The data is collected in a study by the Brown University and examines the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan. The author, Neta Crawford, a professor in Boston denounces that data "are hidden by governments, determined to paint an overly optimistic picture". Iraq is the place with the highest number of victims: at least 300 thousand, of which 200 thousand civilians.
Washington (AsiaNews / OLJ) - The war that the United States and its allies launched against terrorism in Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan has caused between 480,000 and 507,000 dead, with an enormous number of civilians, according to a report published two days ago by the Brown University (Rodhe Island).
The study examines the wars that the US launched since September 11, 2001 (terrorist attack on the Twin Towers in New York), first in Afghanistan against the Taliban; then in Iraq against Saddam Hussein and, after his fall, against Al Qaeda and then against the Islamic State; and therefore against Pakistani terrorists.
The half a million deaths include the military, but also civilians, journalists, humanitarian workers, collateral victims of the conflicts.
According to the report, Iraq is by far the site with the highest number of victims, with around 300,000 deaths recorded since 2003, the year of the anti-Saddam invasion. Of these, at least 200,000 are civilians: five times more than the dead in Afghanistan and eight times more than in Pakistan.
The study does not take into consideration the conflict in Syria, which has made at least 500 thousand deaths of which more than half are civilians. And it does not even consider the war in Yemen, with nearly 20,000 deaths, which has links to the US war on terrorism, for spreading cells of the Islamic state in the Middle East.
Neither does the toll take into consideration indirect victims of conflicts and the humanitarian and health consequences that derive from them and which last even beyond confrontation.
On the American side, 7,000 soldiers died in anti-terrorist operations. The number of victims among US soldiers has fallen more and more because gradually "the United States - explains the report - have transferred most of the land fights to their allies".
The author of the report, Neta Crawford, professor of political science at the University of Boston, says laconically that "we will never have a full toll of these wars" because the real data "is hidden by governments, determined to paint an overly optimistic picture ".