The Challenge of Terrorism and War on Terror: Chinese Response

Human Costs: The biggest price to be paid in a war is the loss of human lives.  In the initial years, with a view to keep their losses at the minimum, Americans made maximum use of their Air Force, which though saved the Americans, resulted into huge losses of civilians on ground. Thus, the war fought in retaliation to less than 3000 killings has, until now, according to most pessimistic estimates, taken 225000 lives, including 6000 American soldiers and 175,000 ordinary citizens; besides, the figure for casualties of American allies including Iraqi and Afghan forces, and the American contractors is nearing 25000 while the estimated number of militants, killed in the two wars, is assumed to be 20000. Importantly the human losses are continuing in the veterans of war  as suicides rate among them has been on the rise, which is also a direct consequence of the WoT .

The physically injured in WoT have been estimated to be 365,000, which includes at least 150,000 American soldiers and contractors, 70,000 members of allied, Iraqi and Afghan security forces, and 146,921 ordinary citizens. Millions of people have been displaced indefinitely and are living in grossly inadequate conditions. The current number of war refugees and displaced persons is 7,800,000.

An important factor leading to human loss in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan is the destruction, caused by the use of lethal ammunitions and the hazardous radiation effects that have also caused fatal diseases, while it has led to unavailability of medical and health facilities as well. Though the human losses, occurring due to these factors, are not directly related to military operations, they are the result of destruction caused by the war and therefore should also be attributed to the war.