Facts From The Forgotten War

afghanstian
Originally uploaded by Randuwa.

The enduring war for freedom....

That's Afghanistan, BTW.

Since we first engaged the Taliban and routed them from this poorest of central Asian nations the following facts are worth some scrutiny.

Americans Killed and Wounded

356 Americans have been killed. The breakout by year looks like this:

2001 - 12
2002 - 48
2003 - 48
2004 - 52
2005 - 99
2006 - 97 to date

As a teacher under No Child Left Behind in a county that has embraced a Standards-Based Curriculum, we are taught to grade according to the trend and not the average....the trend isn't very pretty.

A look at the wounded who have required air-transport for medical attention beggars even more questions.

Wounded in combat - 633
Injured in Non-Hostile events - 1,327
Disease - 3,605

Disease? Is there a plague in Afghanistan that we've not been told about? Past the middle ages, has there been a war were illness trumped combat in threat to the welfare of the troups by a factor of 6 to 1?

Afghanistan is a coalition affair. The top 10 nations who have seen casualties in the war for Enduring Freedom in descending order are:

1) USA - 356
2) Canada - 44
3) United Kingdom - 42
4) Spain - 19
5) Germany - 18
6) France - 9
7) Italy - 9
8) the Netherlands - 4
9) Romania - 4
10) Denmark - 3

And things in Afghanistan have been and are deteriorating as regional "war lords" reassert their power and control. As the Taliban picks up the pieces wherever they can -- to quote Monte Python: "They're not dead yet!" And as the herione/poppy trade undergirds the local economies of so much of the nation again, it's only lucrative resource.