[More analysis of the Wikileaks Afghan War Diary]
I was looking at situations where Enemy Killed in Action was greater than 0, which gave 3729 incidents. I expect that if there are more civilian deaths than are encoded in the database, they are here, as armed people tend to classify those they kill as combatants, sometimes when they are not. But let’s take the data for what it says, and say that who they say were combatants are, for now.
[More analysis of the Wikileaks Afghan War Diary]
I was looking at situations where Enemy Killed in Action was greater than 0, which gave 3729 incidents. I expect that if there are more civilian deaths than are encoded in the database, they are here, as armed people tend to classify those they kill as combatants, sometimes when they are not. But let’s take the data for what it says, and say that who they say were combatants are, for now.
I looked at the deaths (total 15219) by Type of Unit. I made an error in the map earlier: CF stands for Coalition Forces, not Canadian Forces. I will have to re-do the map with a Canada specific search.
TypeOfUnit Data
(empty) Sum – EnemyKIA 744
Sum – EnemyWIA 64
Sum – EnemyDetained 37
ACM Sum – EnemyKIA 174
Sum – EnemyWIA 23
Sum – EnemyDetained 11
ANSF Sum – EnemyKIA 756
Sum – EnemyWIA 103
Sum – EnemyDetained 86
ANSF/CF Sum – EnemyKIA 131
Sum – EnemyWIA 20
Sum – EnemyDetained 27
CF Sum – EnemyKIA 5486
Sum – EnemyWIA 386
Sum – EnemyDetained 254
CF/ANSF Sum – EnemyKIA 59
Sum – EnemyWIA 7
Sum – EnemyDetained 8
CIV Sum – EnemyKIA 58
Sum – EnemyWIA 9
Sum – EnemyDetained 2
Coalitn Sum – EnemyKIA 1520
Sum – EnemyWIA 94
Sum – EnemyDetained 122
Contractor Sum – EnemyKIA 1
Sum – EnemyWIA 0
Sum – EnemyDetained 0
ENEMY Sum – EnemyKIA 682
Sum – EnemyWIA 93
Sum – EnemyDetained 54
GIROA Sum – EnemyKIA 58
Sum – EnemyWIA 18
Sum – EnemyDetained 6
Host Nation Sum – EnemyKIA 1
Sum – EnemyWIA 0
Sum – EnemyDetained 0
Host Nation SF Sum – EnemyKIA 194
Sum – EnemyWIA 22
Sum – EnemyDetained 33
Infastructure Sum – EnemyKIA 42
Sum – EnemyWIA 22
Sum – EnemyDetained 0
None Selected Sum – EnemyKIA 5213
Sum – EnemyWIA 340
Sum – EnemyDetained 651
OGA Sum – EnemyKIA 100
Sum – EnemyWIA 6
Sum – EnemyDetained 0
Total Sum – EnemyKIA 15219
Total Sum – EnemyWIA 1207
Total Sum – EnemyDetained 1291
One striking thing is that in engagements where the enemy is killed, there is hardly any wounding. Even in big incidents where dozens of enemy are killed, there are very often 0 enemy wounded. This raised the suspicions of Wikileaks. This is also presumably unsurprising to military types, who I suppose would argue that the business of war is to kill the enemy.
Organizing the deaths by Category, we see a majority of the Enemy Killed (8225) are from Direct Fire:
Category
Ambush 242
Arrest 1
ARTY 10
Attack 1352
BLUE-BLUE 4
Cache Found/Cleared 46
CAS 148
CCA 2
Close Air Support 188
Cordon/Search 34
Counter Mortar Fire 27
Deliberate Attack 104
Detain 2
Detained 2
Direct Fire 8225
Enemy Action 43
Escalation of Force 61
Green-Blue 1
Green-Green 1
IDF Counter Fire 7
IDF Interdiction 51
IED Ambush 140
IED Explosion 695
IED Found/Cleared 279
IED Hoax 1
IED Suspected 11
Indirect Fire 1345
Interdiction 367
Kidnapping 1
MEDEVAC 187
MEDEVAC (Other) 1
Mine Strike 2
Movement to Contact 53
Murder 7
Narcotics 12
None Selected 15
Other 211
Other (Hostile Action) 189
Other Defensive 6
OTHER OFFENSIVE 201
Patrol 7
Police Actions 4
Premature Detonation 182
Raid 37
Recon 15
RPG 6
SAFIRE 390
Search and Attack 15
Small Unit Actions 36
Sniper Ops 108
Surveillance 95
TCP 1
Tribal Feud 2
Turn In 1
UAV 33
UNEXPLODED ORDNANCE 6
Unknown Explosion 7
Total Result 15219
And organizing by Type, the data seem to suggest that NATO/US forces kill mostly those who attack them, since 9652 of the 15219 Enemy deaths are from engagements that were started by the Enemy (coded as “Enemy Action”).
Type:
Criminal Event 34
Detainee Operations 2
Enemy 43
Enemy Action 9652
Explosive Hazard 1691
Friendly Action 3749
Friendly Fire 6
Non-Combat Event 9
Other 22
Suspicious Incident 11
Total Result 15219
Next we look at deaths on the NATO/US side of things (Friendly Killed in Action)
