Speaker Pelosi’s Iraq War Fact Sheet

September 19, 2007

AMERICANS STILL OPPOSE
PRESIDENT BUSH’S 10-YEAR WAR IN IRAQ –
Even After General Petraeus’ Testimony and Bush’s Speech Last Week
AMERICANS STILL OPPOSE PRESIDENT’S FAILED IRAQ STRATEGY
· 68 percent of Americans think the number of U.S. troops in Iraq should be reduced or withdrawn entirely – up from 65 percent in the first week in September. [CBS News, 9/17/07]
· Two-thirds of Americans polled said their opinion of the war had not changed with General Petraeus’ testimony or President Bush’s recent speeches. [Pew Research, 9/18/07]
· 59 percent support setting a timetable to withdraw American troops from Iraq and sticking to it “regardless of what is going on in Iraq at the time.” [USA Today/Gallup, 9/19/07]
GROWING STRAIN ON U.S. TROOPS
· Since January of this year, we have lost 786 brave servicemen and women to the war in Iraq – 56 percent more this year than at this time in 2006. [icasualties.org]
· As of September 19th, 3,783 U.S. troops have been killed and nearly 28,000 have been wounded in the Iraq war since it began in March 2003. [Department of Defense, 9/19/07]
· Patricia Barron, National Military Families Association: “Families are truly exhausted.” [MSNBC, 9/19/07]
· Retired Army Major General John Batiste: “American formations continue to lose a battalion’s worth of dead and wounded every month with little to show for it.” [Army Times, 9/12/07]
IRAQ’S DETERIORATING SECURITY SITUATION
· On September 18th all official U.S. government ground travel in Baghdad and throughout Iraq was suspended and U.S. diplomats are banned from leaving the Green Zone after members of a private security firm guarding a State Department convoy shot and killed a number of Iraqis. [CNN, 9/19/07]
· According to the Defense Department’s September report, “Measuring Stability and Security in Iraq,” ethno-sectarian attacks increased in July and attacks against Coalition forces reached record levels in June. [Department of Defense, 9/14/07]
IRAQI PEOPLE FACE GRIM REALITY
Dorothea Krimitsas, International Committee of the Red Cross: “Everyday life is a nightmare for Iraqis and that is why they flee…It is very difficult to say what will happen but it looks very bleak. What we see is clearly a deteriorating humanitarian situation.” [Reuters, 9/19/07]
· Astrid van Genderen Stort, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees: “Many Iraqis are fleeing multi-ethnic areas before they are forced to do so…Children don’t go to school any more, their parents often don’t have jobs. More children are wandering the streets. Child labor is rising. You get children collecting garbage.” [Reuters, 9/19/07]
· Between 67 percent and 70 percent of Iraqis say the surge has “hampered conditions for political dialogue, reconstruction and economic development. [BBC, 9/10/07]

· Dorothea Krimitsas, International Committee of the Red Cross: “Everyday life is a nightmare for Iraqis and that is why they flee…It is very difficult to say what will happen but it looks very bleak. What we see is clearly a deteriorating humanitarian situation.” []· Astrid van Genderen Stort, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees: “Many Iraqis are fleeing multi-ethnic areas before they are forced to do so…Children don’t go to school any more, their parents often don’t have jobs. More children are wandering the streets. Child labor is rising. You get children collecting garbage.” []· Between 67 percent and 70 percent of Iraqis say the surge has “hampered conditions for political dialogue, reconstruction and economic development. []

1 Comment

  1. This war is like a bottomless pit, not only in the destruction it causes but in the major issues from which it distracts the nation – health care reform, the environment, a Medicare program that by some estimates is less than half funded for when the boomers begin retiring in droves in the coming decade.

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