Site icon Ernst Kappa

An eye for an eye… or two: Comparing death tolls

As of April 2011, the number of estimated deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan including military and civilians almost doubled the casualties of the 9/11 attacks. But to be fair, 19 of these last ones were hijackers, so I’m thinking Americans would agree they can burn in hell.

Assumptions:

– Osama Bin Laded was actually the master mind of 9/11
– Three planes could possibly be hijacked without U.S. authorities being able to stop any of them
– A plane, which fuselage wreck, seats, bodies, luggage, etc was never evidenced, actually crashed at the Pentagon
– The steel structure of the Twin Towers could possibly melt down to the ground by the combustion of the plane crash… after 11 and 9 seconds of being hit, respectively.
– 7 World Trade Center collapsed even when no plane crashed against it
– Etc, etc, etc…

Even if the latter is true, how could we possibly be opening champagne bottles and celebrating the death of a man, like if we had won the world cup, while forgetting all what happened in between 09/11/2001 and 05/02/2011?

So what are we celebrating again? I just wonder if Afghanistan’s and Iraqis would be as happy as Americans are right now whenever George Bush dies. I think they should be a little pissed off provided that Bin Laden was not even born in any of those countries and still they payed the consequences. After all it seems like an eye for an eye game… or two.

“An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind…” – Mahatma Gandhi

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UPDATE: Sept 12, 2011

“According to some studies, at least 137,000 civilians have died violently in Afghanistan and Iraq in the last ten years; among Iraqis alone, there are 1.8 million refugees and 1.7 million internally displaced people….”

Extract from Joseph Stiglitz article: http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/stiglitz142/English

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http://projects.washingtonpost.com/fallen/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coalition_casualties_in_Afghanistan
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War

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