The Iraqi Body Count: Pretty reliable information on the body count.
A summary of the fourth year, which gives you a quick impression.
Baghdad, mapping the violence: Shows a map of Baghdad and the bomb attacks. Shows only attacks resulting in 10+ deaths. It also shows the ethnic composition of the neighbourhoods, and the segregation of the last year.Also, as requested by Annom, a poll of Iraq.
Since the figures aren't so clear, here is the full article. The Poll itself can be found here(pdf).For everyone who still wants more, some here, the rest can be found here.
Thanks for this post! Interesting stuff!
ReplyDeleteI would like to know how those figures would look if the UN had done the invasion in a total different way. People really were happy about the invastion in the first year. Civil war might have been inevitable, but I don't think the USA did the best thing to avoid this.
This graph shows they fucked up.
Good post,
ReplyDeleteIt's been 4 years all ready o.O
well, time flies when your having fun...
Good question Annom, don't know realy. It's a complicated situation down there, has been and will be for quite some time. Maybe the UN would have done things differently but wether or not that would make a huge difference in today's situation, I don't know.
Good post, good labeling also :)
ReplyDeleteThe UN would most likely have brought more goodwill among the population. The UN has a much less aggressive and dominant style.
But the religious tensions might be unavoidable without a ruthless ruling like before the invasion.
That's a shocking graph, Annom!
ReplyDeleteI guess we can speak of chaos in Iraq, with 73 civilians dying every day.
The US have made a lot of mistakes (i.e. the hanging of Saddam pissed of lots of Sunni's) in Iraq, and did not think everything over. IMO, this country wasn't ready for democracy, after 24 years of Saddam.
I don't think the UN would have done a much better job. They are slow, and lack of consensus.
Take a look at Darfur for example.
They couldn't even assemble an independent team of investigators.
Yeah, I was talking about a ideal UN intervention. Not the way the do(read don't) do it now.
ReplyDeleteChange UN in my previous post with a coalition of Canada, Holland, Belgium, Germany, Finland, Denmark and maybe France and the UK.
I'm not sure what you mean by "ready for a democracy". What would have made them ready for a democracy? I don't think Saddam would have made them ready for a democracy. Even today most Iraqi want a democracy.
It takes a lot of time and effort to bring a stable decent democracy in Iraq. You need the peoples army to fight for a democracy to be able to "win". I think education and freedom of and easy access to information is the most important to get the people ready for a democracy.
Even the chaos in Iraq right now could be worth it in the end in my opinion. That doesn't mean I think this was the best way to get rid of Saddam, but I can't say it has fully failed. I still see some hope that this might be good in the long run(read: 10-100years), but I'm aware that is a very optimistic way of thinking.
Maybe I need to explain myself a bit.
ReplyDeleteBy 'not ready for democracy' I meant this:
After 24 years of saddam wiping out every bit of opposition, most of the iraqi leaders only understand violence and revenge.
The change should have been less abrupt and more moderate.
bad example:
if you give a starving kid all he can eat, he'll eat him self to death.