Posted on 04/12/2003 5:32:41 AM PDT by GailA
Study: 20 percent of war deaths are blacks
By THOMAS HARGROVE April 11, 2003
Nearly a fifth of the fatalities among U.S. troops in the current war in Iraq are black, which will be the highest cost African Americans have paid in any of America's wars if the trend continues.
There are also indications that Hispanics may be over-represented among the war dead, according to a Scripps Howard News Service study.
This isn't the result of minorities being assigned to dangerous duty in front-line units. Elite combat troops like Special Forces units and the Green Berets are disproportionately white, military experts said. The U.S. Army's dash to Baghdad forced supply convoys occasionally to traverse enemy-held territory in southern and central Iraq, leaving minority troops assigned to logistical units vulnerable.
"We opened ourselves up to this by driving forward, leaving long logistical supply lines that must travel territory that we do not militarily control," said David Segal, director of the University of Maryland's Center for Research on Military Organization. "But our combat doctrine is one of deep intrusion after all, to go after the command-and-control centers of our enemies."
The study was based on an analysis of the 105 fatalities identified by the Defense Department as deaths related to the war as of April 10. Scripps Howard was able to determine the race of 98 of these, of whom 19 were African American.
"I was not aware of this and am surprised by it," said Julian Bond, national chairman of the NAACP. "I knew that black soldiers were concentrated in the non-combat positions of the military, which makes this all the more surprising. But clearly, these support troops were subjected to battle conditions unexpectedly."
The study found the race of 19.4 percent of all fatalities in which race was able to be determined was black. African Americans represent 13 percent of the U.S. population and 20 percent of all military personnel.
"African Americans are, relatively speaking, over-represented in the military. But the real point of the spear, groups like Special Ops, are almost lily white," Segal said. "It is just that in the kind of war we are fighting, there is no insulation for people in the rear areas from death or injury."
Three of the dead black soldiers - Spec. Jamaal Addison of Roswell, Ga., Pfc. Howard Johnson of Mobile, Ala., and Pfc. Brandon Sloan of Bedford, Ohio - were killed March 23 when a convoy of supply troops from the Army's 507th Maintenance Co. were ambushed Nasiriyah, Iraq.
Those three and nine others were killed either by enemy gunfire during convoy duty or by accidents while driving military vehicles. The remaining seven are reported to have died in what appear to be non-convoy related combat encounters.
The study also found that 14 of the dead troops (or 14.3 percent) have Hispanic surnames and may consider themselves to be Hispanic. Fewer than 8 percent of all military personnel are Hispanic, according to the Defense Department. However, military experts warn that this is a difficult statistic to prove unofficially since ethnicity is self-defined.
For example, Mexican-born Marine Lance Cpl. Jesus Suarez del Solar of Escondido, Calif., who died March 30 when the First Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion encountered enemy fire, is officially Hispanic only if he identified himself on military records as Hispanic.
It seems likely, however, that fatalities among black and Latino troops will hit new highs in the second Iraqi war since both groups experienced steadily increasing percentages of combat-related deaths in recent wars.
Very few blacks and Hispanics were assigned to front-line combat units during World War II. According to a study released by the Pentagon's Directorate for Information Operations and Reports, blacks accounted for 8.4 percent of all military deaths during the Korean War.
"Korea was the war during which we racially integrated the military and so African American casualties started to increase," Segal said. "They actually approached parity (with population percent) during the Vietnam War."
The Pentagon estimates that 12.4 percent of the combat deaths in Vietnam were among blacks, almost exactly the percentage of blacks in the American population. In the 1991 Persian Gulf War blacks accounted for 17.3 percent of fatalities.
Hispanic casualties, although difficult to calculate exactly, also appear to be rising. Soldiers who identified themselves either as Hispanic or partially Hispanic represented 2.4 percent of deaths in Korea, 0.6 percent in Vietnam and 4.1 percent during the first Persian Gulf War.
(e-mail hargrovet(at)shns.com)
One could theorize it's safer to be black in Iraq than in NYC.
Uh, so, what's the problem, exactly?
They deserve our gratitude and respect.
Since it seems those of us that are of a conservative bent are the only ones that truly believe in a colorblind society, I agree with you 100%.
It sure didn't take long for the race whores to get moving on the incoming data. It looks like they don't really know the difference between deaths and casualties, or are clouding the differences on purpose
When my son took his SAT, he put himself down as a Hispanic Quaker. I thought it was hysterical, his father was not pleased.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.