Monday, February 12, 2007

Female fatalities

Everyone knows women are banned from combat operations in the US armed forces. But, as with so much else, Iraq has broken the rules--in this case, of engagement. Anyone care to guess how many women have been killed in Iraq? How about the last two or three wars?

5 comments:

SS97 said...

60 women in Iraq and Afghanistan?

mishdiaz said...

I seem to remember around 10 nurses in Vietnam... and a couple in Korea... but was that the extent of their service? Also I think that the women who served in the factories making bombs and such should be considered casualties too... the girls with the yellow hands? In Iraq the first Gulf war I do remember the two woman POW's and of course the little gal that was taken prisoner the first of this second gulf war and rescued..and all over the news. I am thinking around 60 sounds right for the fatalities this time around.... and around 500 casualties? Anyone know for sure? I do know that women are on the Navy ships since I have a friend on a ship in the gulf right now.

moville said...

actually, the toll is higher than 60--75 to this point. I seem to remember something like 28 women, all nurses, killed in Vietnam. I'm not sure about I gulf war.
i don't mean to imply that the men's deaths are insignificant. i draw attention to the women only because they are technically forbidden in combat situations. But this war is waged everywhere--in the market, at checkpoints, at the PET sale--so there ARE no official combat situations any more. Everyone is a target all the time, unfortunately.

german said...

i don't mean to be cruel or insinsitive but i do think its time reevaluation deploying women to foreign soil. its only time until some unfortunate women gets captured raped and totally brutalized by the evil there and sadly they will probably televise it on al jihad news on the internet. i don't want to see that but i think that might be the next step for them to try to get us out

moville said...

i think that is entirely possible, though it would be difficult for the jihadis to square torturing a woman with their hands-off, antediluvian views on females...maybe the nationality would trump all other considerations, but i'm not so sure.
On the other hand, Insurgents killed that British aid worker, whose first name was Margaret, a couple of years ago--despite her years of service to the people of Iraq.