Shocking Tally of Iraq Civilian Causalities

[Occhidiangela]

Perhaps the decision to use WP was partly determined by the building materials used in the city?  It seems to me that fires would not easily spread in cities like Fallujah.
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The "Ban" is the usual attempt to make war more humane by rule. That approach is not always practical.

The WP being used on stone houses would hardly start a lot of fires, but that is not what causes "collateral damage" casualties among civilians: the effects of WP itself does.

I also wonder sometimes at the classification of a casualty of "women and children." It carries an assumption, politically loaded, of conventional war which guerilla war most certainly is not. In a guerilla war, combatants can indeed be women and/or "children." A 14 year old with a gun is a combatant, not a child, but the journalists will report it as a child if someone has conveniently wandered off with the gun. Same with a woman, though my gut feel is that most Arabs wouldn't send their women to fight a guerilla war. I may be wrong about that, and of course the recent capture of the 35 year old woman suicide bombing (failed) for Zarqawi makes me wonder further, since Fallujah is one of his favorite places to fight.

Grains of salt required, regardless of who is reporting.

Occhi