What about the Iraqi military losses???

[Pedrunn]

We all hear about the about 50 military soldies dead, the few as prisioners, the couple dozen of destroyed tank and the crashed chopters of the coalision troops.
Or the hundreds of dead civilians from Iraqi!

But what about the Iraqi military losses. I dont remember hearing nothing about!?!

So does anyone know how many Iraqi soldiers have lost their lifes or how many tank/craft where hitted?

[MarkG]

mainly i think Iraq hasnt announced military casualties....

[lightblue]

Sort of working from news reports I'd wager somewhere in the thousands if not already past ten thousand.

You don't really know what's happened with the airstrikes on military targets.

[Az]

I think it will be around the 1500 now.

lightblue: 10,000? how did you come up with that number?

[Pekka]

I'm more with Azazel here.. My estimation would be about the same.

[lightblue]

It depends what you call military losses - do Baath party officials, local militia count as well.

One battle last week (near Nasiryah IRRC) was supposed to have killed 500 Iraqi troops. That building that they couldn't get in Umn Qassr contained 120 troops. The 14 T55s that the UK Challenger2 tank destroyed would have contained going on 60 troops. The column destroyed by the Marine Corps yesterday contained 30 something vehicles, so a conservative estimate would be another 100. Military positions in northern Iraq have been pounded day after day.

The only casualties we here off are the ones that are reported by the embedded reporters, we don't know how many have died in the Baghdad bombing raids, in the Basra shelling etc etc.

10000 is the highest number though, it is more likely to be around 5000 or so.

[Dauphin]

I heard a FOX news host claimed 35,000. So we must have an upper limit of 10,000.

[spiritof1202]

The US won't comment on actual Iraqi military losses in terms of people... just equipment. They don't want to appear to be killing anyone... even soldiers.

Thats why we haven't seen piccies of the charred corpses of the Iraq convoy that tried to leave Basrah.

Its interesting to note that according to Iraq, that US vehicular losses count twice, cos there are two directions you can film them from.

[Ming]

It would be silly for Iraq to announce the number of their own casualities considering they are currently claiming victory at the moment

We would call that bad PR

[Jaakko]

I'm in the 2000 or so camp. There just hasn't been enough munitions flying to justify more, IMO.

However, without details on all the battles fought, it's very hard to tell what's accurate. The only thing we know for sure that there's still a whole lot of bloodshed left.

[Urban Ranger]

Ming, they are winning if they are keeping the coalition from Baghdad. The coalition didn't make much progress the last few days. Somebody severely underestimated number of troops needed, as 120,000 are being called from the US.

The US won't comment on actual Iraqi military losses in terms of people... just equipment. They don't want to appear to be killing anyone... even soldiers.

Not true. There's at least one battle where the coalition claimed they have killed hundreds of Iraqi soldiers.

[Ming]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
Ming, they are winning if they are keeping the coalition from Baghdad.

The campaign is taking longer than earlier optimistic estimates... I wouldn't call the pounding they are taking winning...

[DanS]

I'm in the 2000 or so camp. There just hasn't been enough munitions flying to justify more, IMO.

There have been about 1,000 sorties a day plus some bombers plus hundreds of Tomahawk misiles plus any number of apache helicopter strikes. Then add the straight battle casualties.

It seems likely to me that they have sustained considerable casualties. There's no lack of munitions flying around.

[DarthVeda]

Raytheon must be having a very good day...

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by spiritof1202
The US won't comment on actual Iraqi military losses in terms of people... just equipment. They don't want to appear to be killing anyone... even soldiers.

Thats why we haven't seen piccies of the charred corpses of the Iraq convoy that tried to leave Basrah.

Actually, there's a different reason. If you're dealing with a mechanized formation, or just in terms of general capability, equipment destroyed counts for far more, and it's easier to quantify. The crews of 14 T-55's can't do much, but 14 T-55's could if they got ahold of an underprotected convoy.

With irregulars or light fighters, the only thing important is the manpower, since they have no heavy equipment of note, pink Toyota pickups aside.