http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-17604991 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-17604991)
I have heard of numbers like this recently. Thanks for sharing the link.
I read that this morning; someone over on the Matrix forums linked it.
When you think about it, it's really not that surprising that we've potentially been low-balling the numbers the last century and-a-half. Not to fault Fox and Livermore at all -- it's actually pretty damned amazing they managed to do as well as they did, given the relatively poor record-keeping back then -- but it's not hard to see how they might have missed so many.
From the article:
QuoteProf Hacker's figure of 750,000 would translate into about 7.5 million US deaths in proportion to America's current population, Prof McPherson notes.
That's staggering to think about.
Makes me wonder how off other casualty counts are. I've read that the total number of Soviet deaths in WWII was 20+ million. Maybe that's even higher too? Hard to connect to such large numbers.
There's probably a lot of ambiguity in Soviet WW2 numbers. I think WW2 casualty numbers from western countries would be pretty accurate.
It is hard to connect with such large numbers. That's why seeing the Civil War deaths based on today's population stood out for me. It seems inconceivable that we would fight a war today that would result in the deaths 7.5 million soldiers, even if it were Americans fighting other Americans.
We wouldn't fight that kind of war today. Unless it was one for total, complete survival, like some kind of massive invasion.
Like the one in Battle LA?
Yes but multiply it by 100. More like a combo of Independence Day and Red Dawn.
Talk about the Mother of All Battles.
Well let's be honest here.
Every prediction that the human race has eliminated the scourge of war has always been wrong. War has been delayed decades in some eras but always comes back to haunt, and always worse than it was previously.
The next massive war, whenever it comes, will not be pleasant to either civilians or combatants.
Could the commanders during the Napoleonic Wars have predicted the massive slaughter of World War I? On the same note, could we, sitting here in an age of limited war, predict the next major war? Each new conflict is more deadly than the last. Scary sh*t if you really want to sit down and think about it.
Which I don't...so I'll just sit here and enjoy my bowl of Cap'n Crunch.
Gus, I was going to give a reasoned response about the current nature of war, but I realized that I don't really want to think about it right now either.
How's the Cap' Crunch?
Tasty. Makes all the bad things go away.