Tens of thousands of civilians likely killed by US in ‘Forever Wars’
by Imogen Piper and Joe Dyke
September 6, 2021
https://airwars.org/news-and-investigat ... ever-wars/
Introduction:
(Air Wars) You often find a similar refrain in US media reporting of the cost of two decades of the so-called ‘War on Terror.’ The trope goes something like this: “more than 7,000 US service people have died in wars since 9/11,” an article or news report will say. In the next line it will usually, though not always, try to reflect the civilian toll – but almost exclusively in generalities. Tens, or even hundreds, of thousands.
Ahead of the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist atrocities, and the subsequent launch of the War on Terror, Airwars has been seeking the answer to one important question – how many civilians have US strikes likely killed in the ‘Forever Wars’?
We found that the US has declared at least 91,340 strikes across seven major conflict zones.
Our research has concluded that at least 22,679, and potentially as many as 48,308 civilians, have been likely killed by US strikes.
There is also this from
The Guardian on the same topic:
https://www.theguardian.com/global-deve ... ysis-finds
Extract:
(The Guardian) Since taking office Biden has reduced US reliance on airstrikes amid a formal review of US drone policy, and has withdrawn from many of the foreign interventions that marked the time in office of his three predecessors George W Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump, since the 2001 attacks on the US by al-Qaida.
...According to the group’s research, the deadliest year in the past two decades for civilian victims of US airstrikes was 2003 when a minimum of 5,529 civilians were reported to have been killed, almost all during the invasion of Iraq that year.
The next deadliest year was 2017 when at least 4,931 civilians were likely killed, the vast majority in coalition bombing of Iraq and Syria.
However, going by the maximum estimates, 2017 emerges as the worst year for civilians, with up to 19,623 killed, almost all in the bombing campaign against IS.
The death toll from US airstrikes – which the group admits is imprecise – compares with an estimated 387,000 civilians who are believed to have been killed by all parties during the war on terror, according to work done by Brown University’s Costs of War Programme.
Don't mourn, organize.
-Joe Hill
