Iraqi Freedom Bests Previous US Wars Where it Counts

Here’s a reality check for those sourpusses out there.

Michael Barone pointed out two weeks ago that we are living in the best of times. Today he reports that George Bush Knows His History.

Barone notes we are seeing record worldwide economic growth and we are at a low point in armed conflict in the world. Barone also believes that we were lucky we had Harry Truman 50 years ago, and today we are lucky to have a president who takes bold action and braves vitriolic criticism to defend our civilization against those who would destroy it.

Michael Barone is right on. The Left may want to think again before they start comparing the War in Iraq with the War in Vietnam, or any other US war.

The reality is, there is no comparison! Comparing fatality figures for American Wars relative to the size of the US population you see that the Iraq War is like no other!

This was posted earlier by anonymous and I thought it was worth repeating for those who are stuck in their own mental quagmire:

There were a little over 2 million Americans in 1776–3,929,214 on the 1790 census. Our population is 100xs as much as it was during the Revolutionary War. In the War of 1812, the population was just over 7 million (7,239,881 on the 1812 census). For the Civil War, our population was right at 30 million–on tenth what it is now. We were at half of our current population during the second World War, and at 183,285,009 on the 1960 census at the eve of Vietnam.

In other words, while every American life is precious, if you what to know the true impact of war casualties as percentage of population–you need to do the following:

If Iraq 2475 (6-5-2006), Then:

Vietnam = 88,433
WWII = 890,042
Civil War = 4,765,813
Revolutionary War = 2,104,062
And, so on…


The simple fact of the matter is that the anti-war movement, many who, if you look at their histories, had no problems with the Soviets in Afghanistan, or the Marxist Sandinistas–both who waged much bloodier wars that what we are currently seeing in Iraq–have FRAMED this argument to fool the American people. It is truly disgusting.

Population and Fatality Numbers taken from American War Library, Census.gov and US Civil War Center. 2003 population from Census.gov

And, here is something I picked up on the cost of this war…

Cost of War
American War Library

American Revolution: $3.2 billion.
War of 1812: $1 billion.
Mexican War: $1.8 billion.
Civil War: $50 billion Union, $21.8 billion Confederacy.
Spanish-American War: $6.5 billion.
World War I: $588 billion.
World War II: $4.8 trillion.
Korean War: $408 billion.
Vietnam War: $584 billion.
Persian Gulf War of 1991: $82 billion. Contributions from U.S. allies ended up covering more than 90 percent of this war’s costs.
Operation Iraqi Freedom: $197 billion, as of March 2006.

Hat Tip to Ben Phillips

Bill Crawford also shares some good news from Iraq, today.

Previously:
Charting the Iraq War
So, How Bad Are Things in Iraq Really?

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Jim Hoft is the founder and editor of The Gateway Pundit, one of the top conservative news outlets in America. Jim was awarded the Reed Irvine Accuracy in Media Award in 2013 and is the proud recipient of the Breitbart Award for Excellence in Online Journalism from the Americans for Prosperity Foundation in May 2016. In 2023, The Gateway Pundit received the Most Trusted Print Media Award at the American Liberty Awards.

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Thanks for sharing!