Claim: U.S. active duty military deaths were higher during the administration of President Clinton than during the administration of George W. Bush.
Example:[Collected via e-mail, January 2008]
Surprise, Surprise (not really)
These are some rather eye-opening facts.
Since the start of the war on terror in Iraq and Afghanistan, the sacrifice has been enormous. In the time period from the invasion of Iraq in March 2003 through today, we have lost over 3,000 military personnel to enemy action and accidents.
As tragic as the loss of any member of the US Armed Forces is, consider the following statistics: The annual fatalities of military members while actively serving in the armed forces from 1980 through 2006:
If you are confused when you look at these figures, so was I.
Do these figures mean that the loss from the two latest conflicts in the middle East are LESS than the loss of military personnel during Mr. Clinton's presidency; when America wasn't even involved in a war? And, I was even more confused; when I read that in 1980, during the reign of President (Nobel Peace Prize winner) Jimmy Carter, there were 2,392 US military fatalities!
These figures indicate that many members of our Media and our Politicians will pick and choose. They present only those "facts" which support their agenda-driven reporting. Why do so many of them march in lock-step to twist the truth? Where do so many of them get their marching-orders for their agenda?
(These statistics are published by Congressional Research Service, and they may be confirmed by anyone at: http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/RL32492.pdf )
Origins: What a muddle one can make of statistics.
The item quoted above attempts to demonstrate that — despite the criticism of President George W.
Bush for involving the U.S. in wars in Afghanistan and Iraq — U.S. active duty military deaths were actually significantly higher during the administration of his predecessor, President Bill Clinton. However, the proffered list of statistics is seriously flawed, as it grossly exaggerates the yearly loss figures for years corresponding to the presidency of Bill Clinton and under reports them for the years corresponding to the presidency of George W. Bush.
The numbers reproduced in this piece were taken from a Congressional Research Service (CRS) report on American War and Military Operations Casualties, using Table 4 on page 10, that presents statistics for U.S. active duty military deaths for the period 1980-2006.(Table 5, which separates combat/operational losses from deaths due to other causes — accident, homicide, illness, suicide — would have been a better source, but since the item quoted above used Table 4 to document its claim, so do we here.)
We find the following totals in that CRS report:
Year
President
Deaths
Total during presidency
1980
Jimmy Carter
2,392
N/A
1981
Ronald Reagan
2,380
1982
Ronald Reagan
2,319
1983
Ronald Reagan
2,465
1984
Ronald Reagan
1,999
1985
Ronald Reagan
2,252
1986
Ronald Reagan
1,984
1987
Ronald Reagan
1,983
1988
Ronald Reagan
1,819
17,201
1989
George H.W. Bush
1,636
1990
George H.W. Bush
1,507
1991
George H.W. Bush
1,787
1992
George H.W. Bush
1,293
6,223
1993
Bill Clinton
1,213
1994
Bill Clinton
1,075
1995
Bill Clinton
1,040
1996
Bill Clinton
974
1997
Bill Clinton
817
1998
Bill Clinton
827
1999
Bill Clinton
796
2000
Bill Clinton
758
7,500
2001
George W. Bush
891
2002
George W. Bush
999
2003
George W. Bush
1,228
2004
George W. Bush
1,874
2005
George W. Bush
1,942
2006
George W. Bush
1,858
8,792
Even though the CRS table does not include loss figures for the last two years of George W. Bush's presidency, the total number of U.S. military losses that have occurred during his administration is already significantly higher than the equivalent figure for Bill Clinton's presidency (8,792 vs. 7,500). When active duty deaths for 2007 and 2008 are factored in (the Pentagon has not yet released figures for these two years, but the U.S. suffered 1,014 war deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan in 2007 and at least another 100 so far in 2008), the discrepancy is even greater.
When we consider all the information in this table, we also find that the number of active duty losses during the Clinton presidency was less than half the number that occurred during the Reagan presidency, and only about 20% higher than the number that occurred during the George H.W. Bush presidency (even though Clinton served as president for twice as long as the elder Bush).
Sources:
