May 2003

Since the invasion of Iraq has ended, a tone of vindication and bravado has seeped into the national mood. Television newscasters and the Department of Defense agree: America is delighted. Soldiers are giving high-fives. Those of us who opposed the president and his generals should be ashamed in the face of a brilliantly successful war.

There is one question, above others, that this prevailing self-satisfaction works to silence. Amidst the atmosphere of recrimination, few will risk asking, "What was the cost?"

On televisions overseas, the Marine blitz and Air Force bombs extracted a human price. While Donald Rumsfeld's talking head became the singular icon of war in the United States, the rest of the world held up photos of Ali Ismaeel Abbas, the 12-year-old boy who lost his parents and eight other relatives, along with both of his arms, in the bombing of Baghdad.

No doubt some have exploited such images for propagandistic purposes. No doubt the pursuit of carnage at times became tasteless sensationalism. But what was the impact for Americans of seeing so few, if any, of those who died?

There are estimates available of the number of civilians killed in the war. A group of 19 volunteers in England, the creators of a Web site called "IraqBodyCount.net," estimate that there were a "minimum" of 2,050 deaths as of late April, when the actual invasion ended. This total reflects the lowest numbers provided in news reports of deadly incidents. A more complete tally would have to add the hundreds, maybe thousands, whose deaths were never reported by any source -- those buried quietly in the rubble, or those who were wounded and later died in one of Iraq's overflowing, and ultimately looted, hospitals.

No country, "coalition" or otherwise, has undertaken this reckoning. "A Swiss government initiative launched in the middle of the war," says John Sloboda of IraqBodyCount, "was abandoned under political pressure."

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