Casualties of War

Samizdata has put the Lancet's figure of 600,000 Iraqi war dead in context, with a view to suggesting that it is "inherently incredible":

• It exceeds by 25% the casualties (450,000) , military and civilian, suffered by Great Britain in all of World War II, including the Blitz, the African, Pacific and European campaigns
• It exceeds by 25% the casualties (460,000), civilian and military, suffered by Italy in all of World War II
• It exceeds the casualties (562,000), military and civilian, suffered by France in World War II, including the initial battles with the Germans, the Occupation, and the reconquest by the Allies.
• It approaches the 3.6% rate experienced by the Japanese in World War II.

There were however said to have been "more than a million" Iraqi casualties in the Iran-Iraq War and Paul Berman's Terror and Liberalism claims that over a million have so far perished in the conflict in the Sudan, though recent UN estimates put the figure at around 400,000.