On 11 Aug 2002 at 19:40, Hermit wrote:

He is right that counting is not value-free.  Undercounting is welcomed
and pursued by one side that wishes to minimize public opinion
dissatisfaction with the conduct of a war, and overcounting is welcomed
and pursued by the other side, which wishes to maximize same,
especially when it is combined with accusations of reckless and
indiscriminate targeting and threats of war crimes trials.
>
<big snip>
> In war, counting is not value-free. To overlook or underestimate the
> civilian dead gives rein to the enthusiasts of precision-guided
> weaponry. It is an invitation to proliferation of war. The thousands
> of Afghan civilians who perished did so because US military and
> political elites chose to carry out a bombing campaign using extremely
> powerful weaponry in civilian-rich areas (the isolated training camps
> were largely destroyed during the first week).
>
> For political reasons, it has been necessary to hide the human carnage
> on Afghan soil as much as possible from the western public. Given that
> many of the bombing attacks - such as those on civilian infrastructure
> (cars, clinics, radio stations, bridges) and those during November and
> December on anything rolling on the roads of southern Afghanistan -
> violated the rules of war, there are war crimes that need to be
> investigated. An inadequate count will make it impossible for the
> families of those wrongfully killed to get the compensation to which
> they are entitled. It will also impede international justice.

---

The
> author is an associate professor at the University of New Hampshire,
> US. His writing on the human costs of the Afghan bombing campaign can
> be found at www.cursor.org; his database of Afghan civilian casualties
> is at http://pubpages.unh.edu/~mwherold
>
> ----
> This message was posted by Hermit to the Virus 2002 board on Church of
> Virus BBS.
> <http://virus.lucifer.com/bbs/index.php?board=51;action=display;thread
> id=26029>