Iraq - US casualties are estimated to be 20,000 (dead and wounded). The number of insurgents is also estimated at 20,000. Therefore each insurgent has injured or killed one American (forgetting America's notorious habit of shooting one another or 'friendly fire').

There are 150,000 US troops in Iraq, but there are not 150,000 insurgent casualties. There might be 150,000 innocent Iraqi and insurgent casualties however.

The number of small calibre ammunition used in Iraq is 1.8 billion rounds (Government accounting office). If there are 20,000 insurgents then US troops have fired 90,000 rounds at each insurgent. Makes you wonder how good these troops actually are at marksmanship! If US troops can actually shoot straight, then who have they actually shot all these bullets at?

The US cannot make bullets as fast as the US forces are firing them and so are buying them from abroad such as the Israeli Military Industries. Ergo, The US industry cannot produce enough ammunition to defeat 20,000 insurgents in Iraq.

There are 40,000 Iraqis in detention, twice the number of so called insurgents - who are they? Why is every able man capable of bearing arms and killed in a crossfire called an insurgent?

The US accuses Syria of 'allowing' terrorists across her borders to Iraq and is threatening Syria with reprisals - but it isn't a nation state's job to protect another's border, only its own. It's Americas job to protect Iraq's borders (it is legally responsible for Iraq) not Syria's. America cannot protect it's border with Mexico (1,000,000 illegal immigrants a year) and yet it expects Syria ( a couple of hundred terrorists) to protect Iraq's borders!!!

Bush this week claimed progress in the training of Iraqi soldiers declaring that 30 of the supposed 100 Iraqi battalions are capable of taking the lead in combat. Interestingly enough, last week in a report to Congress the top US commander in Iraq confessed that the number of Iraqi battalions capable of operating without US help is just one. Eyebrows raised in surprise, in June the same commander declared that the number was three. Some progress. If the number is one battalion that means that a mere 750 soldiers are ready to stand up if the 150,000 odd coalition forces were to leave tomorrow. After 2.5 years that's one hell of a training program.

Staying in Iraq briefly, the Iraqi government recently paid $3,500 per piece for American made MP5 machine guns. They recieved Egyptian fakes worth $200 a piece according to Iraq's finance minister.

Two weeks ago Bush announced that the 2nd most wanted Al'Qaeda operative in Iraq. The NY daily news said he was hardly in the top 15, and someone else pointed out that there have now been 33 'top lieutenants' killed or captured in the last 2.5 years even while terrorist attacks have increased and the insurgency grows on a daily basis.

Estimates for repairing the damage caused by Katrina vary but a commonly agreed figure is $200 billion. Where's the money going to come from? With the US $7 trillion in debt, an annual budget defecit of $365 billion anually and a soaring trade defecit can America afford to rebuild New Orleans? Not to mention the additional costs for the destruction caused by Rita. The plan is to cut $80 billion from Medicare and $50 billion from Medicaid, to reduce school lunches, rent subsidies for the poor and so on. Meanwhile, the tax cuts for the obscenely rich this year alone is, surprise surprise, $225 billion. So the poor will pay for rebuilding NO while the rich get even richer and suffer not at all. Some nation eh?

Terrorists this year will kill 85,000 American citizens - more than the total of soldiers that dies in Vietnam. That would be a shocking headline wouldn't it? But of course it isn't true. The real headling should be Americans deliberately kill 85,000 of their own citizens this year. Why? Because if the gap in health care between blacks and whites was eliminated, this is how many lives would be saved EACH YEAR.

Some figures just don't add up do they?

yechydda,