War by the numbers

There's a statistic I've heard any number of times that goes something like: World War I was the first major conflict in which more soldiers died battlefield trauma than of camp illnesses and wound infections. Indeed, such progress continues: Cousin E informs us that, on average, it takes a wounded US soldier three days to get from Iraq to the US, versus 41 days in Vietnam. And yet, The Economist (2 Nov 06) reports that, of the approximately 2,800 US soldiers who have died in Iraq, some 600 (21%) of those deaths were from illnesses or accidents. The figures don't exactly compare, I realize, but it's a sobering observation on the messiness of war, even in our most modern armed forces.