By The Numbers
For those who like to measure progress by numbers, Terrorist Death Watch has an update, with helpful graphics. Â
Chuck Simmins of TDW had been toiling away diligently, recording the deaths of terrorists as reported by MNF-I flaks. Turns out, they weren’t reporting them all. Lt. Gen. Raymond Odierno had a press conference recently, largely ignored by the press, in which he reported 3,184 terrorists killed since January 2007, and another 1,018 wounded. Simmins took that number, subtracted the ones he had already logged to avoid duplication, and then averaged them out over the last six months. Turns out our soldiers are killing terrorists at a rate of up to 10 to 1.
AP likes death numbers. Why doesn’t AP like these death numbers?  I read AP’s Iraq copy every working night. I have not seen these numbers in the AP copy that comes across my screen.Â
Welcome Punditeers! Free her or flog her? Get your crime and punishment here. Meanwhile, assistance needed in classifying this particular beast: uberFisk or Superfisk? So many questions to ponder. Does Hillary = Sexy? Then, of course, the question underlying all of modern and ancient philosophy and political thought: What is it about boobs? Well, maybe not all but a lot of it.
Posted by Jules Crittenden at 10:47 pm on Thursday, June 7, 2007
11 Responses to “By The Numbers”
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June 8th, 2007 at 12:02 am
Yes, well, Jules, the problem is that those death numbers are fort the wrong nationality, i.e., not American. Thus, AP isn’t interested.
June 8th, 2007 at 12:18 am
[...] Jules Crittenden with another factoid the AP is leaving out quite a bit lately: [...]
June 8th, 2007 at 5:38 am
The problem I have with numbers like Terrorist Death Watch’s is that body counts of non-uniformed enemies are very uncertain figures, especially if they remove their casualties. An extreme example is 30 suspected Taliban killed or wounded based on nearby people’s reports after a bombing raid plus guesses about how many non-combatant civilians were among the casualties. In a society with many armed civilians, some of them part-time terrorists, the assesment of who was on which side becomes even harder. Over-reporting and self deception based on unreliable figures are one of the reasons the army switched to the “we don’t do body count” position. If the military try hard to make their numbers reliable, they will substantially undercount the enemy casualties. If they ease up on the checking, they can easily massively overcount.
The U.S., U.K. , and Canadian casualty figures are reliable because they’re linked to healthy democracies, are subject to scruitiny and oversight, and have developed the habit of honesty. I
The fact that we are winning against the terrorists is reliably visible in things like a secure Ramadi, tribes changing sides and Taliban troops being harried and slaughtered over Southern Afghanistan without having a meaningful impact.
June 8th, 2007 at 3:15 pm
Death Tolls and the blogosphere today.
Jules has two excellent must read pieces, one of which shows Death Tolls that our media has been ignoring…. terrorist death tolls.
June 8th, 2007 at 5:00 pm
[...] Blogged Boston Herald columnist Jules Crittenden: Lt. Gen. Raymond Odierno had a press conference recently, largely ignored by the press, in which he reported 3,184 terrorists killed since January 2007, and another 1,018 wounded. [...]
June 8th, 2007 at 6:27 pm
Correction: AP likes the death of American imperialists fighting for the Chimperor. (Also, burning civilians, lest we forget their magical correspondent Jamil Hussein).
The noble freedom fighters resisting colonial occupation, not so much.
June 9th, 2007 at 1:13 am
[...] years but it is important to see what the media has not been forthcoming in reporting. According to Jules Crittenden, Lt. Gen. Raymond Odierno had a press conference recently, in which he reported 3,184 terrorists [...]
June 9th, 2007 at 12:56 pm
And how many nonterrorist insurgants were killed? Or do we assume that everyone who fights against the U.S. army is, by definition, a terrorist?
June 10th, 2007 at 12:40 pm
Progress In Iraq — “By The Numbers”
Another excellent posting on the ignored news in World War III from GP blogally Jules Crittenden.
For those who like to measure progress by numbers, Terrorist Death Watch has an update, with helpful graphics.
Chuck Simmins of TDW had been toiling aw…
June 11th, 2007 at 12:42 am
[...] The Numbers June 10th, 2007 Jules Crittenden points out that our kill ratio in Iraq is roughly 10:1. Chuck Simmins of TDW had been toiling away diligently, recording the deaths of [...]
July 26th, 2007 at 9:39 pm
Ball park estimates are good enough for me, provided the source is reasonably reliable.