It is irresponsible and despicable for academics and scientists to use their trusted position and their credentials to spread deception for partisan purposes.
Much to my regret, I find myself forced to revisit old territory on the subject of civilian casualties in Iraq and the questionable means being used to estimate them. In 2004 a study by researchers from Johns Hopkins University was published in The Lancet. It purported to be a statistical analysis of civilian deaths in Iraq during the first year after the invasion. It was immediately latched onto by the left and they began talking about 200,000 civilian casualties and other alarming numbers despite the fact that the study was poorly conceived, shoddily executed and a classic example of bad methodology.…
Article comments
76 - Lucky Frog
" So clearly all studies with wide confidence intervals shouldn't be considered useless! "
Sounds reasonable to me. That much of an uncertainty factor renders the figures unusable foe anything except stirring up trouble, which is clearly the intent here. did you take a look at those video quotes? These guys are fanatics on a mission, not objective scientists.
77 - MCH
Two GOP senators demand new strategy in Iraq
By The Associated Press - 10/16/06
WASHINGTON (AP) " Two leading Republican senators called Sunday for a new strategy in Iraq, saying the situation in getting worse and leaving the United States with few options.
Sens. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska and John Warner of Virginia are part of the growing list of Republicans who are speaking out against President Bush’s current plan for Iraq as U.S. casualties rise.
"The American people are not going to continue to support, sustain a policy that puts American troops in the middle of a civil war," Hagel said on CNN’s "Late Edition."
Hagel said he agreed with Warner, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, who said after a recent visit to Iraq that Iraq was "drifting sideways." Warner has urged consideration of a change of course if the Iraq government fails to restore order over the next two months or three months.
Warner said Sunday he stands by that assessment, and even in the week since his trip to Iraq, there has been an "exponential increase in the killings and the savagery that’s going on over there."
"You can see some movement forward, but a lot of movement back," Warner said on Face the Nation on CBS. "We have to rethink all the options, except any option which says we precipitously pull out, which would let that country fall into a certain civil war."
Bush told reporters last week that he invites a change in strategy if the plan isn’t working. But he also said the U.S. will not leave until the job is done.
Hagel said it is time to change course, but "our options are limited."
"We need to find a new strategy, a way out of Iraq, because the entire Middle East is more combustible than it’s been probably since 1948, and more dangerous," Hagel said. "And we’re in the middle of it."
78 - troll
Dave - #70 assumes that the country is open for inspection by the improperly so called central authority - NGOs - the UN - and media types...it's not
if it were then a direct count would be possible
half a million deaths unreported beyond the local level does not seem so unlikely...anarchy is hell on bureaucrats
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another way to look at the confidence interval is as a statement about the study rather than about the 'real' number...if this study were repeated numerous time then the result would fall within the interval 95 out of 100 times in the long run
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I heard Burhnam on cspan the other day where he said that this study was carried out on the cheap for $50k...I would like to see $250k invested for the next one
79 - ErnestD
Dave, you've been attacked for your assertion that the authors oversampled urban regions. There's an easy way to check whether you're right: look at a relatively non-controversial figure that is reported by the authors and would differ between urban and rural areas. Then compare it with some well-grounded stats from a presumably independent body.
One such figure is the infant mortality rate. Infant mortality in urban areas is lower than in rural areas in countries like Iraq, just as most measures of non-violent death would be. Burnham et al, over the entire time period of their survey, report 40 infant deaths out of 1474 live births, or 27 per 1000 live births. This is half the number (50/1000) estimated by the US government(which some would accuse of bias towards underreporting infant mortality) and only a quarter of the UN Population Division's number of 100/1000. Incidentally, the UN's mortality rates, whether infant, child, or total, have remained essentially unchanged since the mid-90's.
If you look at the birth rate, the authors' numbers also indicate a total Iraqi birth rate far lower than the actual, well-established number. This, too, argues in favor of your assertion of urban oversampling.
Unfortunately, it is unlikely that anyone will ever find out which neighborhoods the authors sampled, and thus be able to verify their representative nature. This is because the authors 1) did not collect "unique identifiers" such as addresses or names out of concern for participants' safety, and 2) did not conduct the survey themselves. They assigned this task to survey teams, natives on the ground in Iraq who picked neighborhoods more-or-less in accordance with the methodology on which Les Roberts instructed them. The teams apparently had quite a bit of discretion, and the authors (to their credit) admit that, "the potential exists for interviewers to be drawn to especially affected houses through conscious or unconscious processes." That these teams were themselves biased against the coalition, and/or cultivated additional biases based upon Les Roberts' own outspoken views on the war (and, by extension, expectations of the survey's outcome) is entirely possible.
Not only will interested parties never know which houses were surveyed, they will never be able to verify any of the data whatsoever, again because of the author's decision not to collect any unique identifiers.
This brings us to the issue of death certificates, raised above in the comments. Death certificates were listed as "present" in 501 cases out of 629 total deaths--just under 80%. The authors make the misleading statement that 92% of deaths were verified by certificate...because the survey teams, at their discretion, did not ask for death certificates in at least 80 cases. What exactly the "verification" entailed is not at all clear from the paper. I get the impression that death certificates may have been a very touchy subject for the surveyed households; this may have been the reason for neglecting to ask for them in some cases. The methods are somewhat hazy on how the survey teams assessed the certificates they did ask for: "At the conclusion of household interviews where deaths were reported, surveyors requested to see a copy of ANY death certificate and its PRESENCE was recorded" (my emphasis). Were all "present" certificates actually viewed? Were names matched? Was authenticity assessed? These questions are left unanswered. The methods then go on to say that, "Where differences between the household account and the cause mentioned on the certificate existed, further discussions were sometimes needed to establish the primary cause of death." At least a subset of the certificates were apparently viewed, then, but it is not clear what fraction of the total this represents.
As for the indignant commenter who was so outraged by supposedly detrimental reference to Johns Hopkins or its researchers: the party affiliation of Les Roberts is available for anybody with an internet connection. Les Roberts ran a campaign in New York as a Democrat candidate for Congress in 2006. His platform had one plank: anti-Iraq war. He raised $160,000 before dropping out of the race in the spring. Who contributed to his campaign? About $90K was raised from individual contributions alone, some of them from his colleagues. These include his co-author Gil Burnham and people who could potentially serve as his "reviewers." So the political party of Roberts is well-established, and the circumstantial evidence leans towards placing Burnham in that category as well. (Professors at Johns Hopkins tend to vote Democrat, in any case. Or, to rephrase, I know and know of a lot of people at Hopkins, and I haven't heard of a single Republican above the rank of grad student, although there might be a few.) In a sense, though, party affiliation isn't so important for bias in this paper as political passion on the issue of Iraq. Both Roberts and Burnham have demonstrated it in multiple venues. Here's an interesting quote from Burnham, interviewed by The World Today: "we wouldn't go to the effort of doing something like this if we didn't feel that here was a situation that was egregious and, you know, there really needs to be some attention to what we can do to better protect the civilians." This is as plain a statement as one can make: Roberts and Burnham conducted the 2004 and 2006 surveys because they already presumed what the outcome would be and wanted to make a political point and, ideally, effect changes in foreign policy, perhaps by helping, through publication timing, to influence the US elections. But why take their word for it? Look in the paper itself. The authors link the coalition forces to execution-style killings and assassinations of innocent civilians in the following two curiously-juxtaposed sentences: "The circumstances of a number of deaths from gunshots suggest assassinations or executions. Coalition forces have been reported as targeting all men of military age." How do the authors reference this astounding suggestion, when, to an approximation, all reported execution-style deaths in Iraq have been ascribed to sectarian and political infighting? They endnote two newspaper articles, both describing a single case where four US soldiers were accused of killing three Iraqi insurgents who were in their custody and may or may not have escaped and attempted to attack the soldiers prior to the killings. According to the soldiers' lawyers, the soldiers were told to kill all military-aged men in a house being used by al-Qaeda and to secure the surrounding houses. The Army, of course, disputes this purported order. In any case, the authors show their propensity, indeed, their desire, to lay blame for all Iraqi deaths at the feet of all coalition forces by turning the case of a) a single order which may or may not have been given; b) concerning a single al-Qaeda-occupied house on an island in a lake in central Iraq; c) involving the deaths of three insurgents who may or may not have been escaping from/attacking the soldiers who shot them; and d)
a military trial that, far from sweeping this under the rug, takes the charge of murder so seriously that the soldiers involved may face the death penalty if convicted....into a sweeping indictment of all coalition forces, US and otherwise, in the execution and assassination of innocent Iraqi civilians. If that's not oozing, pustulent bias, then I'm a Baltimore Raven.
Like you, Dave, I don't wish to accuse Burnham and Roberts of intentionally falsifying data. It is quite possible to produce utter trash like this paper simply by the action of biased "unconscious processes." As a point of fact, although I consider Les Roberts to be a special case, I have quite a bit of respect for Gil Burnham and much of his work. I do not doubt that he is a very conscientious and well-intentioned individual, and I applaud his efforts on behalf of public health. We all have a certain capacity for self-delusion, and of being led astray by people we respect, so while I criticize this bit of his work, I respect Burnham himself.
It is unfortunate, however, that The Lancet chose to disregard their own conflict of interest disclosure policy in publishing this paper. The author's ties to the Democrat party and their close affiliations with the anti-war movement constitute a perfect match for "conflict" as described in The Lancet's author's guide: "A conflict of interest exists when an author or the author's institution has financial or personal relationships with other people or organisations that inappropriately influence (bias) his or her actions. Financial relationships are easily identifiable, but conflicts can also occur because of personal relationships, academic competition, or intellectual passion. A conflict can be actual or potential, and full disclosure to The Editor is the safest course. Failure to disclose conflicts may lead to publication of a Department of Error. All submissions to The Lancet must include disclosure of all relationships that could be viewed as presenting a potential conflict of interest."
Of course, since the Editor of the journal is himself farther to the left than even Les Roberts, this inconvenient bit of advice was ignored when the paper was fast-tracked for publication ahead of the 2006 US Congressional elections and when the Editor himself wrote an inflammatory commentary on the piece.
My colleagues in science sometimes wonder why the Bush administration doesn't seem to like them. Call this one 'Exhibit A.'
80 - Dave Nalle
I'll respond at more length later, but to back up what Ernest says in the last post about Roberts, part of the problem is that The Lancet is overseen by Richard Horton who is about as rabidly partisan as they come. As you suggest, full disclosure to the editor and editorial oversight become meaningless when the editor is the one with a history of bias.
Dave
81 - Martin Lav
So now we all know why you question the numbers in the first place Dave. Your own paritsan reasons are not disimilar to what you claim the study was about. You accuse everyone else on here that tries to refute your fuzzy math with their own fuzzy math of getting OFF TOPIC and the topic to you is partisan politics driving outrageous if not false body counts. Is that really the point, or are the body counts the point? You claim that any innocent loss of life is a tragedy yet you spend your whole article and time refuting these NUMBERS. Is that all they are to you? Numbers piped in over the wire into your modest suburban compound somewhere outside of Austin?
Why don't you write your next article on how the analysis of the number of Jews killed during WWII was blown out of porportion? Come on let's see that one Dave. Are you scared that Ruvy wouldn't compliment you anymore?
Mr. Bishop, you feel into Dave's trap, once you trap him, he dismisses the facts, once you don't have the facts, he asks for them. He goes to great pains NOT to mention Bush, yet he consistently writes articles that back him up. He claims the LEFT/ists are all about manipulating the media, yet he prowls around the rags waiting for things he can refute claiming all the while he's a libertarian with no agenda.
I say put Bush in power in Iraq Dave.
Put that mother fucker in the palace and make him and all his neocons butt-buddies clean this mess up one home at a time, with no child left behind. Let the Iraqi's have his blood and then maybe the rest of us good Americans can live in peace.
82 - S.T.M
I always thought the practise of body counting to gauge the success or otherwise of an operation to be an extremely flawed piece of methodology, particularly in Vietnam ... and it was a favourite trick of the US general staff there but fooled no one.
Civilian and military casualties just can't be used to argue the toss either way here: In my book, you're either winning, or you're getting spanked.
Right now, we're all getting royally spanked, no matter how much Vietnam-style spin is put on it.
To paraphrase, there's not much point winning the war if you can't win the peace. Time to get out of the bastard of a place and let the locals sort it out amongst themselves ... while we work on the development of the hydrogen-powered engine.
83 - MCH
Dittos 82 and 83!!
Another phoney stat is when the war-wimps, in an effort to justify the cluster fuck over there, compare traffic fatalities to being killed in combat.
84 - Gary Kunkel
ErnestD, from what I've read, infant mortality is commonly significantly underestimated in surveys such as this. Also my calculations for birth rate gave me about 33 births/1000 people per year, which is about the birth rate I've seen as a current Iraqi national average(32.5).
Also, I think the word "any" as used in the sentence you mentioned can only refer to the pertinent death certificate, otherwise the meaning of the sentence becomes absurd(and would have intentionally been written absurdly). Also the word "presence" would be commonly used to report whether data(in this case the relevant certificate) were "present" or "absent".
"Where differences between the household account and the cause mentioned on the certificate existed, further discussions were sometimes needed to establish the primary cause of death." -- To me this implies that they at least had it in their study design to examine each certificate (otherwise the statement would indeed be dishonestly misleading).
Lastly, as opposed to some of us on the left, I don't feel that a well-designed study must be thrown out just because of bias. There is inherent bias in many, many medical and public health trials(e.g. drug company funded trials, other trials where you REALLY want your intervention to help people), but they can still be of value, even if they have to be taken with a grain of salt. The key is whether the author's were honestly trying to control for all of the biases that they could, and I really do think these guys made that effort. I also think the authors' biases, base on listening to them talk, lie not so much in knee-jerk anti-war sentiment as they do in honestly grieving over and wanting to know what the true human costs are. I do agree they should have put their strong feelings about the needless deaths caused by the war in the conflict of interest statement at the end of the article(but I don't agree that it negates the entire validity of the study).
To me it seems obvious that this kind of number is likely to be much closer to the truth than the 45K counted by Iraq Body Count, especially when someone I consider a media-savvy Iraqi blogger writes:
"I have personally witnessed dozens of people killed in my neighbourhood over the last few months (15 people in the nearby vicinity of our house alone, over 4 months), and virtually none of them were mentioned in any media report while I was there. And that was in Baghdad where there is the highest density of journalists and media agencies. Don't you think this is a common situation all over the country?"
(from HealingIraq - BTW the guy thinks 300K is a better estimate!).
Gary
I promise if I ever write again it will be 4 lines tops.
85 - Dave Nalle
So now we all know why you question the numbers in the first place Dave. Your own paritsan reasons are not disimilar to what you claim the study was about.
Actually, Martin. I wasn't aware of the political histories of the people involved in the study until that information was brought to my attention as a result of this study. I suspected they leaned left based on the circumstances under which the study was released, but their long personal history of activism was news to me.
He goes to great pains NOT to mention Bush
Actually, I've written articles specifically critical of Bush. You jsut selectively ignore them.
, yet he consistently writes articles that back him up.
No, I write articles about truth. It just happens that the truth sometimes supports Bush and you don't like it.
claiming all the while he's a libertarian with no agenda.
I think we've been over this before. I certainly do have an agenda. It's to make sure that Americans enjoy the most freedom they can with the least interference from government and in an environment of honesty and openness.
I say put Bush in power in Iraq Dave.
Put that mother fucker in the palace and make him and all his neocons butt-buddies clean this mess up one home at a time, with no child left behind. Let the Iraqi's have his blood and then maybe the rest of us good Americans can live in peace.
Sounds good to me. He'll need a new job in 2009 anyway.
Dave
86 - ErnestD
Gary Kunkel,
I agree with you on several points. For example: infant mortality is often underestimated by survey-based methods. However, while I'm not intimately familiar with the CIA methods that yield the figure of 50/1000 live births, I do know that surveys constitute a major component of the UN Population Division's methods. This would imply that the 100/1000 figure given by the UN is also an underestimate. And is there any plausible mechanism whereby the Burnham survey would have been MORE predisposed to underestimate than the UN survey? I can't think of one, but I would be interested in any suggestions.
As for live births, I suspect that you left out the pre-invasion period, which the authors include. Unfortunately, with births as with numerous other figures, the authors don't give a temporal breakdown of the numbers. So all we can do (without getting into complications) is to look at total births during the entire 54-month (4.5-yr) period covered by the survey. That gives us a birth rate of about 25.5/1000 per year. It's not as massive a discrepancy as the infant mortality data give, but still fairly large--almost 25% under. And there are few reasons I can think of for why families would underreport births in this survey.
As I stated in my previous comment, and as Gary reiterates, the epidemiological literature is full of biases. However, I maintain that the bias in other papers is usually of a more benign nature than in this report.
Will anybody out there defend the authors in their suggestion that coalition forces are under orders to execute any Iraqi men of military age? The authors' juxtaposition of the two sentences I quoted in my last comment is either evidence of woeful writing skills combined with abysmal editing and reviewing, or else a calculated attempt to defame coalition forces. In either case, such suggestions can add fuel to an already-raging anti-coalition fire in Iraq and are truly inflammatory. While "grieving for needless deaths," the authors should not involve in their solution an aggravation of an already-violent situation by stretching the truth.
87 - Dave Nalle
The authors link the coalition forces to execution-style killings and assassinations of innocent civilians in the following two curiously-juxtaposed sentences: "The circumstances of a number of deaths from gunshots suggest assassinations or executions. Coalition forces have been reported as targeting all men of military age." How do the authors reference this astounding suggestion, when, to an approximation, all reported execution-style deaths in Iraq have been ascribed to sectarian and political infighting?
Ernest, I sort of glossed over that quote while going throught he article the first few times, because I was primarily looking for numbers and methodology information, trying to figure out how it was all done.
But as you bring up, the inclusion of non-scientific conclusions like that in a report like this is incredibly troubling and throws the objectivity of the entire effort in doubt.
If such a thing were actually going on, I don't see how it could be kept under wraps, and it would be a scandal of a level which would dwarf everything that's come out of Iraq to date added together.
Dave
88 - Gary Kunkel
Ernest, not sure how that works but what I read was the UN got ~27/1000 infant mortality on first 2005 survey, then realized it must be low and resurveyed with more detailed attention and got a more "expected" #. I think some people don't consider a lot of things live births that the UN does consider live births(i.e.premature etc..).Gary
89 - Gary Kunkel
Also thanks for the correction, that extra year does bring the birth rate down to 25% less than the Iraqi average. G
90 - Martin Lav
Doesn't this:
"a scandal of a level which would dwarf everything that's come out of Iraq to date added together."
Contradict this:
"sort of glossed over that quote while going throught he article the first few times, because I was primarily looking for numbers and methodology information, trying to figure out how it was all done"
And doesn't that contradict this:
"My estimate was almost pure guesswork. I never intended to do a mathematical analysis and should have realized including any numbers at all was a mistake which would let someone like you try to distract from the issues with the methodology by trying to turn it into an argument about numbers."
The point is simple Dave, you sit in your modest compound somewhere outside of Austin trolling the rags for you to counter an argument of philosophy with your superior intellect and facts. When Bishop refutes your facts, you say it's symantics and then you later blast everyone else about their philosophies. I think you exhibit a double standard. The bottomline is that there are many people being killed by your Boy-Bush and although you go to great pains to show everyone that you've written countless "articles" blasting Bush and his administration, your continual appeasement and flip-flopping is transparent. You have no F'n argument at all. Whether it's 1 dead or 1 million it's not the end of combat operations, there was no civil war til we got there and apparently the place is no better off with Sadaam out of power than it was with him in.
Why are you wasting everyone's time with your trivial bullshit about formula's and clusters and demographics and all this bullshit when people are dying, everyone knows it and it should end now.
Take a stand for once.
No one is going to climb your wall and shoot you in the street.
Be brave Dave, be brave.
91 - Dave Nalle
As usual, Martin, your arguments make no sense at all. Not only are the things you quoted not contradictory, they're not even related to each other.
And then you repeat as arguments against me things which I myself said, like the point that it doesn't matter how many actually died as far as setting policy either for or against the war.
Why are you wasting everyone's time with your trivial bullshit about formula's and clusters and demographics and all this bullshit
Because organized deception promoted and legitimized by the media deeply offends me, Martin. And it ought to offend you too, because it's the first and most important step on the road to fascism.
when people are dying, everyone knows it and it should end now.
Your mistake is in thinking that 'people dying' is reason for anything to stop. People die all the time and often for incredibly petty and preventable reasons. The question is whether the objective is worth the cost paid in human life. There are far more people dying for much less good reasons in other parts of the world. Why are you not concerned with those situations?
Dave
92 - Gary Kunkel
Here's my last post, I swear it, before I agree to disagree about whether this study has merits. Given that this is it for me, I'll drop my 4 line limit :)
I don't believe the juxtaposition of those two sentences about coalition forces and executions suggests anything more than "bad editing". Those two sentences are in a paragraph that is discussing the possible causes of the concentration of deaths in adolescent to middle age men. They are two sentences in a list of 3 sentences that are trying to explain this concentration of deaths. The first sentence mentions that besides being a combatant, lifestyle factors, time outside the home, etc..., could play a role in this age and sex being more likely killed. The second suggests that the manner of death indicates assasinations and executions are happening (which refers back to their premise that there may be other reasons for the age/sex preference of deaths than them being combatants). The third sentence in the list mentions that there are reports of coalition forces targeting all men of military age(this is another in the list of reasons why this age/sex concentration MIGHT exist, without the men being combatants, which is the premise of this paragraph). To me all 3 sentences are used to highlight reasons (outside of combatant status) why military-age men would be more likely killed: they are out and about in the line of fire more; they may be preferentially targeted for assassinations; they may be targeted by US troops with a quick trigger or orders to kill military-aged men that are out and about (whether you believe it or not, this has certainly been reported a few times and the statement simply says this has been reported). SO, yes I think the juxtaposition is unintentional. This listing technique is common practice in the only literature I know(medical) so allow me to paste two example paragraphs that are similar:
"We observed weak or null relationships between black tea or oolong tea and mortality. The discrepancy between green tea and other teas might indicate the specific role of substances rich in green tea. However, the smaller variations in the consumption of black tea or oolong tea may have contributed in part to the noted lack of association with mortality."
" The graded association between short sleep and poorer self-rated health is intriguing...It is possible that existing poor health causes shorter sleep....Alternatively, short sleep times could have a causal role, perhaps contributing to increased daytime fatigue or to a loss of restorative sleep-related biological processes...There may also be underlying factors that cause both short sleep and poor health...Finally it is possible that changes in mood associated with inadequate sleep cause a negative bias in the evaluation of health status..."
To me the paragraph in question is analogous to these(though poorly written). I don't think these guys are stupid enough to suggest executions(even if they rarely occurred) by coalition forces would make a significant number of excess military-aged male deaths, but targeting this age/sex of individual preferentially(in operational situations) might play a role.
Thanks again for the discussion you all, I hope we all at least admit to ourselves that we're seeing this issue through different lenses, and I'm heartened that we can at least talk rationally about it.
Gary
93 - Bishop
Regarding this sentence: "Coalition forces have been reported as targeting all men of military age.27,28"
Citation 27 is to a Christian Science Monitor news review of other news reports about three american soldiers charged with murdering Iraqi civilians. The article quotes the new york times as follows:
"...But the lawyers are also making a more startling claim: that the soldiers were given explicit orders before the raid to "kill all military-age males" they encountered."
"The lawyers for the men also allege that after they captured the men, "a sergeant in the company asked over the radio why they had done so, instead of killing the Iraqis as they had been told to do.""
"The lawyers say that two senior officers " a colonel and a captain " have acknowledged that they gave that order, as have other men in the same company."
94 - ErnestD
Gary,
I concede your point about authors in the medical literature often resorting to bulletin-style listing...sometimes this happens because space is limited; often because scientists (like me!) aren't always the best writers.
But in the examples you gave, the authors at least use words such as "alternatively," "however," and "finally" to indicate a progression of thought or separate ideas.
I suspect that, if the authors and/or editors are indeed innocent of trying, slyly, to make a connection between coalition forces and execution-style deaths, the poorly-structured paragraph was the result of a careless and precipitous rush to publish the material.
Even if we just look at the last sentence of the paragraph, though, the reference to coalition forces is highly irregular. Two references are given, but both references are newspaper articles. While it is not altogether unheard-of to ref popular press in some epidemiology papers, it's also not particularly orthodox. Furthermore, both cited articles cover the same incident and contain largely the same information...one reference would have sufficed, but two ref's make it look, to the casual reader, as if more than one incident had occurred. In fact, the sentence (again, whether poorly written or intentionally misleading) gives the impression that targeting military-aged noncombatants is common.
When we consider that this single incident involved three Iraqi deaths (whether civilian or combatant depends on your definition of combatant), and that information about the alleged order comes ONLY from lawyers for the accused soldiers, it is troubling that Burnham, Roberts, and colleagues saw fit to bring this up at all.
95 - ErnestD
Bishop,
I was interested to read your assertion that the three dead men were civilians, and I would be grateful for any references you could provide, as I thought they were combatants. Further, it is telling that you leave out the soldiers' assertion that the men had been captured in the raid and that at least two of them were killed when they tried to escape and attacked their captors.
In any case, not just Ref 27, but both of the references, are to the same incident. And if you read the many accounts of this incident more closely, you will find that even the defense lawyers (who are the only source of this accusation) do not claim the alleged order was a blanket encouragement to kill all Iraqi men they "encountered" during the raid. The purported order pertained to ONE HOUSE--an al-Qaeda HQ on an island in a central Iraqi lake. According to pre-raid intel, the people in the house were armed al-Qaeda. That is why even the lawyer's version of the order states that the surrounding houses were to be merely "secured"--i.e., there was no standing order to kill military-aged males outside of that one al-Qaeda house.
But, really, these are defense lawyers making the claims. ("If it doesn't fit, you must acquit.") It is an offense to scientific integrity itself that the authors of this paper were permitted by editors, reviewers (?), and even their own consciences and self-respect, to use mass media reports replete with speculation and hearsay from interested parties to accuse coalition forces of misconduct on a level sufficient to impact the numbers of casualties reported.
And that's the main thing here. We don't yet know all of the facts surrounding this single incident. But we do know that it's being investigated aggressively, not covered up, by an Army that the Lancet accuses of targeting all Iraqis of military age. While the deaths of these three Iraqis would indeed constitute an outrage--IF they occurred under the circumstances described by the defense lawyers--it is intellectually dishonest to turn this one case and these three deaths into a possible explanation for increased deaths in Iraq. That the authors have resorted to such underhanded, defamatory tactics says much about the strength of their arguments.
96 - Gary Kunkel
OK, now I am making myself a liar but one more comment and I really am done and ready to move on with life.
I don't think referencing news articles is inappropriate, given that there aren't a lot of studies about Iraq to reference. Also, the CSmonitor article at least makes it clear that that particular battalion would try to round up military aged men routinely, and I could imagine how those guys running away would look mighty suspicious! Here are a couple of other references about preferential targeting that they might have also used to make a better point than they did:
"At least one US battalion had orders to shoot any male of military age on the streets after dark, armed or not." [4]NYT article on fallujah
"Puckett said that while Wuterich was evaluating the scene, Marines noticed a white, unmarked car full of 'military-aged men' lingering near the bomb site. When Marines ordered the men to stop, they ran; Puckett said it was standard procedure at the time for the Marines to shoot suspicious people fleeing a bombing, and the Marines opened fire, killing four or five men." - article referencing Haditha, not describing orders about targeting only mil.aged men but I bet they look a lot more suspicious.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that profiling in targeting is the wrong way to do it in tense and violent operations, or that a lot of military-aged men wouldn't be combatants, but I think this preferential targeting could certainly play a modest but significant role in an increase in non-combatant military-aged men's violent death rates.
I agree Ernest, that the paragraph is poorly constructed, and your point about sentences not being well delineated is excellent. Maybe the editor(who does seem like one of those oxymoronic angry peace activists) took out the sentence lead-ins ;)
Gary
97 - Dave Nalle
Ernest, you're being too generous in #95. Given the reputation and past actions of the authors it's more realistic to believe that the suggestion of war crimes was intentional rather than inadvertent.
I think this preferential targeting could certainly play a modest but significant role in an increase in non-combatant military-aged men's violent death rates.
I can't imagine it plays nearly as significant a role as the involvement of a portion of those military aged men in terrorist/insurgent activities.
Dave
98 - Gary Kunkel
I would agree Dave, modest to me means other things are bigger contributors(perhaps more likely than terror/insurgent would be sectarian reprisals etc...). Thanks again, take care!
Gary
99 - Martin Lav
"Your mistake is in thinking that 'people dying' is reason for anything to stop."
Never said that Dave. Generally it's true, but in this case in Iraq it's OBVIOUSLY true.
"People die all the time and often for incredibly petty and preventable reasons."
Is this a bizare quote from Rumsfeld Dave?
This has to be one of the lamest if not THE lamest reasons for war that I've ever heard. Even for you this is outrageous.
"The question is whether the objective is worth the cost paid in human life."
What is the objective of the Iraq War Dave. Maybe you can explain it to me and tell me at the same time if it's being achieved, when and at what cost.
"There are far more people dying for much less good reasons in other parts of the world."
Once again an astounding statement. Since there's far more people dying elsewhere, where are they and what are the reasons? More importantly is the US the cause. Are we at war somewhere else that I missed?
"Why are you not concerned with those situations?"
Because whatever "situations" you are referring to I suspect the US is not the invader/liberator/instigator. Are they?
If you can't see the difference then apparently war is just another tool in your libertarian belt to ensure that you enjoy whatever freedoms at any costs, in the confines of your compound somewhere near Austin.
Me I think it's pathetic that you could be so callous to the entire world as long as it serves your interests and protects your freedoms.
All for 1 and 1 for me huh Dave?
100 - Dave Nalle
I would agree Dave, modest to me means other things are bigger contributors(perhaps more likely than terror/insurgent would be sectarian reprisals etc...). Thanks again, take care!
Very true, Gary. When I referred to involvement in insurgent/terrorist activity I propbably should have said as either perpetrator or victim. While I don't believe that there are US death squads or that Iraqi police death squads are at all common, I've seen plenty of evidence of sectarian death squads.
Dave
101 - Dave Nalle
"People die all the time and often for incredibly petty and preventable reasons."
Is this a bizare quote from Rumsfeld Dave?
Nope, all mine. A bit obvious, but I'm just tailoring my statements to the audience.
This has to be one of the lamest if not THE lamest reasons for war that I've ever heard. Even for you this is outrageous.
Your mistake here is in thinking it's a reason for war. I can't imagine where you got that idea. It's a way of putting casualties in realistic perspective and a necessary consideration in setting priorities when it comes to foreign policy and war, but it's not a reason for going to war.
"The question is whether the objective is worth the cost paid in human life."
What is the objective of the Iraq War Dave. Maybe you can explain it to me and tell me at the same time if it's being achieved, when and at what cost.
That's more or less the same question I was asking. I wouldn't be bringing the issue up as a question if I already had all the answers. My general take on the war is that there are many objectives and that some of them are achieved just by creating chaos and violence there, but at a cost which raises the issue of whether the effort is worthwhile.
"There are far more people dying for much less good reasons in other parts of the world."
Once again an astounding statement.
In a year as many people die of AIDS in Africa as this highest estimate this study claims died in 3 years in Iraq. To me that's more senseless and more criminal.
Since there's far more people dying elsewhere, where are they and what are the reasons?
Sectarian violence and chaos in Darfur has certainly cost more lives than the Iraq war and AIDS in Africa is an even bigger problem, as noted above. Both are preventable at a high cost. Would you like to pick one of those causes instead of Iraq?
More importantly is the US the cause. Are we at war somewhere else that I missed?
The US isn't the cause of what's going on in Iraq in any meaningful sense. We didn't create a country composed of 3 distinct separate cultural groups which hate each other. All we did was create the opportunity for them to be themselves. They still have the choice of whether or not to behave like civilized human beings. When you sell a man a gun are you responsible for what he does with it, or is how he uses it HIS choice?
Because whatever "situations" you are referring to I suspect the US is not the invader/liberator/instigator. Are they?
Actually, a lot of people would argue that US policy is one of the major factors in not getting AIDS in Africa under control. We're tops on the list for blame along with the Catholic Church.
And again, giving people their freedom is not a bad thing, and it doesn't make you responsible for how they abuse that freedom. The very nature of freedom is that it's their choice what they do with it, not ours.
If you can't see the difference then apparently war is just another tool in your libertarian belt to ensure that you enjoy whatever freedoms at any costs, in the confines of your compound somewhere near Austin.
Yes, I do place the freedom and welfare of my family, my neighbors and my nation above those of others. If you don't then you're either irresponsible or lying.
Me I think it's pathetic that you could be so callous to the entire world as long as it serves your interests and protects your freedoms.
All for 1 and 1 for me huh Dave?
The survival of the United States is ultimately to the benefit of the world as a whole, Martin. The alternative to having us in a position of leadership is pretty scary to contemplate.
Dave
102 - Martin Lav
Dave you are the master of attempting to explain this inexplicable. I for one am sick of it. You and your selfish value system can stay forever locked in your fortified compound somewhere near Austin, Texas defending your right to take advantage of every liberty you have to screw everyone else. You and your kind are just like Bush and Co. never owning up to any self-criticism or admitting mistakes, so therefore can never learn from history only from your warped belief system. People like you are dooming the world with your approach as you will never allow for differences in people or approaches. Following your path is suicide as there are no winners.
Feel safe in your compound somewhere near Austin, because you create your own necessity to feel paranoia.
Americans will try diplomacy when war proves not to work, not a second before.
Hoorah!
103 - Dave Nalle
Martin, a discussion with you is always more than vaguely hallucinogenic. It's like you're talking to someone who exists in your mind, rather than me. I'm not sure where you got all these weird ideas about what I believe and how I think, but I can't see how it could possibly come from anything I've posted here.
Dave
104 - MCH
"I'm not sure where you got all these weird ideas about what I believe and how I think, but I can't see how it could possibly come from anything I've posted here."
- Dave Nalle
"I never said that. That's not what I said. Why are they always lying about what I said?"
- Rush Limbaugh
105 - chancelucky
Does someone have an online link to the Lancet study itself?
Thanks
106 - Dave Nalle
It's in the second paragraph, chance.
Dave
107 - chancelucky
Thanks Dave,
didn't see the link highlight.