Death be not proud

Quote of the day goes to Riverbend in Iraq, who returns from a long hiatus to blog about the Lancet report on Iraqi war dead.

We literally do not know a single Iraqi family that has not seen the violent death of a first or second-degree relative these last three years. Abductions, militias, sectarian violence, revenge killings, assassinations, car-bombs, suicide bombers, American military strikes, Iraqi military raids, death squads, extremists, armed robberies, executions, detentions, secret prisons, torture, mysterious weapons – with so many different ways to die, is the number so far fetched?

Really. Anyone who has been reading the news for the last three years looking for truth rather than talking points would have to admit that not every death is reported to or by official sources. And that's just in Iraq. What about Afghanistan? Has anyone counted the innocent deaths there?

For the record I was against going into Afghanistan as well. I never believed you could "wage war" on terror by military means. But that invasion was widely supported pretty much solely on the basis of "revenge." Americans were angry about 9/11 and wanted retribution for our own innocent deaths and that theme carried us into Iraq.

I have to ask, whether you believe 40,000 or 600,000 deaths have occurred as a result trying to militarize an ideological conflict - how many deaths does it take to satisfy that blood lust? And for those who still support the WOT because they're terrorized by their own unreasonable fear of death by terrorist attack, what is it about the ongoing daily carnage in the terrorist training ground of Iraq that makes you feel safer?