Gideon Polya, “Iraq: Genocide by All Definition. Bush’s Iraq war. 2 million Iraqi excess deaths”, MWC News, 29 September 2007, partly cached by Google.
Iraq: Genocide by All Definition. Bush’s Iraq war. 2 million Iraqi excess deaths
Excess deaths (avoidable deaths, deaths that should not have happened) provide a key, fundamental, bottom-line measure of the human consequences of human actions. Excess deaths can be violence-related (from bombs and bullets) or non-violent (due to deprivation).
Recent authoritative estimates of violence-related post-invasion excess deaths in occupied Iraq (as of September 2007) are of 1.2 million (from the expert UK ORB polling company) and 0.8 million (from the top US Bloomberg School of Public Health group at Johns Hopkins University who estimated 0.6 million violent deaths as of July 2006).
Authoritative estimates of non-violent post-invasion excess deaths in Occupied Iraq as of September 2007 are of 0.7 million (from the latest UN Population Division data) and of 0.8 million (calculated from United Nations Children’s Fund, UNICEF, data on post-invasion under-5 year old infant deaths; for impoverished Third World countries the under-5 infant deaths are about 0.7 of the total excess deaths, as described in the MWC News article “Layperson’s Guide to Counting Iraq Deaths”).
We can now estimate total post-invasion violent and non-violent occupied Iraqi excess deaths and these clearly range from 0.7 million + 0.8 million = 1.5 million (minimum estimate) to 0.8 million + 1.2 million = 2.0 million (upper estimate).
I recently sent a letter to the Australian Green, Democrat and some Opposition Labor MPs informing them of the latest authoritative estimates of 1.5-2 million post-invasion Iraqi excess deaths, a US$2.3 trillion accrual cost for the Iraq War (according to 2001 US Economics Nobel Laureate Professor Joseph Stiglitz), 4.2 million Iraqi refugees and huge war crimes associated with the US Coalition occupation of Iraq - yet now the latest US, UK and Spanish Mainstream media reports say that Bush rejected Saddam Hussein's pre-war offer to leave for a mere US$1 billion.
My conclusion from this immense disparity is that the war and occupation was about oil, hegemony and control as clearly indicated recently by the former US Federal Reserve Head Alan Greenspan and by outstanding US scholar Professor Noam Chomsky (from "63-Nobel-Laureate" Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT).
War for profit is a war crime. Nobel Laureate Harold Pinter has demanded war crimes trials for Bush and Blair, asking "“How many people do you have to kill before you qualify to be described as a mass murderer and a war criminal? One hundred thousand? More than enough, I would have thought." 2 million? More than enough, I would have thought.
For the thoroughly referenced letter with detailed documentation of all of these matters see; the letter to Australian MPs (with most links removed for ease of reading) is reproduced below for your information and convenience.
THE LETTER
Dear Mr, Mrs, Ms, Dr, Senator …,
Re 1.5-2 million Iraq War excess deaths, $2.3 trillion accrual cost & war crimes trials
As a senior scientist and responsible Australian citizen I have been writing to media and political representatives for the last 4 years alerting them to a mounting Holocaust in Occupied Iraq and Afghanistan. My representations have been overwhelmingly IGNORED in a process of continuing Holocaust Denial except by the Australian Greens, the Australian Democrats, some morally-responsive Labor Opposition MPs and a range of mostly Alternative media throughout the World. Indeed I have published and widely disseminated copies of a book on the subject, “Body Count. Global avoidable mortality since 1950” (G.M. Polya, Melbourne, 2007: and MWC News ).
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) has just published a book “Lies, Deep Fries & Statistics” (ed. Robyn Williams, ABC Books, Sydney, 2007) that includes a chapter by me entitled “Australian Complicity in Iraq Mass Mortality” in which I conservatively estimated Occupied Iraq post-invasion excess deaths of 0.4 million as of early 2005 (my estimate did not include violent deaths) (for on-line version see ) .
As of September 2007 the total post-invasion Occupied Iraq violent and non-violent excess deaths can be estimated at 1.5-2.0 million (the accrual cost of the war as estimated by Nobel Laureate Professor Joseph Stiglitz (Columbia) is about $2.3 trillion; and recent “insider” revelations squarely expose oil and hegemony as the core reasons for the invasion and occupation of Iraq.
Post-invasion, violence-related deaths in Iraq have been estimated by the expert UK ORB polling company to be 1.2 million, this estimate being consonant with 5 estimates of post-invasion Iraq excess deaths from 4 other authoritative data sets. However the ORB report has been almost completely ignored by Mainstream media and politicians, leading to public protest from top US medical epidemiologists Professors Gilbert Burnham (Johns Hopkins University) and Les Roberts (Columbia University) (see: here):
“Ignorance of Iraqi death toll [is] no longer an option. Not wanting to think about civilian deaths in Iraq has become almost universal. The average American believed approximately 9,900 Iraqis had died as a result of the war according to a February 2007 AP poll. Unfortunately, recent evidence suggests that things in Iraq may be one-hundred times worse than Americans realize… Being forthright about the human cost of the war, perhaps over a million deaths to date, is in our long-term interests… Established methods for estimating deaths exist, even in times of war. Discussion of trends and policy effects based on meaningful and validated measures such as median income and death rates would make our leaders more accountable and leave us better informed. Deliberately ignoring the numbers of dead Iraqis is not an option worthy of the United States, or in our enlightened self-interest."
It has now been reported that pre-invasion Saddam Hussein offered to go into exile for $1 billion (see the circa 27-28 September 2007 UK Daily Mail, UK Telegraph, and US Washington Post ). This is revealed from the transcript of talks on 22 February 2003 between George Bush and the then Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar at the President's Texas ranch which were recorded by a diplomat and which were published on 25 September 2007 in the Spanish newspaper El Pais.
Simply consider that $1 billion offer versus the horrendous human and financial cost of the Iraq War (US$):
1. $0.5 trillion cost accounting cost of the Iraq War to the US so far.
2. $2.3 trillion accrual cost of the Iraq War (according to 2001 US economics Nobel Laureate Professor Joseph Stiglitz (Columbia) and his colleague Professor Linda Bilmes (Harvard University).
3. $2.5 trillion accrual cost of the War on Terror overall (according to 2001 US economics Nobel Laureate Professor Joseph Stiglitz (Columbia) and his colleague Professor Linda Bilmes (Harvard University).
4. 4,101 US Coalition deaths and 28,000 US soldiers wounded so far.
5. 1.2 million post-invasion violence-related Occupied Iraqi deaths were recently reported by the expert UK ORB market analysis company (see: as compared to 0.8 million post-invasion violent deaths estimated (as of September 2007) from the latest medical literature data and 0.7-0.8 million non-violent post-invasion excess deaths (deaths from deprivation and estimated from UN agency data ). The ORB data has not been reported by Mainstream media except for the Los Angeles Times and the UK Guardian/Observer. The total post-invasion violent and non-violent excess deaths in Iraq now total 1.5-2.0 million.
6. 0.5 million post-invasion under-5 infant deaths - 90% avoidable and largely due to gross US Coalition violation of the Geneva Convention that unequivocally demands that the Occupying Power does everything “to the fullest extent of the means available to it” to keep its conquered subjects alive (see Articles 55 and 56 of the Geneva Convention Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War ); the “total annual per capita medical expenditure” permitted in Occupied Iraq by the US Coalition is $135 (2004) as compared to $2,560 (UK), $3,123 (Australia) and $6,096(the US) (see WHO).
7. More than 4.2 million Iraqi refugees have left their homes with more than 2 million fleeing the country (according to UNHCR).
Ergo, George W. Bush simply wanted to violently occupy Iraq for oil and hegemony - for a detailed strategic analysis indicating exactly that by outstanding US scholar Professor Noam Chomsky of 63-Nobel-Laureate MIT see: here ; and for the “oil confession” by former Reserve head Alan Greenspan, see: MWC News .
The Iraq War has been an immense war crime for profit and hegemony and because of the enormous loss of life involves capital offences under US Federal Law .
The time for Media, politician and bureaucrat lying by commission and omission is over. It is high time for war crimes trials and indeed formal complaints have been lodged. Such prosecution has been demanded by no less than UK Nobel Laureate Harold Pinter back in 2005 when Mainstream media who actually cared to report post-invasion Iraq civilian deaths estimated “100,000” (in his 2005 Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech: “The invasion of Iraq was a bandit act, an act of blatant state terrorism, demonstrating absolute contempt for the concept of international law. The invasion was an arbitrary military action inspired by a series of lies upon lies and gross manipulation of the media and therefore of the public; an act intended to consolidate American military and economic control of the Middle East masquerading as a last resort all other justifications having failed to justify themselves as liberation. A formidable assertion of military force responsible for the death and mutilation of thousands and thousands of innocent people.
We have brought torture, cluster bombs, depleted uranium, innumerable acts of random murder, misery, degradation and death to the Iraqi people and call it 'bringing freedom and democracy to the Middle East'.
How many people do you have to kill before you qualify to be described as a mass murderer and a war criminal? One hundred thousand? More than enough, I would have thought. Therefore it is just that Bush and Blair be arraigned before the International Criminal Court of Justice.”.
Two million? More than enough, I would have thought.
Silence kills and silence is complicity. We cannot walk by on the other side. Please send, publish, and otherwise disseminate this document to everyone in your ambit in the interests of Humanity.
Yours sincerely,
Dr Gideon Polya
Macleod, Melbourne, Australia
28 September 2007
I received a prompt reply from a very decent Member of the Australian Parliament who thanked me for the information and made it clear that the current awful threat to Iran was a key concern and that they were now “trying to highlight the PR campaign from the USA to soften up the public for an onslaught in Iran”.
US Mainstream media and politicians in Australia and around the world continue to ignore these horrendous consequences of Bush’s war policies. The bigger picture of the Bush Family war policies in Iraq since 1990 is summarized thus: violent Iraqi deaths in the Gulf War (also involving US deception) 0.2 million; 1990-2003 Iraqi excess deaths under US-UN Sanctions 1.7 million; post-invasion Iraqi excess deaths 2.0 million.
The Bush Wars against Iraq have (so far) killed about 4 million Iraqis out of an average 1990-2007 population of about 24 million and created over 4.2 million refugees – this clearly constituting Genocide as defined by the UN Genocide Convention. We are witnessing a continuing Iraqi Holocaust and Iraqi Genocide that is ignored by the racist, holocaust-ignoring, holocaust-denying, Bush Mainstream media of the perpetrator countries.
Just compare this continuing atrocity with the Nazi German Jewish Holocaust – 5 million killed, 1 million excess deaths from starvation and deprivation i.e. about 6 million excess deaths out of a Jewish population in Nazi Europe of about 9 million and a total world Jewish population at the time of about 15 million (see: . Gilbert, M. (1969), Jewish History Atlas (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London) and Gilbert, M. (1982), Atlas of the Holocaust (Michael Joseph, London)).
Peaceful, remote, non-nuclear-armed, NPT-signatory, non-aggressive, non-foreign country invading or occupying Iran has a population of over 70 million (three quarters of whom are Women and Children). We must all stand up to prevent the next, looming Bush-ite atrocity now being daily adumbrated for Iran - and demand the prosecution of Bush and his war criminal, mass murdering, racist accomplices in the horrendous Iraqi Holocaust.