Iraq War Statistics as of Sept 20, 2006: Staying the Course of Failure

For anyone following the statistics of the Iraq War, it comes as no surprise that the US attack on and occupation of Iraq has created more, not less, terrorists. Reported the New York Times on September 24, 2006:

" A stark assessment of terrorism trends by American intelligence agencies has found that the American invasion and occupation of Iraq has helped spawn a new generation of Islamic radicalism and that the overall terrorist threat has grown since the Sept. 11 attacks."

Per the Times, a newly issued report entitled “Trends in Global Terrorism: Implications for the United States,’’ which represents the consensus views of "the 16 disparate spy services inside government," flatly states that "... the Iraq war has made the overall terrorism problem worse."

Staying the Course of Failure

The Iraq War has failed to quell terrorism. It's failed to bring Bush-style democracy to the Middle East. And it's utterly failed to improve the lives of Iraqi citizens. Yet President Bush and Donald Rumsfeld insist on staying their present course of failure.

I updated my Iraq War Statistics & Results article to September 20, 2006. In the 16 days since my last update:

-- Both houses of Congress approved an additional $70 billion in war spending mainly for Iraq, bringing the total to about $505 billion of US taxpayers' funds spent on the Bush Administration's failed war-making since 9/11.

-- Japan pulled all of its troops out of Iraq, while the US added 11,000 additional ground troops, bringing the total to 144,000, plus 7,200 from Great Britain and merely 3,600 from all other countries.

-- The UN issued a formal report on September 20, 2006 stating that Iraqi civilian deaths were greatly undercounted and underreported for July and August 2006, and likely before then, as well. Thus, estimates of Iraqi civilians killed in their own country since the US attack are unreliable, but are known to exceed 50,000, and probably top 100,000.

Be sure to scan my quick-reading article, Iraq War Statistics & Results as of September 20, 2006 for the latest on dramatic increases in US troops casualties and seriously wounded, as well as the continued deterioration of quality of life measures for Iraqi citizens.

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