I have followed the work of RJ Rummel for a long time, and urge y'all to familiarize yourselves with the contents/tables/photos on his site. His conclusion being the more 'free' - libertarian (his term) - a people are, the less violent, and less likely to war or commit democide upon foreign nations.

I asked him several years ago about the American Civil War, but he never replied. Maybe time for several more to try for an answer? Don't forget to point out that the Union's invasion of the Confederacy was upon a foreign and sovereign country. He hasn't tallied our killing of civilians in the Middle East as yet.

STATISTICS OF DEMOCIDE

Chapter 13

Death By American Bombing And Other Democide ^*

By R.J. Rummel

The bombing of non-combatant populations violated international and humanitarian laws.
----American protest to Japan about its bombing of China in 1938 The American Government and the American people have for some time pursued a policy of wholeheartedly condemning the unprovoked bombing and machine-gunning of civilian populations from the air .
----American President Roosevelt on the Soviet bombing of Helsinki in 1939

In domestic democide, such as lynchings, the American government was probably indirectly responsible for around 2,000 killed since 1900. But in foreign wars, the American military may have killed hundreds of thousands of foreigners in cold blood, virtually all civilians, and the greater majority of these by bombing.

Table 13.1 presents the democide and associated sources, estimates, and calculations on the United States. I have separated the United States from the other centi-kilo murderers listed in table 14.1 because of the special interest in this country and likely questions about its foreign democide. The first part of Table 13.1 lists the number of Americans killed in wars or foreign military violence during this century (lines 2 to 41), which overall total 633,000 dead. The remainder of the table concerns American democide and domestic conflict.

The first case of massive and extensive democide was during the Philippine War, which the United States fought to takeover the Philippines from a newly independent Filipino government and pro-independence guerrilla forces (lines 47 to 89). With the approval, if not under the command of their officers, American soldiers widely used torture, and often shot their prisoners and surrendering guerrillas. Moreover, as a military strategy American forces laid waste to inhabited areas of guerrilla infested island areas, destroying villages and killing many civilians in the process.

During World War II the United States indiscriminately bombed enemy cities, the A-bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki being the worst. About 105,000 Japanese were killed in Hiroshima or died from injuries and radiation afterwards, 60,000 in Nagasaki. All this was democide. In this photograph this injured Hiroshima mother and her baby wait for medical treatment. The baby, too weak to suckle, died in ten days.

Surviving civilians were often driven into camps or controlled villages, where conditions deteriorated such that many died from hunger and disease (e.g., line 61).
Numerous letters from soldiers and other first hand reports during the war attest to the responsibility of the American Army for thousands of deaths. Estimates of the number for particular campaigns, such as on Luzon or the Visayas Islands are difficult to find. Indeed, the Philippine War seems to have dropped into a memory hole (it is rarely even recognized as a colonial or imperial war--American war-deaths in the Philippines are usually classified under the Spanish-American War). The table presents the few mortality figures I could find.

If possible I classify and consolidate the estimates of primarily civilian deaths by province, as for Batangas province (lines 55 to 62); and Island, as for Luzon overall (lines 64 to 70). Separately I also give the overall estimates (lines 76 to 80). The consolidation of these (line 81) I then compare to the sum of the province/island totals (lines 81 and 82), and combine them into a final range (line 83) in the usual manner.

Next I list the only two large, democide related, estimates I could find (lines 87 and 88--scattered throughout the literature, often in the letters home of American soldiers, there are accounts of the murder of several to a few dozen Filipinos). The problem, then, is to estimate a reasonable overall democide, given the range of total deaths already determined above. Based on several works on the war¹ and taking account of General Bell's claim that on Luzon alone one-sixth of the population was killed, or about 600,000 Filipinos,² I assume that 10 to 50 percent of Filipino deaths were due to American democide, with 25 percent as the most prudent guess.

Calculating these percentages in the table (line 89), I get a democide range of 25,000 to 487,000 (showing the huge uncertainty involved), with a central estimate of 128,000 murdered.

To keep their people in line and to punish collaborators, Filipinos also committed democide, particularly the pro-independence guerrillas. This was, however, at a comparatively low level. I give an estimated range in the table (line 92) that seems consistent with the sources.

At the same time the United States was involved in the sack of Peking. Following the defeat of the Boxer rebels and Chinese Imperial Army eight foreign military contingents sacked Peking and the far countryside. Homes and shops were looted, women raped and murdered, and unarmed civilians generally killed. Elsewhere I have calculated the overall Chinese toll (shown on line 96), from which I guess that of the eight contingents American soldiers were less (1/16th), as much (1/8th), or more (1/4th) involved. The resulting range of 125 to 6,250 murders appears sufficient to well include the actual American democide, given the sources;³ this may have been about 625 innocent Chinese.

The United States committed its greatest democide during the Second World War. This was in the indiscriminate area bombing of German and Japanese cities, including Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Not all American strategic bombing was of this type. Early in the war the American Air Force concentrated on precision bombing of both Germany and Japan. But as the war progressed British pressure and American bomber losses in such bombing persuaded the Americans to join the British in broadly targeting the center of urban areas.

Regarding Japan, the apparent lack of success of precision bombing led to the assumption of command over the bombing by General Curtis Lemay, who was disposed to massive area bombing of Japanese cities. The bloody aftermath of this inhuman and barbarous form of warfare I lay out in the table (lines 100 to 226)... finish reading at RJ Rummel site