Insurgent ‘body count’ records released

[unhappycamper]

Insurgent ‘body count’ records released
By Joseph Giordono and Lisa Burgess, Stars and Stripes
Mideast edition, Monday, October 1, 2007

American and coalition troops have reported killing and capturing more suspected insurgents in the first half of 2007 than in any other similar period of the Iraq war, while military officials said so-called “body count” reports are meant to give “scale” to the fight.

Last week, USA Today reported that since June 2003, the U.S. military in Iraq has kept a count of insurgents killed, injured and detained. Those figures were later released by the military to Stars and Stripes.

Through August 2007, those figures show, 18,832 suspected insurgents had been reported killed, 5,196 injured and 119,752 arrested by U.S. and coalition forces.

In 2007, the figures show, coalition troops arrested an average of around 100 suspected insurgents each day. Military officials have said both the increased casualty and capture figures are attributed in part to the “surge” and more aggressive tactics by units throughout the country.

The figures are compiled from “significant action” reports received from the field, said Capt. Michael Greenberger, who released the statistics to Stars and Stripes.

“The number of individuals detained does not represent the number of detainees currently held in Iraq. The number of individuals detained is an aggregate number and does not reflect the length of time individuals may have detained,” Greenberger said.


Rest of article at: http://stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=49180



uhc comment: I thought we didn't 'do' body counts. Back in the good old Viet Nam days, everything was about body counts.

[ck4829]

1. Almost 120,000 arrested?

By arrested, they probably mean there was little or no incident involved with their capture.

Something seems fishy about that number, don't know what it is.

[zbdent]

2. gee ... those figures sure don't sound like the ones that the RWers use

(badly) to discount the soldiers' blood shed in this illegal war ...

Remember, they always point out the # of soldiers killed in Iraq over the time period vs the # of murders committed in a collection of US cities in the same time period ... CONVENIENTLY IGNORING the fact that the count of US casualties is not including the number of indigents + that are also killed ... and the real comparison would be soldiers = police/firefighters in the cities. If there were the same number of police/firefighters killed in the time period (nationwide!), there would be an amazing outcry ...