April 13, 2003

THE MEMPHIS Commercial Appeal reports

THE MEMPHIS Commercial Appeal reports that 20 percent of war deaths are blacks:

Nearly a fifth of the fatalities among U.S. troops in the current war in Iraq are black, which will be the highest cost African Americans have paid in any of America's wars if the trend continues.

NAACP chairman Julian Bond, however, notes that the deaths have largely occurred among non-frontline troops. He doesn't see a race angle:

"I was not aware of this and am surprised by it," said Julian Bond, national chairman of the NAACP. "I knew that black soldiers were concentrated in the non-combat positions of the military, which makes this all the more surprising. But clearly, these support troops were subjected to battle conditions unexpectedly."

Bond's considered response will be something to remember when anti-war screechers seize on these statistics as evidence of "Bush's racist war for oil".

Posted by Tim Blair at April 13, 2003 02:14 AM
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