At least 1,16,000 Iraqi civilians and more than 4,800 coalition troops died in Iraq between the outbreak of war in 2003 and the US withdrawal in 2011, researchers said on Friday.
Its involvement in Iraq has so far cost the United States USD 810 billion (625 billion euros) and could eventually reach USD 3 trillion, they added.
The estimates come from two US professors of public health, reporting in the British peer-reviewed journal The Lancet. They base the figures on published studies in journals and on reports by government agencies, international organisations and the news media.
‘We conclude that at least 116,903 Iraqi non-combatants and more than 4,800 coalition military personnel died over the eight-year course of the war from 2003 to 2011’, they said.
‘Many Iraqi civilians were injured or became ill because of damage to the health-supporting infrastructure of the country, and about five million were displaced. More than 31,000 US military personnel were injured and a substantial percentage of those deployed suffered post-traumatic stress disorder, traumatic brain injury, and other neuropsychological disorders and their concomitant psychosocial problems,’ they added.
Citing figures from the website costofwar.com, which looks at funding allocated by Congress, the study said that as of 15 January this year, the Iraq War had cost the United States about USD 810 billion, ‘not including interest on debt.’ ‘The ultimate cost of the war to the USA could be USD 3 trillion,’ it said.
US SPIES ‘LEARNING LESSONS’ FROM IRAQ WMD DISASTER
Spy agencies still live under the shadow of disastrous intelligence failures that paved the way for the Iraq war, and now face a crucial test as they track Iran’s nuclear program.
In the run-up to the invasion of Iraq 10 years ago, the CIA and other intelligence services confidently asserted that Saddam Hussein's regime had stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction.
Their findings backed up the White House’s strongly-held conviction that Saddam was a menace who had to be toppled by force. But it turned out the intelligence community was ‘dead wrong in almost all of its pre-war judgments about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction,’ according to an official inquiry, the Silberman-Robb report.
The spy services failed to collect solid information, botched their analysis and reached conclusions based on flawed assumptions instead of evidence, making it ‘one of the most public, and most damaging, intelligence failures in recent American history,’ the 2005 report said. Despite a desperate search for arsenals after the invasion, no WMDs were found.
Its involvement in Iraq has so far cost the United States USD 810 billion (625 billion euros) and could eventually reach USD 3 trillion, they added.
The estimates come from two US professors of public health, reporting in the British peer-reviewed journal The Lancet. They base the figures on published studies in journals and on reports by government agencies, international organisations and the news media.
‘We conclude that at least 116,903 Iraqi non-combatants and more than 4,800 coalition military personnel died over the eight-year course of the war from 2003 to 2011’, they said.
‘Many Iraqi civilians were injured or became ill because of damage to the health-supporting infrastructure of the country, and about five million were displaced. More than 31,000 US military personnel were injured and a substantial percentage of those deployed suffered post-traumatic stress disorder, traumatic brain injury, and other neuropsychological disorders and their concomitant psychosocial problems,’ they added.
Citing figures from the website costofwar.com, which looks at funding allocated by Congress, the study said that as of 15 January this year, the Iraq War had cost the United States about USD 810 billion, ‘not including interest on debt.’ ‘The ultimate cost of the war to the USA could be USD 3 trillion,’ it said.
US SPIES ‘LEARNING LESSONS’ FROM IRAQ WMD DISASTER
Spy agencies still live under the shadow of disastrous intelligence failures that paved the way for the Iraq war, and now face a crucial test as they track Iran’s nuclear program.
In the run-up to the invasion of Iraq 10 years ago, the CIA and other intelligence services confidently asserted that Saddam Hussein's regime had stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction.
Their findings backed up the White House’s strongly-held conviction that Saddam was a menace who had to be toppled by force. But it turned out the intelligence community was ‘dead wrong in almost all of its pre-war judgments about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction,’ according to an official inquiry, the Silberman-Robb report.
The spy services failed to collect solid information, botched their analysis and reached conclusions based on flawed assumptions instead of evidence, making it ‘one of the most public, and most damaging, intelligence failures in recent American history,’ the 2005 report said. Despite a desperate search for arsenals after the invasion, no WMDs were found.