Iraq War Fatalities: The White Man's Burden

With the most spectacular element of the Bush Administration's Invade the World - Invite the World grand strategy now a decade old, it's worth taking a look at the U.S. military death tolls by ethnicity and sex. This is an infrequently covered subject of scant interest to the press because women and minorities were not hit hardest. 

In the mid 2000s, non-Hispanic whites made up about 61% of the 25-year-olds in the U.S. But through this 2009 report by Hannah Fischer of the Congressional Research Service, whites made up 74.7% of Iraq war fatalities, while minorities only accounted for 25.3%. So, whites gave the last full measure of devotion at an 89% higher per capita rate than nonwhites in Iraq.

The sacrifice gap was even larger in Afghanistan through 2009, with whites dying at a per capita rate 146% higher than nonwhites.

And, of course, the white man's rate was even higher compared to the rest of the population of young adults of both sexes: roughly 500% higher in Iraq, and over 650% higher in Afghanistan.

Take up the White Man's burden--
Send forth the best ye breed--
Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives' need;
To wait in heavy harness,
On fluttered folk and wild--
Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half-devil and half-child. 

Take up the White Man's burden--
In patience to abide,
To veil the threat of terror
And check the show of pride;
By open speech and simple,
An hundred times made plain
To seek another's profit,
And work another's gain. 

Take up the White Man's burden--
The savage wars of peace--
Fill full the mouth of Famine
And bid the sickness cease;
And when your goal is nearest
The end for others sought,
Watch sloth and heathen Folly
Bring all your hopes to nought.

Next time, maybe not?