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1,000 Down, How Many More?
American Death Toll in Iraq Tops 1,000 Mark

September 14, 2004

On Tuesday, Sep 7th, 2004, the casualty count for American deaths in Iraq reached the 1,000 mark. More than 1,000 of our friends and neighbors, family members and fellow Americans have now given their lives in this ill-advised war. How many more will join them before we realize the folly of this misdirected effort?

Our military claims that 1,000 is not a high number, considering the number of US troops involved (currently 140,000) and the length of time we’ve been in Iraq. But just what sort of number is “acceptable?” How many more Americans will lose their lives in this questionable cause? Ask yourself, is this cause worth the death of your children, or neighbors? Ask the parents, friends and family members of the casualties.

An average of two Americans have died daily since we invaded Iraq and the death count has slowly increased since major combat operations ended. More than 7,000 Americans were wounded by the end of August 2004. We were promised before the war that the casualties would be minimal.

We reached the 1,000-casualty mark 18 months after the start of this pre-emptive war on March 20th, 2003. Bush’s foolish plan promised we would be welcomed with open arms by the liberated Iraqi people, this war would last only 20 days, we would pull our troops out in four months and return Iraq to its people. There were no contingency plans.

suicide bombings and coordinated attacks employing increasingly sophisticated tactics in August --- a daily average of 67. This is double the 1,000 attacks in July --- an average of 37 per day. The US attack and continuing presence in Iraq is increasing the numbers of the terrorists--- estimates now range from 4,000 to 20,000 in Iraq.

America was pushed into a pre-emptive attack by the Bush Administration and it was a devastating mistake. Americans are still dying. Iraqi people are still dying. The country and its people are not better off than they were when Saddam was still in power.

Bush’s major mistakes include rushing to war without really investigating the situation. In hindsight, it turns out Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction and if the U.N. had been given time and the support it needed to conduct its lawful investigations this fact would have been known. Saddam did not have the right, or the might, to stop the U.N. investigations and the US did not need to take over the country before beginning our own fruitless search.

Our own intelligence operations warned the Bush Administration that there were no WMDs, but Bush suppressed all information to the contrary and proceeded with his original plan, which was originally proposed by the Project for the New American Century (PNAC) in 1997. The members of this organization include such administration cronies as Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, James Woolsey, Paul Wolfowitz, William Bennett and Jeb Bush, many of whom are now in charge of America’s military and foreign policies.

It turned out that Iraq was not a real threat to the security of the US.   Saddam’s power was waning, the country was in a financial crisis created by the embargo imposed since the Gulf War and the military was not as fierce and powerful as Saddam wanted the world to believe. It turned out that his blustering threats and claims of possession of WMDs were merely bravado designed to ward off the real threats of Iraq’s powerful neighboring countries.

Saddam told us he had eliminated WMDs before the invasion and it turned out to be true. Although we know the country had previously possessed chemical weapons, (we actually sold them to Iraq) none were found and they had been eliminated or removed as he claimed.

Faced with this irrefutable evidence, our country’s greatest waffler, George W. Bush, changed his reasons for the war. Bush, himself, has admitted there are no WMDs but refuses to take the responsibility for his actions. Like every other mistake the man has made, he is pointing at others and blaming them for his actions. He actually had the audacity to say that if “they” had told him the real truth he wouldn’t have attacked Iraq.

Of course, this is after the administration mercilessly attacked its critics in an effort to combat all of the evidence that opposed the rush to war. Examples, such as the atrocious attack on Ambassador Joseph Wilson, in which his wife was exposed as a CIA agent in reaction to his objections to the war, are inexcusable and illegal. Our national security was jeopardized by this and similar actions. The responsible people should be identified and sent to prison.

If the War in Iraq was a matter of  poor intelligence it was a matter of a low level of intelligence in the White House. The CIA warned against the war. The military leaders cautioned against it, particularly in the form of the war plan formed by the chicken hawks in the White House. But the Bush Regime forced America into war by pushing it through Congress on short notice and by taking advantage of Americans’ patriotic fervor following the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

around the world. The pre-emptive attack on Iraq has inflamed terrorism, it has been about as effective as pouring kerosene on a fire and it has alienated most of the rest of the world, including our strongest allies, who are now concerned by the bullish attitude of Bush and Company.

The solution to the terrorist situation will not be a matter of military might. The only real solution is to form alliances --- to work together with the rest of the world to combat the threat. The US cannot do this alone.

A global effort, in which friends and neighbors work together to spot terrorist activities and report them to officials, where terrorist training camps are identified and destroyed by small, efficient military attacks, and where the financial capabilities of terrorist organizations are disrupted and eliminated, offers the only real solution.

It is important to support our military people currently in Iraq. They are there under very difficult circumstances and have been placed in extreme jeopardy. We must all work to bring them home. How many of our friends must die before the country comes to the realization that these lives are being wasted because of an unjust and ill-planned war?

It is not unpatriotic to question the War in Iraq, nor the intelligence of this administration. Intelligent Americans must see through this issue and spread the word. We need to get our people out of Iraq, we need to restore the world’s faith in America by forming worldwide alliances --- and we need to get rid of Bush in November ……..

For the good of this country and the rest of the world.