THIS ARTICLE APPEARED IN PAKISTAN TODAY and reports that 17,000 U.S. soldiers are not listed on the Pentagon’s casualty list.
This piece is based on Mark Benjamin‘s UPI article. Benjamin also brought the lariam/suicidal behavior by some U.S. Special Forces to light.
Key points from Mark Benjamin’s article:
— Nearly 17,000 service members medically evacuated from Iraq and Afghanistan are absent from public Pentagon casualty reports
— In addition to those evacuations, 32,684 veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan now out of the military sought medical attention from the Department of Veterans Affairs
— The military has evacuated 16,765 individual service members from Iraq and Afghanistan for injuries and ailments not directly related to combat
— The Pentagon has reported 1,019 dead and 7,245 wounded from Iraq. And 27,571 of the veterans who have sought health care from the VA served in Iraq
— Among veterans from Iraq seeking help from the VA, 5,375 have been diagnosed with a mental problem, making it the third-leading diagnosis after bone problems and digestive problems. Among the mental problems were 800 soldiers who became psychotic.
Benjamin quotes a number of veterans’ advocates who complain that the Pentagon is too narrowly defining its reported casualties from the war.
I think they have a point. And this is only on the U.S. side of the equation.
There are some NGOs actively involved in trying to assess Iraqi casualties, but one site is here.
With such little oversight from Congress and most of the media, the Pentagon is getting away with making affairs in Iraq look far less horrible than they are.
— Steve Clemons
