Talk:United States military casualties of war/Archive 1

Afghanistan
Afghanistan numbers come from:
 * 66 through June 27, 2003
 * Then one on June 28, 2003

Kingturtle


 * Can someone separate Afghanistan deaths from the military operations in the Philippines, Horn of Africa and Pankisi Gorge? I think the war in Afghanistan deserves a death count separate from all the others. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.105.21.234 (talk) 18:25, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

Lebanon
Shouldn't 'Reagan's War on Terrorism' be 'Beirut Intervention' or 'Lebanon Deployment'? The term Reagan's War on Terrorism seems somewhat NPOV, as would 'Lyndon B. Johnson's Vietnam War'. I'm sure the intent is not to make a POV comparison with the current War on Terrorism but it could be construed that way.Ark30inf 02:15, 27 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Cambodia
Are the Cambodia casualties of the early 1970s included in the Vietnam War totals, or do we need to make a new entry for Cambodia? Kingturtle 03:25, 6 Apr 2004 (UTC)
 * If you look at, you'll see that the estimates of the number of Americans killed in Vietnam vary by about 2000 one way or the other, whereas the estimated number killed in Cambodia is only about 500, so whether you include the losses in Cambodia (or Laos too, for that matter) or not, it's really within the margin of error. However, the number we have on this page presumably came from somewhere (it would be great if this page had sources for all the bald info it includes), and if we knew where, we could find out what was included. Neow 06:00, 6 Apr 2004 (UTC)
 * Casualty numbers for the major wars came from a Deptartment of Veteran's Affairs page (I can't find it right now- only off-site copies. It also listed last living veteran and number of living veterans.) Rmhermen 13:43, Apr 6, 2004 (UTC)
 * I found a good page at the VA and linked to it. Only some of the numbers in our table match what the VA page says. I wonder where the other numbers came from? Neow 18:36, 6 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Total casualties
We need to add another column for each war's total casualties. Kingturtle 00:27, 10 May 2004 (UTC)
 * Since we already have a total dead column, I presume you mean a total (dead+wounded) column. The difficulty arises through with what to call it, as that is sometimes called casualties while sometimes casualties is used to refer to deaths only. Besides all you need do is add the last two columns. (Or do you want to add civilian deaths?) Rmhermen 13:34, May 10, 2004 (UTC)


 * In a chart that is useful, one does not have to do math on his own. Total dead does not equate total casualties. Therefore, another column needs to be added. I'd do it, but I don't know the syntax for this kind of chart. Kingturtle 22:44, 10 May 2004 (UTC)


 * My issue is not the utility of that column but its naming. The word casualty is often and confusingly used when refering only to deaths, not deaths and wounded (or death and wounded and missing). Rmhermen 20:09, May 11, 2004 (UTC)


 * In the four definitions of the word casualty, none of them refer only to deaths...

1. An accident, especially one involving serious injury or loss of life. 2. One injured or killed in an accident: a train wreck with many casualties. 3. One injured, killed, captured, or missing in action through engagement with an enemy. Often used in the plural: Battlefield casualties were high. 4. One that is harmed or eliminated as a result of an action or a circumstance: The corner grocery was a casualty of the expanding supermarkets.
 * So I don't know where the confusion is. This article is meant to list casualty totals, and a column should be added. Kingturtle 22:27, 11 May 2004 (UTC)
 * I easily found many websites using "casualty" but only listing deaths before I wrote my previous comments. Besides we don't have a column yet for "missing in action" (remember that there are still 8,000 missing from Korea 50 years ago!) Without that the totals will be off. Rmhermen 20:52, May 12, 2004 (UTC)
 * Yes, a MIA column would be great too. Where can we get MIA data? Kingturtle 21:48, 12 May 2004 (UTC)

potential source for more info: http://www.cwc.lsu.edu/cwc/other/stats/warcost.htm - Kingturtle 00:52, 13 May 2004 (UTC)
 * I was first going to suggest using footnotes or a separate table for MIA's since very few wars have any. However the more I look the less sure I am that they are not already being counted in the "total dead" figure. Even from the First Gulf War of 17 missing, 16 are considered "presumed dead". Does that mean that they are part of the "total dead"? The numbers I found were:

Rmhermen 14:13, May 13, 2004 (UTC)
 * WWII 78,000
 * Korea 8,200
 * Vietnam 1859
 * Cold War 123
 * Gulf War I 1
 * Enduring Freedom 1?

Spanish American War
I also believe that these casualties are incorrect. In the Battles of San Juan Hill and El Caney the number of KIA exceed 500, yet this list the casualties at only 350. If you add up all the casualties killed in all the battles listed in the "Battles of the Spanish American War" you will easily come up with more than 600.
 * These numbers are taken from the Department of Veteran Affairs website. Rmhermen 18:22, May 22, 2005 (UTC)

War on Terrorism
Operation Enduring Freedom could be a subcategory of the War on Terrorism, since Rmhermen says it is Afghanistan & the Philippines only. What do you think? Copperchair 19:06, 9 August 2005 (UTC)
 * Don't need to take my word for it - read the article. Are there any other WoT military casualties? Rmhermen 21:53, August 9, 2005 (UTC)
 * I have reverted this again as Copperchair has failed to show that any of the casualties mentioned outside of Afghanistan and the Philippines or from any other program than Operation Enduring Freedom. Defining this by ambiguous political terms is not the best choice. Rmhermen 02:18, August 14, 2005 (UTC)
 * I have reverted the table back to wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as the Obama administration no longer uses the term "War on Terrorism".65.123.238.246 (talk) 17:53, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

WoT totals
There are 4 or 5 different totals for the WoT on the page, someone who has researched this enough should correct this.

IMO it would be better to seperate the totals for Iraq, Afghanistan/Pakistan and 'other'

Lenbrazil (talk) 15:12, 7 September 2011 (UTC) Yeah, I agree, its hyper obvious that the war on terror totals is showing some really old info in the graphs, like 6 000 some casualties, rather then 48 000. Ottawakismet (talk) 03:47, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Why wouldn't the 3000 American's civilians and military personel killed on 9-11-01 not count? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.147.194.97 (talk) 16:35, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

Iraq War: Incorrect Info?
The death of Sgt. George Alexander was the 2000th American combat fatality, there are something like 2124 total. Assuming combat fatality and KIA mean the same thing, the numbers are out of sync. Sherurcij 04:45, 3 November 2005 (UTC)

No, we was the 2,000th American fatality. As of November 5th, there have been 1601 combat fatalities. I think you may have been looking at total coalition fatalities. See www.icasualties.com for more details. czolgolz

I'm new to this page, but I'm unclear about the number of wounded indicated for the Iraq war. Over 40,000 is indicated, but when I read the reference page iCasualities, I see just under 30,000. Am I missing something, or is this incorrect? Pacohi (talk) 01:35, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

American casaulties in the Civil War
I assume this means just the Union side.However it can be misleading and could mean every American who died or was wounded.It clarify it myself but im not even sure myself what it meansDermo69

New research using census data suggests the number of deaths from the American Civil War was at least 750,000 and perhaps as high as 850,000. More information at this link. http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/09/20/recounting-the-dead/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.54.237.117 (talk) 18:38, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

MILHIST assessment
Rated as NA because this should be a list.--Looper5920 06:47, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Future plans
Eventually this page should include more information than just the table. World War II casualties is an example of what can be done. Civilian deaths need to be addressed. (The title of this article does not exclude them.) People should be able to tell at a glance which wars were the deadliest in raw numbers, and which were deadliest in terms of percentage of people killed. A chart like the following, which is a first draft, should be included--go ahead and fill it out more if you have the data, and then we'll move it to the article. —Kevin 17:24, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

Wars ranked by percentage of population killed

Northern Russian Expedition 1918-1919
Why isn't this conflict listed? We lost almost 200 soldiers. One of them is buried in my local cemetery. Czolgolz 18:09, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

See online articles: Northern Russian Expedition American Expeditionary Force Siberia —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.53.145.152 (talk) 18:35, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

War in Bosnia 1992-1995
The US never took part in the war in Bosnia, which ended with the signing of the General Framework Agreement for Peace (more commonly known as the Dayton Peace Agreement) in Paris on December 14, 1995. In early 1996 the USA deployed troops in Bosnia and Hercegovina, i.e. after the cessation of hostilities. Pursuant to UN Security Council Resolution 1031 these peace-keeping troops were part of, and operated under the command of NATO. The multi-national force went by the names of IFOR (Implementation FORce) and Operation Joint Endeavour; it was operational from 20 Dec. 1995 - 20 Dec. 1996, when its UN mandate ran out. Pursuant to UN Security Council Resolution 1088, the operation was continued as SFOR (Stabilisation FORce); it was gradually scaled down to its present 7,000 soldiers, who come from both NATO and non-NATO countries. While SFOR is operational until the present day, the USA withdrew its forces from the multinational force between 1998 and 2001.

Domovina 01:13, 20 October 2007 (UTC)domovina

Total deaths as a percentage of the U.S. population
How about a table ranking the wars by the percentage of the U.S. population killed in the war? I think I read somewhere that the Revolutionary War then becomes the bloodiest war in U.S. history. --Timeshifter (talk) 17:12, 13 January 2008 (UTC)


 * This is addressed in the table several sections above, which hasn't yet been completed or moved to the article. As a percentage of population, the Revolutionary War ranks second behind the Civil War, but was much deadlier than the world wars. —Kevin Myers 16:26, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

There is something wrong with the deaths as a percentage of population calculations for the Vietnam and Korean Wars. They are off by a factor of 10 or so. I didn't bother to look up the actual 1970 US population, but let's estimate it at 220 million. 58,151/220,000,000 gives me a death rate of 0.026% of the population. I don't feel confident enough to make changes on a Wiki page anyway. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 38.104.60.222 (talk) 16:12, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

New references
An IP user has added a lot of lesser known conflicts, such as cold war deployments. Great info, however the reference seems to only include Naval and Marine personel. Could someone clean this up a little? Czolgolz (talk) 15:26, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Citations 5,6,7,9 and 10 still only list marine/navy conflicts. This really needs to be fixed.Czolgolz (talk) 18:54, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Additional US War Casualites

 * North Korea {Cold War} 1959:1968-1969;1976;1984 killed 41; Wounded 5; 82 captured/released.
 * USS Liberty incident 1967 killed 34; Wounded 173
 * Vietnam War prior to 1964-US Casualites were Laos-2 killed in 1954 see ; Vietnam-195 killed {70 killed + 125 non hostile actions} from 1956-1963. See —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.53.145.100 (talk) 10:56, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

I think the dates for the Vietnam War should be changed on the table, as there were US casualties before 1964. Czolgolz (talk) 14:34, 23 April 2008 (UTC)
 * I have changed the start date of the Vietnam War to 1957, to concide with the first dates on the War memorial. I'd appreciate feedback. http://www.virtualwall.org/iPanels.htm Czolgolz (talk) 16:43, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

PS to War Casualites Updates: According to may 13, 2011 DOD POW/MIA:

Korean War-7995 unaccounted for. 675 repatriated of whom 162 identified —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.83.72.154 (talk) 15:16, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Correct Errors
"Dead as % of population" figures for Vietnam & Korea are wrong ... too low by about a factor of 10 ???? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.244.119.168 (talk) 03:05, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Deaths in American Revolution up to and including Yorktown was 4,435 according to US Dept of Defense, as listed here: http://hsus.cambridge.org/HSUSWeb/toc/treeTablePath.do?id=Ed1-5 Not sure why the other sources show numbers that are so much higher? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sprague (talk • contribs) 00:22, 22 October 2012 (UTC)

Addition of presidents and their parties
I really dont' think this is necessary, especially the party. Also, President Bush is not technically a 'junior' since he does not have the same name as his father. I really think such a major change needs to be discussed. Czolgolz (talk) 14:52, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Additional Conflicts
Maybe a section covering the casualties of smaller conflicts can be added, much in the way the section "Other Pirate Actions" and "Indian Wars" were added to cover smaller conflicts in those periods.

For example "Conflicts in the South Pacific" 1814-1898 (Including Marquasas, Fiji, Drummond, Samoa. The US Navy website gives a list of all Navy and Marine fatalities in the conflict during this period.

Another one could be "Maritime Security Operations 1831-1899" and include the smaller conflicts like China 1853-60, Shimonoseki, Formosa, Sumatra, Da Nang etc.

Likewise one can be made for Latin America in the mid 19th to early 20th centuries (Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Dominican Republic).

The Dominican Intervention 1916 on, should also be added. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 61.161.67.2 (talk) 15:01, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Also, the Wiki page KFOR Casualties lists 18 additional US fatalities (17 accidental, 1 Land Mine). So, for Kosovo, there should be a total of 20 fatalities. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 61.161.67.2 (talk) 11:38, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Deadliest battles
I haven't found any definitive list of America's deadliest battles, but that'd be something interesting to throw on here. The estimates always vary, and the straight definition of a battle varies, but it could be done. I'm pretty sure the top 3 are Meuse-Argonne Offensive, Battle of the Bulge and Battle of Okinawa. --PDTantisocial (talk) 07:39, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

"to present" as end date is ambiguous
For conflicts still in progress (e.g., Iraq, Afghanistan) the reader coming to this page cannot determine the period over which the counts relate. Suggest either put the end date in the table or -- since for current conflicts the date should contain the month and day -- to keep the table column clean, after "to present" use an asterisk and in the first space after the end of the table explicitly identify the end date. Myboswell (talk) 16:05, 17 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Agreed. The numbers listed are woefully out of date, leaving the reader with misinformation.  See http://icasualties.org/ for the latest info.  --Art Smart Chart/ Heart  04:49, 1 June 2010 (UTC)

Drug War
If we're going to have a section for the War on Terror, why not another line item for the nationally declared War on Drugs? I suspect there have been dozens of people killed on both sides of that war. I would be happy to add a line item for that, with all the requisite cites, but I don't want to go to the trouble if there's already been a consensus against such a line item. I don't see it on this talk page, but maybe it's been discussed in an archive. Please advise if you know one way or the other. Thanks. --Art Smart Chart/ Heart 04:44, 1 June 2010 (UTC)
 * The drug war is not a military conflict between two belligerents, additionally the casualties listed by the source are not military casualties but civilians killed in drug raids. It should be removed, and war on terror should be split up into the iraq war and operation enduring freedom.XavierGreen (talk) 23:14, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
 * If so, then the title of this article should be "United States military casualties of conflicts between two belligerents" instead of "United States casualties of war" --Art Smart Chart/ Heart  21:40, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
 * The war on drugs is not a military conflict, rather a war on a concept, the military is not actively engaged in drug enforcement, though i can see the merits for including military casualties suffered in coast guard raids or confrontations with smuggling vessels. But a source must be provided, the current source provides no data on military casualties only on civilians killed in interactions with police.XavierGreen (talk) 20:17, 22 July 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree that the chart should stay the way it is. 'War on drugs' was just a cute term by the Reagan administration. Why not include Roosevelt's War on Crime as well? Or the war on obesity, or illiteracy, etc. Czolgolz (talk) 01:53, 23 July 2010 (UTC)
 * The War on Terror is also a war on concept. Please explain how the War on Terror is qualitatively different than the War on Drugs.  Neither has been formally declared by the U.S. Congress, as mandated in the U.S. Constitution (and the same can be said of all conflicts post WWII).  Both involve use of the U.S. military abroad, plus federal and state agencies domestically.  True, there is a big difference quantitatively, but I'm asking what the difference is qualitatively.  --Art Smart Chart/ Heart  12:04, 23 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Let's all try to get our facts correct. The War on Drugs was formally declared by Richard Nixon on June 17, 1971.  It is not "just a cute term by the Reagan administration."  --Art Smart Chart/ Heart  12:12, 23 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Mia culpa. However, the war on terror is a kind of umbrella term covering the two declared wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. These charts only count military casualties, and the war on drugs would have been mostly civilian police. Czolgolz (talk) 14:03, 23 July 2010 (UTC)
 * The war on terror should not be listed either as it is a war on concept as well. Instead it should be broken into at least two parts and listed as Iraq war and Operation Enduring Freedom. If nessesary OEF can be broken down into its constituent operations such as oef-horn of africa, oef-phillipines, and oef-afghanistan.XavierGreen (talk) 19:14, 23 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Agreed. I would have no problem deleting both War on Drugs and War on Terror as wars on concepts.  Do we have a consensus?  Thanks, everyone.  --Art Smart Chart/ Heart  06:01, 24 July 2010 (UTC)

The section on the War on Drugs is highly POV. Also there are two dogs counted among the 42 casualties according to the source it sites. If there are any sources for specific operations (ie Colombia, Peru, Bolivia) they should be added. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.122.132.127 (talk) 19:19, 17 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Wrong. The dogs weren't counted among the 42.  Please check your facts.  Thanks.  --Art Smart Chart/ Heart  02:49, 18 August 2010 (UTC)


 * The fact that that particular "source" had dogs listed as victims (between Tarika Wilson and Isidro Aviles -- who is listed in spite of not being killed, just dying in prison after being convicted of committing a crime)of the War on Drugs should cast enough doubt, even if they aren't among the 42 you state here. It's a POV source at best, and rubbish at worst. It hardly belongs on what is supposed to be a neutral article.  69.122.132.127 (talk) 21:23, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

There is, however, neutral and sourced info about casualties sustained as part of the drug war in Colombia and elsewhere. For example, BBC news mentions a US piloted fumigation plane that crashed on April 8, 2003 killing the pilot. Other incidents are listed in it as well. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/2927241.stm

MSNBC has a similar one http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3225977/

UPI has an article about a USN helicopter that went down off of Colombia, killing 5, on December 14, 2005. http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2005/12/14/US-helicopter-crashes-near-Colombia/UPI-90211134552577/

If this is going to be a legitimate article, then more attention should be paid to what sources are used. 69.122.132.127 (talk) 21:36, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

In any case, it ought to be deleted because this article focuses on military casualties only. American civilian casualties aren't included for any of the other conflicts. 69.122.132.127 (talk) 23:03, 20 August 2010 (UTC)


 * The title of the article is "United States casualties of war", not "United States military casualties of war", the first sentence of the article notwithstanding. Why is that sentence even in the article, instead of naming the article to what you think is intended?  If the article is only to include military casualties, then it should be so named.  In either case, the first sentence should be removed.  It's contradictory as is, but if the article gets properly renamed, then it's redundant.  --Art Smart Chart/ Heart  02:37, 21 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Yet, that sentence is there. There is no column on the chart for civilians (the column you used was intended for non-hostile deaths). Even if that sentence wasn't there, there is still the matter of the source you took that data from.  The website is obviously pushing a POV, and as such doesn't mesh with Wikipedia standards. Why don't we put it up to a vote though, and see what everyone has to say? 69.122.132.127 (talk) 03:52, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I vote no on listing civilian casualties. Do we really want to research how many civilians died in the Civil War, the Indian Wars, etc. Plus the source is POV. Change the article title if you must, but don't include the drug war. Czolgolz (talk) 04:11, 21 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Wikipedia articles must have neutral POV, but sources are not required to be. Otherwise, no blogs could be used as sources.  The requirement is verifiability.  Many of the line items in this article have no reference at all.  Should they all be deleted?  At least the line item in dispute HAS a source.  Your quarrel with its point of view, which I do not concede, reveals your own.  --Art Smart Chart/ Heart  04:15, 21 August 2010 (UTC)


 * I vote no. It doesn't fit here. If we were to include it, we might as well list every case were someone (deserving or not) was either killed by the police or died in jail.  It might fit in the general page on the "War on Drugs", but not here.  This is addition to the obvious issues with source itself.  It is basically one person's view on those particular killings, as such even the information he presents is suspect and has no place on this page. 69.122.132.127 (talk) 04:34, 21 August 2010 (UTC)


 * I would agree that people dying of natural causes while in prison should not be included in the count. Please correct the exact number as appropriate.  However, Nixon declared the War on Drugs on June 17, 1971, and since then, dozens of Americans have (rightly or wrongly) died in the continuing conflict.  Whether anyone thinks such a war is a good idea or not is their point of view.  But whatever their point of view, it does not diminish in the slightest the fact that there are dozens of United States casualties of the War on Drugs, and as such, their numbers fit within the title of this article.  --Art Smart Chart/ Heart  05:04, 21 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Since the article mostly focuses on what the "author" deems to be illegitimate killings by law enforcement (and has no mention of killings by cartels or drug dealers) it cannot stand as the primary source of data. It's POV and incomplete.69.122.132.127 (talk) 13:57, 21 August 2010 (UTC)


 * The US military losses in Colombia have already been added, and the losses in Panama have been there for some time. Once legitimate sources are found for the Operations in Central America and Peru/Bolivia are found, they'll be added too.  The website you provided still doesn't fit with the article as a whole.  It's also very unbalanced, and is itself largely unsourced.  Because of this, it has no place here.  Many more law enforcement officers were killed than listed on that page (never mind the fact that some of those listed are hardly "innocent".  We didn't list American citizens killed while serving with Germany in WWII, either).  In either case, the article is specifically about military casualties.  If changing the title to "United States Military Casualties of War" would work, than I have no objection to that.  Again, we should let consensus speak, and go with what the majority says.  69.122.132.127 (talk) 13:57, 21 August 2010 (UTC)


 * As an aside, if you wanted to create a specific article for Drug War Deaths, I've got a number of sources that meet Wikipedia standards that may help (including drug related murder rate data and names, not just those who died as a result of law enforcement). 69.122.132.127 (talk) 14:00, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

If the consensus is to delete the War on Drugs entry due to lack of military casualties, then we definitely need to change the article's name from "United States casualties of war" to "United States military casualties of war". If that's the consensus, then I'd be happy to issue the Move command. But please don't delete the War on Drugs entry until that article name change. Thanks. --Art Smart Chart/ Heart 02:14, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

The article clearly states that it is ONLY MILITARY CASUALTIES. The source you used isn't legit either. 69.122.132.127 (talk) 12:55, 31 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Okay, since you insist that this article should contain "ONLY MILITARY CASUALTIES", I've renamed it accordingly. You also make a key point about the POV of the reference used.  I see a few line items with no reference at all.  Please correct that issue ASAP.  I think any line items without a neutral POV source, or any verifiable source at all, should be deleted, and I will act accordingly in the near future.  Thanks for your expedient help.  --Art Smart Chart/ Heart  10:07, 2 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I've been updating the table, and replacing unsourced items with sourced ones. I have more than a nagging suspiscion that any future changes you make will NOT be in good faith, and will constitute vandalism. I WILL report you if you do. ShanYang (talk) 16:24, 2 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Thanks for your many valuable contributions to this article. Although you state that you "WILL" report me if I make future changes to the article, it seems you already did. I suspect the admins agree with me that it's a frivolous complaint.  --Art Smart Chart/ Heart  04:02, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

Block evader
I've turned pending changes on in this article as a means of stopping the indef blocked editor from editing it from IP accounts. He/she edits from the 119.x range, and it would be appreciated if other editors disallowed these changes. Thanks, Nick-D (talk) 10:27, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

Sections that should be added.
If there are no objections, I'll add sections for some of the following conflicts:

1854-56 US involvment in the Opium Wars. 1863 Battle of Shimonoseki. Specific Indian wars such as the Snake War that have sourced data. 1903-04 Dominican Intervention. 1945-48 Trieste Conflict. 1958 Lebanon Intervention.

Also, shouldn't sections be added for military losses during Reconstruction, major riots, and the 1877 Great Railroad strike? They all kind of fall in the same sort of catagory as the Civil War.

I'll wait a bit, and if noone objects I'll go ahead. 69.122.132.127 (talk) 23:11, 20 August 2010 (UTC)


 * As long as you can provide sources (which appears to be the case) that would be great Nick-D (talk) 23:50, 20 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Cool, I'll get on it. I may need some oversight in regards to formatting though.  69.122.132.127 (talk) 23:59, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I dunno, the article is casualties of 'war.' A railroad strike is hardly a war, is it? Czolgolz (talk) 04:13, 21 August 2010 (UTC)


 * The 1877 strike resulted in a fairly large deployment of troops (to Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, Washington etc) and military casualties. I won't add anything about it without some sort of consensus.  It is a boarderline issue. 69.122.132.127 (talk) 04:40, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

Should we cover conflicts where American military personnel were killed, but weren't major participants, such as the 1945-46 Vietnam conflict (an OSS officer killed by the Viet Minh), the First Indo-China War (CIA and military pilots killed), the Six Day War (The Liberty Incident) and the Eritrean War of Independence (several killed by rebels)? Also, does anyone have any opinions regarding long-running, disorganized conflicts such as in Korea after 1953( the flare-ups in the late 60s' and late 70s')?69.122.132.127 (talk) 16:29, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

Othe Actions Against Pirates
If noone objects, I'm going to redo that line, and add citations. The number of wounded sounds fishy. 69.122.132.127 (talk) 13:48, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Ya the number of wounder there was completely bogus.XavierGreen (talk) 00:19, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

Formal Mediation
I've filed for formal mediation regarding the ongoing "Drug War" issue. ShanYang (talk) 13:17, 31 August 2010 (UTC)


 * I responded to the mediation request, although I now consider it moot due to the article name change. --Art Smart Chart/ Heart 03:54, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

Undoing revisions
Does anyone know how to remove revisions en-masse? I wish to remove my contributions(including those I made as 69.122.132.127 before I opened an account). —Preceding unsigned comment added by ShanYang (talk • contribs) 21:03, 2 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Whenever we make contributions to Wikipedia articles, it is with the understanding that the product of our work becomes the property of Wikipedia and the public per the Wikipedia Commons licensing agreement. For you to remove your own previous contributions en-masse, without regard to merit, constitutes vandalism.  I have reverted your vandalism, and have issued a level 1 warning on your talk page.  If you'll pardon the schoolyard analogy, you may want to take all your marbles and go home, but they are no longer your marbles to take.  I hope you understand.  Thanks again for all your valuable contributions.  --Art Smart Chart/ Heart  04:32, 4 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I find it odd that you would revert my deletions, when you were threatening to delete my contributions as a whole yourself. ShanYang (talk) 16:33, 4 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I do apologize if that's how I came across. No, I highly value your many contributions.  Thanks again for all your hard work.  --Art Smart Chart/ Heart  18:12, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

Korean War on Chart
This may just be an error, but on the chart comparing all the major American Wars in terms of total deaths (the one with the red lines), the Korean War is shown to exceed the Civil War despite being listed as 53,686 deaths. I'm not sure how to fix it, but can someone else do it please? Thanks!Valkyrie Red (talk) 14:59, 21 October 2010 (UTC)

standard of inclusion
I noticed Operation Eagle Claw was not included and wondered why. But I can't see that this page establishing any criteria for inclusion. What deaths are we listing? Enemy action required? Official source for the totals? Etc. This should be clearly set out in the introduction. Rmhermen (talk) 02:24, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

It is included. The whole criteria seems to be casualties incurred (hostile and non-hostile) during military action with sources. 134.74.154.74 (talk) 20:03, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Avoid ambiguous euphemisms and jargon
I propose that we eliminate the use of the words "disassembed" and "damaged" from this article in favor of more common and precise terms such as "killed" and "wounded", or that we define the irregular usage of these words in the introduction.

From the page: "Human beings disassembled." This is not a common usage of the world disassembled. It is not clear whether disassembly refers to deaths or deaths and injury. Common definitions for disassembly are: 1)to come/take apart 2)disperse, scatter 3)translate from machine code into a symbolic language. I assume that usage of the word disassembly in the article is found in military jargon to refer to deaths and injuries. This use of jargon is entirely unnecessary because there are many words in the English language which can more accurately and more clearly convey what is meant in the article, such as killed, deceased, casualties, wounded, injured, etc. In the same vein, I think that referring to people as "damaged" rather than wounded unnecessarily reduces clarity.173.58.233.95 (talk) 21:44, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

Missing actual 9/11 casualties in War on Terror: Afghanistan and Iraq Wars total
This should be adjusted upward by 3000 killed on sept 11th. Agree?!-G (talk) 13:14, 11 September 2012 (UTC)


 * Only the military casualties at the Pentagon should be counted. 165.65.136.113 (talk) 21:32, 18 October 2012 (UTC)

Combat deaths and total deaths
Gulf War numbers are from. Does this page include those killed in "nonhostile" actions? I assume that means friendly fire and the like. If so, then there are 121 more deaths for the Gulf War. -- Minesweeper 08:57, Oct 20, 2003 (UTC)


 * Correct. this article includes nonhostile actions WITHIN the totals. Kingturtle 23:23, 20 Oct 2003 (UTC)

This page is a combination of combat deaths and total deaths. American Revolutionary War, War of 1812, Mexican-American War, Korean War, Invasion of Panama (Operation Just Cause), Persian Gulf War use combat deaths only

Spanish-American War, World War I, World War II, Vietnam War, Operation Enduring Freedom War use total deaths.

American Civil War uses an unknown figure somewhere in between combat deaths and total deaths. 

Not sure on these: Philippine-American War, Beirut Deployment, Persian Gulf Escorts, Invasion of Grenada (Operation Urgent Fury), Rmhermen 19:46, Mar 1, 2004 (UTC)


 * I do not want question marks where we have exact numbers. Let's talk about it in TALK for a while and iron out some things first. I don't know if total death numbers exist for some of these wars. Kingturtle 05:24, 2 Mar 2004 (UTC)


 * Then you shouldn't falsely claim that they are totals. I would rather have ? than false information. I and Minesweeper have already told you that they are not totals in all cases. Look at the link I provided, look in several of the articles on Wikipedia itself. Since good total don't exist for some wars isn't it better to list combat deaths? Rmhermen 13:36, Mar 2, 2004 (UTC)


 * My totals are not false. When I get home, I will locate my sources. Kingturtle 22:43, 2 Mar 2004 (UTC)


 * They are incorrect. As Minesweeper told you above back in Oct. there are 121 more death in the Gulf War total then you showed and if I check American Revolutionary War the article says 4,400 combat deaths (your total) and an estimated 20,000 due to non-combat causes. If I check the link I provided I find Civil War deaths 184,594 combat, 558,052 total - not your total 364,511. I have no explanation for the differnce on that one though. Similar problems with other totals. Rmhermen 22:58, Mar 2, 2004 (UTC)

How about adding an extra column so we can display both combat and total casualties? Rmhermen 14:03, Mar 3, 2004 (UTC)


 * That is a terrific idea. Will it be easy to compile the totals? Kingturtle 23:10, 3 Mar 2004 (UTC)


 * I added a third column. My concern now is that there are two or three dozen minor actions not listed with death tolls highly than say the Beirut deployment or Persian Gulf escorts. What is our criteria for inclusion? Major action? Declared war? The Barbary War was both declared and had a higher death toll than Grenada. So did Somalia which isn't listed and is recent. The Indian Wars count over a thousand dead. Rmhermen 14:58, Mar 4, 2004 (UTC)


 * When I created the list, I included only the actions I had numbers for. But I think we should include every action that resulted in a casualty. If you have numbers for other actions, please include them. Kingturtle 18:04, 4 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Two more columns, one with total population at the time and the other with casualties as a percentage of total population might be handy. Jhobson1 12:11, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

The "Deaths Per Day" calculations seem to be completely wrong. The Vietnam War should work out to around 8. (~51,000 deaths ÷ ~7,000 days ≠ 26) I also did rough estimates for the Civil War (625,000 ÷ 1,460 = 428, not 599) and World War II (405,399 ÷ 1,460 = 278, not 416) so I'm guessing since the three I randomly checked were all not even close to being correct that most, if not all, totals need fixing. I would update it myself but I see that there are disputes to some death totals. Maybe deaths per day should just be removed for now? 132.198.242.153 (talk) 22:57, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

The total deaths in combat adds not only the total for civil war deaths but also the union and confederate soldier totals, in effect doubling the total at the bottom. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Prglj49 (talk • contribs) 11:49, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

Indian Wars
Speaking of the Indian Wars, I am guessing that a death toll of less than 1000 doesn't include the First Nations casulties, which might be deemed somewhere between 100,000 and 1,000,000 (in terms of casulties of combat plus democide). Are we only counting US citizens, or soldiers/civilans who inhabited the continent? (unsigned)


 * The first words of the article are "Military casualties suffered by the United States of America", and there's nothing in this article about "soldiers/civilians who inhabited the continent", so this is clearly a list of casualties of US soldiers. —Kevin 17:30, 25 December 2006 (UTC)


 * But the Civil War numbers include Confederate deaths. Isn't that inconsistent?   Ccrrccrr (talk) 23:09, 13 January 2013 (UTC)

Casualties of opponents?
I think it would be great to include here — or in a new article — casualties among the opponents in each war. Obviously, that is not what this article is about now, but I think it would be useful information to consider along with this information. In what wars did we do the most damage, as well as in what wars did we suffer the most damage. Ccrrccrr (talk) 23:05, 13 January 2013 (UTC)

Union Civil War Combat Deaths appears to be fiction?
There is no basis/source given for the 168,496 figure, which is about 58,000 more than standard references. I also notice the figure has been creeping up from already lofty values... Something doesn't smell right and it certainly isn't consistent with the basis used for Confederate combat deaths. Red Harvest (talk) 06:22, 29 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I added numbers from a U.S. government source for these. Not certain where the higher numbers came from but probably from some recent historian's works regarding undercounts. Rmhermen (talk) 22:46, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

Suicides
There has been a lot of coverage regarding the recent increase in suicides in the United States Military, enough that it may warrant its own article per WP:GNG. Should a section about suicides int he United States Military be created, or should a new article be created?--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 06:14, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

include pre-Independence wars?
I'm mostly thinking of the French and Indian War and King Philip's War. Should this article include them as part of American History? I got the impression in school that nothing important happened in the Colonies until the American Revolution, but what do you guys think? Do colonial wars count as part of national military history? Mang (talk) 14:36, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

Non-Combat Deaths
In this table, it would be good to know what defines "Other" deaths for each war. I wonder if the definition varies. In some cases it could include deaths from wounds after so many months. Does it include suicides? equipment failure? military accidents?

I am sure a break-down of each is impossible, but a good definition should be easy to find. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Olegersmith (talk • contribs) 15:09, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

Grand totals
The Grand Total line is out-of-date. Is there a way of totally this without typing in every single number for every war into a spreadsheet? Rmhermen (talk) 15:46, 11 June 2013 (UTC)

War on Terror
Absolutely not, came here to say that too. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.164.56.232 (talk) 08:39, 8 February 2014 (UTC)

Should Iraq and Afghanistan really be grouped together under the War on Terror?108.201.216.214 (talk) 10:30, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

Gray bars
The gray bars appear to note major wars, but they should have an explanation. For example, the Spanish-American War, generally considered a major war, doesn't have a gray bar.108.201.216.214 (talk) 10:34, 24 August 2013 (UTC)
 * Seems that at least the same list of top-10 wars by casualties should have gray bars in the main table.--LUOF (talk) 01:45, 21 March 2014 (UTC)

Wars ranked by total number of U.S. military deaths
The last two entries in the table with the above title seem wrong. 0.002 is less than 0.006, so the Philippine American war was more deadly than the War on Terror, and should appear above it in the table. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.22.76.12 (talk) 19:22, 23 May 2014 (UTC)

Marquesas Expedition
The Marquesas Expedition link takes you to the Wikipedia article on the Marquesas Islands, rather than the article specifically about the military conflict. The correct article is this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuku_Hiva_Campaign

I don't know how to make the edit, or I would do it myself. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2602:30A:2E52:DFE0:B003:7059:4281:2DE0 (talk) 17:25, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

What is 'other'
I ask as I do not understand the concept. When a fatality is recorded as other what are the typical causes ? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.187.112.211 (talk) 15:14, 9 June 2015 (UTC)
 * In early wars, mostly deaths from disease and accidents. In more recent wars ((WWII and after), disease became less prominent with traffic accidents and suicide becoming leading causes. Rmhermen (talk) 03:58, 10 June 2015 (UTC)
 * Basically anything that wasn't the result of an action intended to kill in an operational sense. As such, hostile includes friendly-fire, landmines and uxo explosions, but not deliberate murder within the same organization.  Jabberwock2015 (talk) 00:08, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

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Iraq/Afghanistan casualties
Can we get some new sources for the casualties for these wars, the DOD link is now 404'd, and the article states that nearly 50,000 Americans have died when its certainly not above 5,000.

Source: http://antiwar.com/casualties/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.17.162.31 (talk) 03:53, 18 April 2016 (UTC)

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Kosovo War
does anyone know why kosovo is listed as 1999-present while the wiki page shows it ended in 1999 and started earlier?

Ari14850 (talk) 16:32, 10 November 2016 (UTC)

Chad Niger 2017?
Should the 4 soldiers who died earlier this year be listed? PaulCHebert (talk) 17:56, 6 November 2017 (UTC)

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I'm new at this. May I recommend that each instance (in the tables) of a number for total US military deaths in the Korean War be closely accompanied by "see note e". That might help people like me who were (at first) completely confused to see such widely differing numbers as 36,516 and 54,246. Smaricic (talk) 14:51, 5 May 2018 (UTC)smaricic

Other deaths (2)
As asked above (undated, probably 2016);

And I’m guessing there’s a standard for this but it’s not cited here (or in other lists);

What is meant by "other" deaths in the table? Does it include civilians that die in warfare – which seems true for the Civil War count – but then why so high for WW2 (which looks like military dying not-in-battle)?

MBG02 (talk) 05:57, 1 December 2018 (UTC)


 * Thanks for update, but I still don’t know. Does the 113,842 “other” for WW2 include civilians? How many were on US territory? Does merchant shipping count as combat or “other”. Is the 450k (to 550k) “other” for the Civil War mostly civilian? Is this explained on Wiki? MBG02 (talk) 12:41, 1 December 2018 (UTC)


 * It means losses from causes other than combat (IE accidents during maneuvering, illness, plane crashes.) 24.184.74.207 (talk) 01:45, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
 * It means military, not civilian. Disease and accident are major causes of death until quite recently. Rmhermen (talk) 13:47, 7 April 2019 (UTC)

Persian Gulf War
Where is the Persian Gulf War? Dave3187101 (talk) 06:29, 7 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Both the 1990-1 Gulf War and the more recent Iraq War are in the table. Rmhermen (talk) 13:47, 7 April 2019 (UTC)

Iraq between 2011 and 2014
As far As I know the US was still fighting in Iraq between 2011 and 2014. Were an American servicemen killed in Iraq between 2011 and 2014? Pjtawney (talk) 23:40, 13 July 2019 (UTC)

U S vs Confederate
Why combine U.S. Patriots with Confederate loyalist in fatalities? At the time of their deaths Confederates rejected the US and should not be listed here. Pjtawney (talk) 23:44, 13 July 2019 (UTC)

Summation error...
regd. civil war. One figure has to be corrected..., either the 450.000 or the sum. - AxelKing (talk) 22:45, 24 July 2019 (UTC)

Suicide Data Missing From Page

 * There were more than 6,000 Veteran suicides each year from 2008 to 2016.
 * From 2005 to 2016, Veteran and non-Veteran adult suicide rates increased 25.9 percent and 20.6 percent, respectively. From 2015 to 2016, Veteran suicide rates decreased from 30.5 per 100,000 population to 30.1 per 100,000 population.
 * In 2016, the suicide rate was 1.5 times greater for Veterans than for non-Veteran adults, after adjusting for age and gender.
 * After adjusting for age, in 2016, the suicide rate for women Veterans was 1.8 times greater than the suicide rate for non-Veteran women.

Source: VA National Suicide Data Report 2005–2016 - Office of Mental Health and Suicide Prevention - September 2018


 * The average suicide rate of Veterans is more than than twice the number that died on 9-11 (6000 vs 2996).
 * More Veterans committed suicide in the 8 years (2008-2016) than the combat fatalities in each of the Revolutionary War, Korean War, Vietnam War, and the sum total of all other conflicts since 1958.

Does anyone know how many committed suicide after the civil war or WWI? My grandfather says the number after WWI was high. Pjtawney (talk) 23:47, 13 July 2019 (UTC)


 * I would imagine that no records were kept of that issue during that time. Dinky town  talk  17:27, 5 October 2019 (UTC)

WWI Deaths
Does anybody have a better idea of what the World War I deaths include? It has a huge "other" category of 63k deaths which is about 10k more than the 53k combat deaths. Does this include the Spanish Flu? Does anybody know what the numbers would be if Spanish Flu deaths were removed from this number? It seems absurd that the number is so much higher than the actual combat deaths. Thanks! Centerone (talk) 01:28, 29 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes, it will include flu deaths. No it is not absurd; it is normal to have high numbers of disease and accident deaths. Check the previous major wars totals. Rmhermen (talk) 16:04, 30 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I'm just wondering if it's possible to somehow tease out the data for 1918 flu deaths vs. non-flu deaths in the "other deaths" category. `It would certainly be helpful to know. Centerone (talk) 23:55, 30 April 2020 (UTC)

Including COVID-19 in Combat Deaths table?
I notice that an IP user has added COVID-19 deaths into the table of "‎Wars ranked by U.S. combat deaths". While I appreciate the attempt to put the current pandemic in an appropriate context, is this really the correct place to do it?--Gronk Oz (talk) 01:50, 16 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Another IP editor removed that entry, but left the table a bit broken so I have reverted it all back to before it was added in the first place.--Gronk Oz (talk) 23:40, 16 September 2020 (UTC)

Some references are all messed up
Search in the page source for history.navy.mil and autogenerated1. It's impossible to say from the page source alone which of those references are used as citations where, so I didn't edit.

2600:1700:C890:5890:DD6C:BC2B:2613:9859 (talk) 15:45, 30 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I looked at navy.mil and I don't see any problem. Could you explain what you think is incorrect? Rmhermen (talk) 16:12, 30 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Perhaps the original poster was put off by the re-use of a single source, named autogenerated1. That is not a problem - in fact it is quite common that a single source will be used more than once in an article.  In this case, that one is used five times.  Giving a name (autogenerated1) to the reference allows it to be re-used without having to specify all its details again.  Then in the list of References, there are five links (labelled a, b, c, d, e) back to their use in the body of the article.  I hope that helps to clarify...--Gronk Oz (talk) 23:48, 16 September 2020 (UTC)

Inconsistent counts for US Combat Deaths tabel.
It appears that an anonymous user has changed the table ranking US Combat deaths. This page now contains self contradictory information. The newly modified table also seems to contradict other sources. 2600:387:8:11:0:0:0:BB (talk) 16:38, 11 December 2020 (UTC)
 * I reverted it until a consensus can be reached.Bkatcher (talk) 17:41, 11 December 2020 (UTC)

Anomalous treatment of enemies of the United States
This page includes casualty counts for the Confederacy in the Civil War, but does not include casualty counts for, among others, the Viet Cong, North Korea, or Nazi Germany. In light of the fact that Confederate soldiers were *not* in the "United States military," they should be excluded from this page. 131.191.80.95 (talk) 05:18, 16 January 2021 (UTC)131.191.80.95

Other deaths
There is no information that clarifies what is meant by "other" death in the table, is this civilian or other front line deaths that aren't caused by combat?

U.S. Civilian Deaths

 * The article title is "United States military casualties of war". However, that does bring up this issue:


 * Do the stats here include civilian deaths among the deaths in various categories (including "combat" deaths)?


 * Since essentially all major U.S. wars in living memory (or even the last century) have taken place on foreign soil -- and thus have mainly involved foreign casualties -- it is easy to forget that U.S. civilians probably died in significant numbers in those earlier wars fought on U.S. soil... and even small numbers of American civilians have perished in our foreign wars,  some as casualties of combat (though not necessarily combatants themselves).


 * Unfortunately, there does not appear to be a Wikipedia article documenting these deaths -- mostly innocent deaths, and thus surely as notable.

All Civilian Deaths in U.S. Wars

 * This, in turn, brings up the broader question of all civilian deaths in U.S. wars -- also not tabulated and documented in any one Wikipedia article, apparently.


 * This is significant, especially in modern times, as more civilians have been killed in U.S.-involved wars -- over the last century and a half -- than in all other wars, combined, in the same time frame, almost certainly. And hundreds of thousands of those have been killed in combat by U.S. military personnel -- a hundred-thousand in one air raid, alone.


 * To be sure, that data is far harder to find than the data on the more-documented, traditionally venerated and commemorated (and thus historically noted) U.S. military casualties.


 * But reporting only data that is easy to find (and fashionable to talk about) is not enough for a thorough and responsible encyclopedic coverage of war deaths - in my humble opinion.


 * ~ Penlite (talk) 09:18, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

All Deaths in U.S. Wars

 * As long as I'm making the point, there doesn't seem to be a comparable tabulation, in any one Wikipedia article, of all deaths, civilian and military, of all factions, in all U.S. wars. That would seem to be a conspicuous lack of reporting and documentation in Wikipedia -- which is supposed to be neutral in its coverage of the various article topics.
 * ~ Penlite (talk) 09:22, 10 November 2020 (UTC)
 * It is somewhat worth noting that there is a Wikipedia article titled "List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll," which provides summary death counts for each of the world's wars throughout history. However, it only provides total deaths -- of all factions, and all people, civilian and military -- for each of the dozens of listed conflicts. It does not separate civilian from military, nor one faction from another -- just total deaths in each conflict, from all causes, combined.
 * ~ Penlite (talk) 10:24, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

From my understanding, the meaning of "other" refers to non-hostile military deaths as part of a conflict (such as accidents, disease, suicide etc.) 24.46.83.131 (talk) 23:18, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

Current events?
Posted By Deftdrummer 8/13/06 Is there a reason that this article is not stamped with the "this article represents current events" as many others have? I only say this because the death toll for our current war gets higher seemingly every day.

Posted By FortKnoxSC 9/12/20 I know nothing of how decisions are made as far as what gets published to Wikipedia, but just a thought: would it be appropriate to list the deaths from the war on COVID-19 here? I certainly mean no disrespect to the armed services, it just seems like that might help some folks who aren't getting it start to get a handle on how big this is. Followup By FortKnoxSC 9/22/20  And if we could add another column to the table, annual deaths (total deaths divided by the length of the war), that might help people see how bad COVID-19 is.


 * While I do agree this is a war we are fighting (against CoViD-19), these are still not military deaths we are talking about here. I mean, sure, some active and especially retired troops have surely been killed, it is not from fighting--certainly no "combat" deaths--in the traditional sense. Plus, there's no way to separate military from civilian deaths as far as I know. I also have yet to see a decent estimate on the number of non-death casualties in terms of who has been suffering from "long CoViD"... Sadly, in just 3-4 more days at yesterday's reported number, the total US deaths from SARS-CoV-2 in ~18 months will SURPASS this page's total of ALL US combat deaths in ~250 years. Prosandcons (talk) 17:09, 11 September 2021 (UTC)

Japanese-American Deaths in WWII
Does anyone know if deaths of Japanese-Americans, either from anti-Japanese mob attacks in west-coast cities or in the multiple concentration camps across the United States, are included in the figure given for US civilian deaths of the Second World War? Or "Other"? Prosandcons (talk) 17:49, 11 September 2021 (UTC)
 * This page seems to be largely from your tireless efforts. Do you happen to know the answer to this? Prosandcons (talk) 17:49, 11 September 2021 (UTC)


 * While I appreciate the compliment, I cannot accept credit for the page given that my contributions are limited to a few recent edits intended to improve accuracy.
 * To answer the question, I do not know for certain whether Japanese-Americans are or are not included; however, I suspect Japanese-Americans who were in the U. S. military and fought during WWII ARE included in the death totals for that war.
 * Further, all Japanese-American civilians who died during the WWII period as a result of the events of WWII should be included in civilian numbers. However, I cannot say for certain if Japanese-Americans who were interned in the camps and died during the WWII period are or are not included in civilian death totals. I would highly recommend looking at the original sources/citations to answer your question.
 * Short of that, I would recommend looking at the official Pentagon/DoD or Veterans Administration sources (links can be found in the citations) to confirm whether they have included Japanese-Americans imprisoned in U. S. internment camps in their numbers. They are the first and last word on any numbers included here. Sorry, I could not be of more help. (Kimdorris) T. Superhero (@/#) 21:35, 11 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Short of that, I would recommend looking at the official Pentagon/DoD or Veterans Administration sources (links can be found in the citations) to confirm whether they have included Japanese-Americans imprisoned in U. S. internment camps in their numbers. They are the first and last word on any numbers included here. Sorry, I could not be of more help. (Kimdorris) T. Superhero (@/#) 21:35, 11 September 2021 (UTC)

Data Inconsistencies Brief Explanation
Before my recent edits there were conflicts in the counts for 1) Civil War; 2) Vietnam War; 3) War in Afghanistan; and 4) Iraq War. I've spent a huge chunk of my life ( ! ) verifying the data, updating the tables, and reconciling the counts. I consulted other WP Articles (see links below) and any relevant sources on those pages. I found the sources/data needed to be updated on these articles as well. :roll_eyes: I was able to reconcile 1) Civil War; 2) Vietnam War; and 3) War in Afghanistan. However, I'm a bit confounded by the numbers for 4) Iraq War. As such I left those numbers alone. Perhaps someone else can have a look and make sense of the data. Ping me if you have questions about any of the data or sources.

Related Articles
 * Casualties of the Iraq War
 * Vietnam War

Kimdorris (talk) 14:36, 2 August 2021 (UTC)


 * This comment was edited by me (Kimdorris). T. Superhero (@/#) 21:39, 11 September 2021 (UTC)

Inconsistent counts for Civil War.
Probably unavoidable given differing sources for the stats, but it lists: Now, I'm not great at math, but shouldn't the total be at least the sum of the parts, rather than 30k less? Or did some people die for both sides? DewiMorgan (talk) 16:23, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
 * 140,414 U.S. Army
 * 94,000 Confederate Army
 * 214,938 total


 * , the problem lies with having to use multiple sources: one for Union and another for Confederate. According to the VA source, Nov 2020, America’s Wars, Battle Deaths (Union) are 140,414. According to the same source, Battle Deaths (Confederate), annotated as incomplete, are 74,524. However, according to the National Park Service, Battle Deaths (Confederate) are 94,000. Going with the VA source only, aggregated Battle Deaths (Union, Confederate) are 214,938. However, we know the Confederate data are incomplete. If we mix the data, as is done in the table, we end up with aggregated totals that should be 234,414 as you pointed out. I think these entries require a footnote explanation. I'll leave that with more experienced editors to determine or RfC. Kimdorris (talk) 14:05, 2 August 2021 (UTC)


 * I do agree that the numbers should be consistent. If using one source for Union deaths and another source for Confederacy deaths, the overall total for both should reflect that. This would not only make much more sense, but would also deal with the issue I have, which is that someone appears to be fudging the numbers of estimates in order to give us the OVERALL US combat deaths currently at >666 thousand. The "mark of the devil"? Given that some of these numbers are estimates, for understandable reasons, and the page is edited by random people, this possibly symbolic "coincidence" I find suspicious. Prosandcons (talk) 16:48, 11 September 2021 (UTC)


 * I noticed the many edit/revert actions prior to my edits. That was precisely why I updated the numbers. Little did I know those edits would take up the better portion of my day (late night) last month. You've touched on a common and oft debated conundrum inherent in the wiki model. Those are the trade-off conditions accepted by the community long before I became an editor. T. Superhero (@/#) 21:59, 11 September 2021 (UTC)

Cold War deaths
What do the 32 deaths in the "U.S.S.R. Cold War" and the 16 deaths in the "China Cold War" rows of the table refer to? The notes for the section on the Cold War (specifically note E) don't provide any information. The listed source is not particularly enlightening, either. It might be helpful to have a clarifying note about this. Tankparksalute (talk) 16:46, 17 December 2021 (UTC)