How many people died in all the wars, massacres, slaughters and oppressions of the Twentieth Century? Here are a few atrocitologists who have made estimates:
M. Cherif Bassouni, from an unspecified "1996" source which I have been unable to track down (Cited in an article in the Chicago Tribune, 25 Oct. 1998)
33 million "military casualties" (That's how the article phrased it, but I presume they mean military deaths.)
170 million killed in "conflicts of a non-international charater, internal conflicts and tyrannical regime victimization")
86M since the Second World War
TOTAL: 203,000,000
Zbigniew Brzezinski, Out of Control: Global Turmoil on the Eve of the Twenty-first Century (1993)
"Lives deliberately extinguished by politically motivated carnage":
167,000,000 to 175,000,000
Including:
War Dead: 87,500,000
Military war dead:
33,500,000
Civilian war dead:
54,000,000
Not-war Dead: 80,000,000
Communist oppression:
60,000,000
David Barrett, World Christian Encyclopedia (2001)
Christian martyrs only: 45.5M [commentary & context]
Stephane Courtois, The Black Book of Communism
Victims of Communism only: 85-100M
Milton Leitenberg [http://www.pcr.uu.se/Leitenberg_paper.pdf]
Politically caused deaths in the 20th C: 214M to 226M, incl...
Deaths in wars and conflicts, incl. civilian: 130M-142M
Political deaths, 1945-2000: 50M-51M
Not The Enemy Media [http://nottheenemy.com/index_files/Death%20Counts/Death%20Counts.htm]
Killed through U.S. foreign policy since WWII: 10,774,706 to 16,856,361 (1945-May 2003)
Rudolph J. Rummel, Death By Government
"Democides" - Government inflicted deaths (1900-87)
169,198,000
Including:
Communist Oppression: 110,286,000
Democratic democides: 2,028,000
Not included among democides:
Wars: 34,021,000
Non-Democidal Famine (often including famines associated with war and communist mismanagement):
China (1900-87): 49,275,000
Russia: (1921-47): 5,833,000
Total:
258,327,000 for all the categories listed here.
Me (Matthew White, Historical Atlas of the Twentieth Century, 2001):
Deaths by War and Oppression:
Genocide and Tyranny:
83,000,000
Military Deaths in War:
42,000,000
Civilian Deaths in War:
19,000,000
Man-made Famine:
44,000,000
TOTAL:
188,000,000
FAQ: How did you get these totals?
(Note: It's commonly said that more civilians than soldiers die in war, but you may notice that my numbers don't seem to agree with that. Before you jump to any conclusions, however, remember that most civilian deaths in war are intentional, and therefore fall into the "genocide and tyranny" category. Many others are the result of starvation.)
My estimate for the Communist share of the century's unpleasantness:
Genocide & Tyranny: 44M
(incl. intentional famine)
Man-made Famine: 37M
(excl. intentional famine)
Communist-inspired War (for example the Russian Civil War, Vietnam, Korea, etc.)
Military: 5M
Civilian: 6M
NOTE: With these numbers, I'm tallying every combat death and accidental civilian death in the war, without differentiating who died, who did it or who started it. According to whichever theory of Just War you are working from, the Communists may be entirely blameless, or entirely to blame, for these 11M dead.
TOTAL: 92M deaths by Communism.
RESIDUE: 96M deaths by non-Communism.
Monday, October 22, 2007
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