Reply #14: Standard military combat casualty reporting. Where is it? [View All]

[TacticalPeek]

An elemental military datum is "fighting strength" of various echelons, and because of it's obvious importance there are ancient, established procedures for reporting casualties effecting fighting strength.

There are something like 8 to 10 classes of casualty, and on every Morning Report, after-action, etc. these numbers are listed.

In the past, this information was summarized and reported to and by the press in a familiar recap:

x killed
y wounded
z missing

I don't recall *any* media account giving this standard information.

I know the Pentagon has "changed the accounting rules" (sniff!) for some things, i.e., "civilian casualties". Guess that was removed from the taxonomy altogether.

But shouldn't the standard "killed, wounded, missing" info be available somewhere? Do the mil flacks not provide it, or does the media itself trim this down to "killed in hostile action"? Obviously fighting strength is also effected by suicides and aWols.

I'm particularly peeved that the public is provided little notion of the number of wounded.