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Counting Iraq’s civilian casualties
BY KRISTEN LOMBARDI
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Bombed buildings. Downed helicopters. Insurgent attacks. News from Iraq has been bleak when it comes to the toll on American troops. But the US-led invasion has imposed a hefty price on Iraqi civilians as well, according to a comprehensive report released this week by International Physicians for Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW), which is based in Cambridge. Any way you look at it, the independent review, Continuing Collateral Damage: The Health and Environmental Costs of War on Iraq, paints a dire picture of the havoc wreaked thus far: 21,700 to 55,000 people are estimated to have died since combat started in March. Among the dead are 7800 to 9600 Iraqi citizens, most of them women and children. By contrast, 394 US and British soldiers have perished. Earlier this week, the Phoenix spoke with Harvard Medical School professor Lachlan Farrow, a long-time IPPNW member, to discuss the war’s impact. Q: Why did IPPNW undertake this project? A: Our biggest concern is the neglect of Iraqi civilian casualties. They’re not on anyone’s radar screen. The report found that between 7800 and 9600 civilians were killed by violent death attributable to the war. That’s a lot. But no one talks about them. If we’re going to have a responsible policy discussion, we need to put the facts on the table. Let’s get the story out about what happens in war and discuss what numbers are acceptable. Q: None of the report’s numbers are specific. Why is that? A: It’s tough to pin down the exact number of casualties in a place like Iraq, where systems aren’t set up to track every death. The US military could tell you every flesh wound that our soldiers have suffered. But there aren’t similar systems for Iraqi civilians or military casualties. We looked at the lowest and highest estimates from credible newspaper reports and other frontline sources. For every episode where [the authors] had credible reports of civilians killed by violence — a car bomb, a sniper attack — they referenced each source, and cited the lowest and highest numbers publicized. Q: What struck you about the report as a physician? A: How relatively few US and UK soldiers were killed, as compared to Iraqi civilians. A lot of soldiers would do almost anything to avoid causing death to innocent civilians. It’s an admirable form of military honor. But when you look at the numbers of Iraqi civilians dead in the direct aftermath of our military attacks, you have to ask about the morality of our approach to war. The TV pictures celebrated the clean bombs. We got this picture of an antiseptic war. But there were 20 civilians who died for every US soldier who died. Q: Were you surprised by any findings? A: Yes, the civilian casualties actually turned out to be 50 percent lower than was predicted by many people. In an IPPNW report a year ago, we were saying more people would die. We were expecting Iraqi soldiers to loyally defend Baghdad, but they melted away. And that meant fewer US and UK casualties, as well as civilian casualties. So as horrifying as numbers of civilian dead are, it could have been worse. Q: What does IPPNW want us to take away from its report? A: In war, it’s the weakest, most vulnerable civilians who suffer most. That was predictable before the war started, and we need to take responsibility for these consequences. President Bush initiated this war, but the American people haven’t had a discussion about the thousands of Iraqi casualties that we now know have taken place. It’s time to do that.
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