to eventually happen considering the ethnic division in the country.

All I wanted to know was the number of deaths caused directly by the American military and the deaths caused by insurgents. I was never defending the occupation of Iraq.

Slink, your not going to get an answer because the US/UK are counting are they, so you have to rely on other sources but either way its academic because yes if Saddam was still in power there would be persecution of certain groups but the killing would not be on the scale it now is. The saddest part of the Iraq conflict its that the US/UK were told that this is what would happen if we occupied the country but they did not care.

Originally posted by slink
The insurgency is the cause of the deaths and that's why I was suggesting that Iraq be split into three countries for each of the major factions in the country. The country appears to be going through a civil war, considering Iraqi citizens are killing other Iraqi citizens and this was bound to eventually happen considering the ethnic division in the country.

I'm not sure splitting Iraq would help. The Sunnis, considering the area they occupy, would have little to no natural resources and would be rather pissed if they got left with nothing. The country can unite and I don't understand why AQ or the insurgency don't try this. They seem to relish encouraging ethnic divisions when, in my opinion, the insurgency would be much more effective if they didn't argue over whose Imam from 1400 years ago was better and concentrated on fighting the Coalition.

*Disclaimer. I am not advocating that they should fight the Coalition, just looking at it from a logical point of view and what I would do in that situation.

Originally posted by stumason

The country can unite and I don't understand why AQ or the insurgency don't try this. They seem to relish encouraging ethnic divisions when, in my opinion, the insurgency would be much more effective if they didn't argue over whose Imam from 1400 years ago was better and concentrated on fighting the Coalition.

Why should they? Since AQ and the insurgency comprised mostly of Sunnis and not Shiites which seems to prefer where they are at which is control of Iraq and the Southern part of Iraq something the Shiites like. It be like the Kurds who prefer to be seperate. Not to mention AQ is a Sunni Wahhabi organization and they considered Shiites even worst than Jews or Christians.

Not to mention the AQ and its allies want an independent Islamic state on 6 of the Sunni provinces.

Originally posted by stumason
I'm not sure splitting Iraq would help. The Sunnis, considering the area they occupy, would have little to no natural resources and would be rather pissed if they got left with nothing. The country can unite and I don't understand why AQ or the insurgency don't try this. They seem to relish encouraging ethnic divisions when, in my opinion, the insurgency would be much more effective if they didn't argue over whose Imam from 1400 years ago was better and concentrated on fighting the Coalition.

*Disclaimer. I am not advocating that they should fight the Coalition, just looking at it from a logical point of view and what I would do in that situation.

Initially the insurgency was attacking just coalition forces but now they are attacking Iraqi police and defense forces. If the insurgents had stopped their attacks wouldn't the coalition forces had been able to leave the country sooner leaving the Iraqis in charge of Iraq? Even after the coalition leaves Iraq why would the insurgents stop attacking the government?

Originally posted by slink

Originally posted by BitRaiser
The bottom line is that the people of Iraq were better off under the rule of Sadam than they are under US occupation. It's now impossible to argue otherwise.

Try saying that to a Kurd who lives in Iraq. I personally don't know any Kurds from Iraq but I'm sure their position in Iraq has improved since the U.S. invasion.

Saddam wanted the Kurdish people out of Iraq. It might seem harsh to us, but under his rule he had every right to demand an expulshion. If you are going to use the treatment of Kurds under Sadam as proof of an evil dictatorship, you must also apply the same judgement to Israel's treatment of Palestinians.

I don't personally condon the actions of either country, but I also conceed that it's none of our business.

The fact remains, the people of Iraq are suffering much worse now than when under the rule of Saddam.

The insurgency is the cause of the deaths and that's why I was suggesting that Iraq be split into three countries for each of the major factions in the country. The country appears to be going through a civil war, considering Iraqi citizens are killing other Iraqi citizens and this was bound to eventually happen considering the ethnic division in the country.

Unfortunatly, this has been tried time and time again and has always led to failure. Viatnam, Germany (the most successful attempt), Korea, Israel, Afganistan, China, and even the US (north vs south).

When you attempt to break up a nation artifically, you are just paving the way for future conflicts. The actual answer is, of cource, enlightenment. When we can become civilized enough to understand that killing eachother over our personal beliefs is just a STUPID thing to do, maybe we have have peace.

Ain't that a big bowl of wishful thinking?

All I wanted to know was the number of deaths caused directly by the American military and the deaths caused by insurgents. I was never defending the occupation of Iraq.

Fair enough.

I was just using your post as a springboard to draw attention to a very valid fact that not many people are going to be thinking about.

Incedently, I am very much against the invasion of Iraq, but since it happened I believe that the US must remain there until the job is finished. If the US were to pull out now, Iraq would become what it was accused of being... a breeding ground for real terrorists and a cesspool of human suffering.

I think the real answer would be to take the spin off and get serious about the situation. Iraq has been conquered. It should be made an element of Pax-Americana and ruled as a state of the union. The people should live under the same laws and constatution that apply to the people of the US. Sure, there'd be massive politcal fallout, but atleast the people would be protected and the occupation would be legitimised. I don't like the idea of growing the American Empire, but atleast this way it would be honest.

True, but there are many agendas at work here. We have the Sunni/AQ insurgency, the Shiite Militias backed by Iran, who have supplied weapons technology and training (so claiming the Shiites aren't involved is untrue) and criminal elements out to make a fast buck.

Originally posted by BitRaiser
Unfortunatly, this has been tried time and time again and has always led to failure. Viatnam, Germany (the most successful attempt), Korea, Israel, Afganistan, China, and even the US (north vs south).

When you attempt to break up a nation artifically, you are just paving the way for future conflicts. The actual answer is, of cource, enlightenment. When we can become civilized enough to understand that killing eachother over our personal beliefs is just a STUPID thing to do, maybe we have have peace.

Well first, Iraq was carved out from the Sykes-Picot Agreement by the French and British after the defeat of the Ottoman Empire during World War I. There is an ethnic conflict going on in the country between Sunnis, Shi'ites and Kurds. Since Saddam Hussein came into power ethnic tensions have increased for decades.

Now the difference between splitting up Iraq and most of the other countries you listed is that Iraq has an ethnic division as opposed to a political ideology division. For example, North Koreans and South Koreans are all ethnically Korean, but one side supports communism and the other does not.

In order to have 3 seperate states emerge from Iraq you would need a lot of cooperation from neighbors like Iran, and the Arab countries and even this could lead to a war between Iran and the Shi'ite Arabs against the Arab Sunni's and other Arab countries.

Originally posted by slink
I am interested in knowing how many of those deaths were caused by the U.S. military and how many were caused by the insurgents.

The United states presence ultimately created the insurgency
So saying that there is no blame for the USA there doesnt work.

Before The USA invaded there was no insurgent activity killing civilians, it was mainly saddam.

Now, its a mixture of X Saddam Bathists, the insurgents, the foreign fighters, the secretarian factions, and the USA military.

All of which are a DIRECT result of the USA's ILLEGIAL war.

We should of been killing 600,000 afghanie Taliban and so forth..
why did we need to obliterate 100's of IRAQI generations when they DID NOTHING>

Originally posted by Agit8dChop

Originally posted by slink
I am interested in knowing how many of those deaths were caused by the U.S. military and how many were caused by the insurgents.

The United states presence ultimately created the insurgency
So saying that there is no blame for the USA there doesnt work.

Before The USA invaded there was no insurgent activity killing civilians, it was mainly saddam.

Now, its a mixture of X Saddam Bathists, the insurgents, the foreign fighters, the secretarian factions, and the USA military.

All of which are a DIRECT result of the USA's ILLEGIAL war.

We should of been killing 600,000 afghanie Taliban and so forth..
why did we need to obliterate 100's of IRAQI generations when they DID NOTHING>

Again, that is not what I meant by asking. I was just curious to know how many of the 600,000 were actually killed by the coalition. I checked and it was about 1/3, which is still way too many people.

Also, the insurgency is also the result of years of ethnic tension brought on by Saddam's policy of killing those who did not agree with his rule, mostly Shi'ite and Kurds. I'm sure that most of those who are dead would be alive if the coalition had not ousted Saddam but then the Kurds would still be living in fear that they would be gassed again and maybe another 200,000 of then would be killed.

Originally posted by slink

Since Saddam Hussein came into power ethnic tensions have increased for decades.

You’ve got to be lying-joking. When Saddam came to power Iraq was in a similar state to what is now. Iraq had, had several different governments in less than five years, there had been over 20 military coups since the place was given British independence in 1933. And almost every time there were political and religious killings afterwards.

Saddam on the other hand managed to keep control of the place for over 30 years until we decided to bomb him out. (Officially in spite of doing what we said).
Anyway Saddam did a lot for social integration he encouraged people to integrate with the housing policy, he gave Iraqis education (before the 1991 Gulf war Iraqis had 92% literacy and 93% access to free, high quality healthcare).
You see Saddam wasn’t stupid. He knew that religious fundamentalism would do nothing for his regime; and judging by the time he stayed in power (and probably also would of) he was vindicated. Saddam knew that the worst enemy of religious fundamentalism is an education, and so even under the U.N sanctions (in which Iraqis needlessly died because Saddam had got rid of his WMD’s) Iraq’s secular education continued to operate reasonably well.

Our media lied about Saddam’s WMD’s, has exaggerated his crimes and denied the western people a proper context with which to judge.
But Kuwait was a mistake (although part of Iraq for thousands of years prior our colonial occupation of 1923). And yes the Kurds are better of. But then again the Kurds aren’t suffering under needless U.N sanctions; and Iran isn’t bribing their tribal leaders to cause trouble against Iraq (that’s why they were oppressed to badly during the Iran Iraq war).

Pure Opinion…
I still think Saddam was right to invade Kuwait for flooding the oil market at a time when his country had lots of Iran Iraq war debt. I just think he should of withdrawn (in spite of the threat of a rebellion from within). As for the Kurds they deserved it (Saddam had offered them autonomy in the early 70’s in exchange for not being bribed). However the way he did it was a bit harsh; then again Iraq was desperate as it had a war to fight with Iran (a war in which America supplied both sides to prevent absolute victory). Even though lots of innocent people got killed; you have to ask yourself “how would you deal with an armed rebellion from within (funded by your enemy) in a resource draining time of all out war?”

DIRECTLY ON SUBJECT

As For he deaths…
There is one way to bring stability to Iraq without Iran being involved (or happy in the least). And that’s to find a pro-western dictator like Saddam.
Saddam himself would of course be alright if his reputation wasn’t somewhat tarnished. Then again it would still work and he would be unlikely to betray us. He is after all in principle extremely pro-western. Oh and name me one time when Saddam lied to us.
stumason Your quite right that splitting Iraq won’t work. It’s difficult to define borders, they’ll probably go on killing each other anyway, and the worst reasons are its still a giant leap forward for Muslim fundamentalism (particularly the Shiite parts).
Worst of all a divided Iraq would constitute bite size revision bits for Iran.
Only a westernised dictator will do; this democracy stuff is just sh** because it will only achieve an Iran style government, with a few (very unhappy) secular people (similar to you and me) at the heart of it.
Facing that; we may as well divide the place up because at least not all the country goes to Iran. As for oil wealth: a population (proportion) based compromise can (admittedly) probably be achieved. However I agree with you that Iraq should not be divided up. Because (given the alternative) why have any of amount Iraq fall to the hands of Iran style ideology?
I don’t care if this is through Iranian sponsorship of authoritarian political parties, terrorist groups, or the indefinite possibility of grabbing territory.
My view is that if enough people want a anti western leader then let them have a dictator and let him be western.