American Casualties of Modern Wars

Yeah but look at the losses taken by insurgents from Western Troops vice versa.
I made this thread because I've been wondering, just how in the FUCK did the Taliban manage to grab all that land and influence despite its heavy losses?

>Taliban
>Middle east
Be more specific next time.
Taliban are in "Afghanistan" which is a country with artificial borders defined by western powers within the last century with a tribal culture and people who simply don't recognize those borders.
It's a bunch of mountains and just generally a pain in the ass to take, but the US also hasn't gone balls to the wall which would go against the current idea of getting the ANA to be independent (lol) of western support and fight their own battles and police their own country.

You're basically fighting a hydra and always will be in that part of the world. We'll be there forever and will not get a return on that investment. The Taliban know they just have to exist in their own country long enough and the US will either fuck off on its own or get involved in a war somewhere else.

>Taliban
>Middle east
Wow, sorry for my ignorance, fren. When you think of Islamic republics you typically think of the Middle East. I didn't know the country was actually in South Central Asia.
I guess it's kind of like how people assume Iceland and Finland are Scandinavia. My mistake.

500,000 is a literal meme, even when taking into account wounded and missing. That said, I dont trust official figures either and wouldnt be suprised if civilian casualties were 80,000 or even inching toward 100,000.

Its easy to be popular when you are the only guys promising to kick out people who are seen as foreign invaders. It doesnt matter that the Afghanistan government has welcomed our help because the government, and the concept of Afghanistan itself, doesnt exist for most of these people. Familial affiliations, village militias, and tribal trade links are the furthest extent of interaction with the greater world for a lot of these people. Kabul for all intents and purposes is a city state.

You're basically saying "Asia" when referring to the Japanese in terms of territory, you retard.
The Taliban don't give a shit about Iraq and we don't fight them in Iraq.

Why is this board he first fucking place you go to get information that is easily googled and you feign some sort of interest? It's pretty obvious you have no real interest in the Taliban or the conflict at large.

Calling the Taliban the rulers at any point in Afghanistan would be something of a misnomer. It'd to be more accurate to say that they were the most successful militia in the country and killed enough of their rivals that they could drive around the country doing whatever they wanted. Like others have said, Afghanistan is barely a country in the way we recognize the concept, if it ever has been at all. If you'd seen for yourself you would understand better. Much of the country is barely out of the stone age, and I mean that pretty literally. No electricity, running water, plumbing, anything. If they're remote enough it's likely that a significant part of the village has literally never left. That village is their entire world. Afghanistan is just the word we use to represent the collection of mostly unrelated 21st century homesteaders and the land they occupy.

Body counts don't matter anymore, we learned this in Vietnam. All it gives you is a gauge of how much you're spending to kill.

Sorry I thought you were talking about Iraq only. Yeah half a million is possible in Iraq plus Afghanistan.

No, the thread was made generally on Modern Warfare and casualty rates. I was just trying to use those conflicts as examples to see the effectiveness of Western Military power vs Dune Hoppers and how it's played out over the years.

where it says casualty, it means deaths though.

Go home Lancet, you're drunk.

Especially given MRAP, body armor and other things. Without those? Theyd have a positive kill ratio.
By presenting fairer, less biased justice system. One that mothers could get justice from. Our forces defend opium growers, serial child rapists, and outright banditry so long as they take a paycheck. We failed, completely, at building a viable government worth a damn, because we didnt want to offend the locals or be imperialist. Its bullshit, supremely pointless bullshit now that Osama is dead.

The campaign wasn't successful even though we killed a shit ton of hajis. Keep in mind actual deaths are far lower than they used to be with body armor, quick evacuation to FSTs, wide use of tourniquets, and armored vehicles.

One thing to keep in mind is many civilian casualties were not on us at all, I'd even say the majority are not. Yes, we are indirectly responsible since our invasion allowed the sectarian war to go up to 11 on a 1-10 scale.

I was in Iraq in 06-07, and it was mostly locals just killing each other. Sunnis and Shiites going at it was hands down the largest cause of civilian casualties. Day after day, they went tit-for-tat. Sunni attack one day, Shiite attack the next. We were not the primary targets then, their neighbors were the primary targets.

My platoon didn't kill much more than two dozen combatants (that we know about) in our entire deployment, while we witnessed civilians bombing with around 500 killed.

We did have one incident where we killed six IP in a truck in the middle of the night, they engaged our trucks thinking we were hajj, and our front truck went to town with a ma deuce, which turned their truck and everyone in it into swiss cheese.

Pic related is not my photo, but this represents a common scene we saw over and over during our deployment. At that point and time, we responded to two of the largest mass bombing that had occured in Iraq. Between those two attacks alone, there was around 350 dead. You don't get a sense of it until you see torn up bodies stacked on each other in the back of a bongo truck.

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iraqi here.

what you say is true.

what 'IP' stands for tho

>USA (2,419), UK (456)
How large were the british forces compared to the American?

>how in the FUCK did the Taliban manage to grab all that land and influence despite its heavy losses?
I wonder..
Look at just last week
washingtonexaminer.com/news/us-drone-strike-in-afghanistan-reportedly-kills-30-pine-nut-farm-workers

Iraqi Police buddy, which we didn't trust at all for numerous reasons. Sincerely hope all is well for you and yours. Take care

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thanks, take care fellow Jow Forumsommando.

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