Troops in Iraq Killed at Rates Approaching Vietnam War-Era Levels
by Drew Brown

April 19, 2004 | With fighting in Iraq now at its worst, the number of U.S. troops killed by enemy fire has reached the highest level since the Vietnam War.

The first part of April has been the bloodiest period so far for U.S. troops in Iraq. There have been 98 deaths by hostile fire so far this month, more than in the opening two weeks of the invasion, when 82 Americans were killed in action.

"This has been some pretty intense fighting," said David Segal, director of the University of Maryland's Center for Research on Military Organization. "We're looking at what happened during the major battles of Vietnam."

The last time U.S. troops experienced a two-week loss such as this one in Iraq was October 1971, two years before U.S. ground involvement ended in Vietnam.

There are 135,000 U.S. troops in Iraq. Nearly 700 American troops have died since the beginning of the war. As of Sunday, 503 had been reported killed in action. At least 3,630 more have been wounded.

The Vietnam War started with a slower death rate. The United States had been involved in Vietnam for six years before total fatalities surpassed 500 in 1965, the year President Lyndon B. Johnson ordered a massive buildup of forces. There were 20,000 troops in Vietnam by the end of 1964. There were more than 200,000 a year later.

By the end of 1966, U.S. combat deaths in Vietnam had reached 3,910. By 1968, the peak of U.S. involvement, there were more than 500,000 troops in the country. During the same two-week period of April that year, 752 U.S. soldiers died, according to National Archives records.

U.S. officials say that comparisons with Vietnam are invalid and reject the idea that Iraq has become a quagmire.

Update (12/8):







[Graphs from Lies.com]


I've been looking for data on how support for (or opposition to) the Vietnam War progressed as the war dragged on, but I'm having some trouble finding it. Here's the closest I've found so far, which breaks support down into three age categories, based on Gallup polling data:

Support for War in Vietnam, by Age

                 Under 30   30-49    Over 49

May 1965            61        59        43 

August 1965         76        64        51 

November 1965       75        68        57 

March 1966          71        63        48 

May 1966            62        54        39 

September 1966      53        56        39 

November 1966       66        55        41 

May 1967            60        53        42 

July 1967           62        52        37 

October 1967        50        50        35 

Early February 1968 51        44        36 

March 1968          50        46        35 

April 1968          54        44        31 

August 1968         45        39        27 

Early October 1968  52        41        26 

February 1969       47        43        31 

September 1969      36        37        25 

January 1970        41        37        25 

March 1970          48        41        26 

April 1970          43        40        25 

January 1971        41        38        20 

May 1971            34        30        23

My point, which would be better supported if I had the right data, is that it took a while for public opinion to turn off the war, and that we've reached the current level of disapproval with the Iraq war much more quickly than the equivalent level was reached during Vietnam.

That, at least, gives me some hope.

Update (12/28): More on this from Kevin Drum, referencing an article in Slate.