Are Rüdiger Overmans’ figures of German military fatalities in World War II plausible?

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Re: Are Rüdiger Overmans’ figures of German military fatalities in World War II plausible?

#46

Post by Richard Anderson » 09 Jun 2018, 17:17

Mori wrote:The Zetterling article has the opposite problem: better knowledge/understanding of OKH documents and other sources but so weak in commenting the statistical approach it ruins its reliability.
I rather suspect Niklas has a pretty good working knowledge of statistics, given that he worked as an operations research analyst and now teaches mathematics. AFAIK from conversations with him, he never criticized the statistical sampling as too small, and he did not do so in his article (yes, indeed he wrote it). His issue with Overmans starts with his use of the “Totenkartei” and the “Allgemine Kartei”, not the size of the samples, but that the two sources should not be overlapped. It was unclear if Overmans had taken care to not do so. The next issue was Overmans assumption that the "deaths" he believes he found in the “Allgemine Kartei” were in fact dead and that they died as a result of the war. His criticism of the statistical method used is actually:

"First we have the fact that he has used two different sets of cards to create his sample. If these have identical distributions this causes no difficulty, but there are strong reasons to suspect they are not identical in their distribution over time. Also he has arrived at the overall casualty figure of 5,318,000 dead by adding together the 3.1 million in the “Totenkartei” with the result of a sample from the “Allgemeine Kartei”. This means that the
“Allgemeine Kartei contains, according to Overmans sample, 2.2 million “deaths”. However, since this is a sample it must be added that there is a margin of error on that figure of almost +/- 200,000.22 Since Overmans uses this total as a basis to calculate the losses for smaller periods, we have a case of two statistical errors of margin piled upon each other. If we look at the figures he gives for losses on the eastern front up to 31 August 1943, this means that the margin of error is in the order of +/- 250,000. Consequently, his losses for each month, often given down to the last digit, must be taken with a large grain of salt."

However, that is only one factor in his argument. The second, is:

"...there are many problems with Overmans set of data. First of all, there are the many ambiguities with those cases where there is no information available on the fate of individuals. Overmans equates these cases with deaths. This is far from safe. Overmans argues that the many other possibilities are small. Probably true, but many small factors can taken together be kind significant, if they mainly pull in the same direction. Since
Overmans have assumed that, if there is no information available on the fate of a man after a certain date, he is dead, uncertainties can only pull in one direction. After all, a man can not be more than dead more than once. Hence, there is a basic risk in the kind of investigation performed by Overmans."

BTW, hospital mortality rate for wounded soldiers in the U.S. Army in World War II was 4.5% and they had much better standards of care than the Wehrmacht. With Feldheer WIA of 4,462,965 for 22 June 1941 to 31 March 1945 (OKW KTB, Band IV.2, p. 1515-1516) that is a minimum of 200,833 DOW. Given that the KIA in the same report was 1,149,007, that is a fairly big change.
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Re: Are Rüdiger Overmans’ figures of German military fatalities in World War II plausible?

#47

Post by Stiltzkin » 09 Jun 2018, 17:45

they had much better standards of care than the Wehrmacht.
I would not be so sure about that, Germany and Britain have always enjoyed a more developed medical sector and higher development index than the US (USA nowdays has a lower life expectancy than western european countries still), but that would be only in the abscence of the war, since the Wehrmacht was in a more dire situation and the EF had certainly a higher impact on DOW rates anyway.


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Re: Are Rüdiger Overmans’ figures of German military fatalities in World War II plausible?

#48

Post by tramonte » 09 Jun 2018, 18:35

As i have mentioned on this case there are several claims of Overmans highly questionable:

1) When using Swedish numbers of 18-40 years old males deceasing after the war (1945-49) it's relatively obvious than 250 000-300 000 German male deceased after the war with no combat relate.

2) Hardly more than 0.5% of wounded German soldiers deceased after 1945 (Finnish figures or latter deceased wounded was just about 0.3%)

3) No way was there 410 000 combat German deaths in western front in 1945. More likely the figure is 100 000 at maximum (or more likely little bit over 80 000)

4) In Italy not 150 000 German soldiers deceased in land warfare 1943-45. Real figure is somewhere near 80 000.

5) Overmans has made exaggerations of German deaths even before mid 1944. He misread even statistics of Heer Ost losses and misunderstood the strength of German forces generally in east 1943-44

6) Only subgroup might increase German casualty numbers bigger than Overman claimed might be German POWs captured by Soviet Union. If Overmans had relatively right number of German POWs deceased in east there is no way even near 5 million German soldiers would have deceased in WW2.

7) Samples are very controversial methods to do studies like these. Overmans figure of 5.3 million is theoretical maximum and all his errors are leading to one direction: less deaths than Overmans has claimed.
"Overmans discusses these cases, but concludes that they are all of minor importance. Probably his conclusion is correct, for each one of these cases. But since all of them point in the same direction, it is not necessarily true that the combined effect is minor. The effect of this would be a smaller number of deaths compared to Overmans figures. In effect, his methodolgy can be said to establish the upper limit on the number of German soldiers that lost their lives. "
8) When real numbers of deaths are unknown there seems to be tendency to highly exaggerate deaths of all war.
" ...there are the many ambiguities with those cases where there is no information available on the fate of individuals. Overmans equates these cases with deaths. This is far from safe. Overmans argues that the many other possibilities are small. Probably true, but many small factors can taken together be kind significant, if they mainly pull in the same direction. Since Overmans have assumed that, if there is no information available on the fate of a man after a certain date, he is dead, uncertainties can only pull in one direction. After all, a man can not be more than dead more than once. Hence, there is a basic risk in the kind of investigation performed by Overmans."
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Re: Are Rüdiger Overmans’ figures of German military fatalities in World War II plausible?

#49

Post by tramonte » 09 Jun 2018, 19:19

Richard Anderson wrote: With Feldheer WIA of 4,462,965 for 22 June 1941 to 31 March 1945 (OKW KTB, Band IV.2, p. 1515-1516) that is a minimum of 200,833 DOW. Given that the KIA in the same report was 1,149,007, that is a fairly big change.

During Continuation War (1941-1944) official Finnish figures of wounded is mostly represented as 157 000. The database giving numbers of DIW Finns between 22nd June 1941 and 14th of Sept 1944 is 12 864 which means that 8.2% deceased. As i have given earlier the numbers of wounded soldiers of June 1944 of which just about 0.3% deceased after the war (1945-48) we can be pretty sure those in 1944 wounded don't change much the big picture. It might be possible that DIW share of wounded of German soldiers might have been near that of Finland. Take 8% or maximum 9% of 4.6 million and you will get DIWs: 370 000 - 415 000.

The American share of 4.5% is pretty low. They likely had the best system to take care of wounded. But there might be some other explanations: the group might have consisted sick people too, not just wounded. Perhaps Finns and Germans had just wounded. I'm not sure. All official documents are always talking about wounded, not "wounded and sick".
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Re: Are Rüdiger Overmans’ figures of German military fatalities in World War II plausible?

#50

Post by Richard Anderson » 09 Jun 2018, 19:32

Stiltzkin wrote:
they had much better standards of care than the Wehrmacht.
I would not be so sure about that, Germany and Britain have always enjoyed a more developed medical sector and higher development index than the US (USA nowdays has a lower life expectancy than western european countries still), but that would be only in the abscence of the war, since the Wehrmacht was in a more dire situation and the EF had certainly a higher impact on DOW rates anyway.
Nice supposition, but no that was not the case during the war. Infections ran rampant in the German hospital system during the war. See Howard M. Snyder, M.D., "Chapter XVI - C, Section III. The German Medical Service in Italy" in Medical Department of the U.S. Army in World War II, Volume I.

"The following notes on special hospitals are representative of the conditions found in all of the hospitals inspected:

A Luftwaffe hospital, set up at Villa d'Este at Cernobbio on Lake Como, was operated chiefly as an orthopedic surgery center. The Germans had added a magnificent operating room to this luxury hotel, and the equipment was excellent. A small prosthetic shop was operated by three mechanics, and the patients for whom prostheses were being prepared were serving as their assistants. All parts, including metal joints, were made from raw materials in the shop. Some prostheses were constructed of wood and others of a plastic material which could be softened with acetone for molding and fitting.

The surgical standards in this hospital seemed much higher than in many others inspected. Even so, the U.S. medical officer who had been attached to it to check on the professional work done by the German staff reported that the aseptic technique here, as in most other hospitals, was far from optimum. Surgeons did not wear masks, even when performing elective major abdominal surgery or orthopedic surgery, and the incidence of wound infection was high." (p. 457)

"GENERAL CLINICAL CONSIDERATIONS

The outstanding impression gained from a survey of these and other German hospitals in Italy was that infection was many times more frequent than in U.S. Army hospitals. " (p. 458)

"Clinical practices in the German Army medical service explained these observations [that infection was many time more frequent than in U.S. Army hospitals]. Blood was used in little more than homeopathic amounts, and an almost complete lack of aseptic technique accounted for the prevalence of wound infection, the extent of which was almost incomprehensible in the year 1945, regardless of military circumstances." (p. 459)

"Shock and hemorrhage. - German wounded received in shock were treated by external heat, stimulants, Periston when it was available, and direct blood transfusions.

The Germans regarded Periston as an excellent substitute for plasma and of such high osmotic properties that it was retained in the blood stream for 12 or 14 hours. It was furnished in 500-cc. units, and the dosage did not exceed 2 units. [note appended: "Periston has never been popular in the United States and was regarded in 1958 as a poor plasma substitute. It has been determined that it is not all excreted, a certain amount being deposited in some of the organs of the body. U.S. medical officers were in agreement with German medical officers that a maximum dosage of 1,000 cc. should never be exceeded."] Supplies, however, were limited, and it was not available in all German medical installations, even in units in the division area, which had prior claims on it." (p. 459)

"Chest wounds. - Most of the patients with chest wounds observed in German hospitals had been wounded weeks and months earlier. About 60 percent of them had empyema. Colonel Snyder was informed that empyema could be expected to develop in about this proportion of shell-fragment wounds and that it could also be expected in about 30 percent of all bullet wounds. In the U.S. Army in World War II, empyema came to be a very uncommon complication." (p. 460)

"No surgery was done in perforating chest wounds unless there were indriven rib fragments. The policy of early, repeated aspiration in hemothorax, which was routine in U.S. Army hospitals, was not employed in German hospitals, and there seemed no general policy for the management of this complication. Some surgeons stated that aspiration was never employed unless it became necessary to relieve dyspnea associated with a large hemothorax or hemopneumothorax. Others said that aspiration was performed within the first 5 days after wounding." (p. 461)

And so on for all the other major wound surgical techniques for extremities, abdominal wounds, and so forth. It also noted, correctly, that German surgical care favored the less seriously wounded, which mirrored their wound statistics (pp. 461-462).

We could also talk about the extraordinarily high instance of typhus in the German forces, especially in the East, due to poor sanitary conditions
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Re: Are Rüdiger Overmans’ figures of German military fatalities in World War II plausible?

#51

Post by Richard Anderson » 09 Jun 2018, 19:37

tramonte wrote:During Continuation War (1941-1944) official Finnish figures of wounded is mostly represented as 157 000. The database giving numbers of DIW Finns between 22nd June 1941 and 14th of Sept 1944 is 12 864 which means that 8.2% deceased. As i have given earlier the numbers of wounded soldiers of June 1944 of which just about 0.3% deceased after the war (1945-48) we can be pretty sure those in 1944 wounded don't change much the big picture. It might be possible that DIW share of wounded of German soldiers might have been near that of Finland. Take 8% or maximum 9% of 4.6 million and you will get DIWs: 370 000 - 415 000.
I suspect the German figure would not be much different, if not higher.
The American share of 4.5% is pretty low. They likely had the best system to take care of wounded. But there might be some other explanations: the group might have consisted sick people too, not just wounded. Perhaps Finns and Germans had just wounded. I'm not sure. All official documents are always talking about wounded, not "wounded and sick".
Um, no, that figure is for WIA that reached the medical system, starting with the field hospitals attached to each division. It does not include diseased or injured. Albeit there is a fine line between Wounded in Action and Injured in Action (IIA), the U.S. Army categorized them separately and Died of Wounds (DOW) is categorized separately from Died of Disease (DOD) and Died of Injuries (DOI).

The Germans also distinguished between Gefallen (KIA), Gestorben (Died), Verwundete (WIA), and Verletze (IIA).
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Re: Are Rüdiger Overmans’ figures of German military fatalities in World War II plausible?

#52

Post by tramonte » 09 Jun 2018, 21:59

An OKH document (Der Heeresarzt im OKH Gen.St.d.H/Gen.Qu. Az 1335 (IIb) Nr. I./01867/44 g.Kdos, 6 März 1944, BA-MA RW 6/v. 555) gives the situation for the German army up to 20 February 1944:

Killed in action....................................................................795,698
Died due to disease, accidents, etc.....................................32,724
Missing...............................................................................588,860
Died in medical facilities due to wounds............................295,709 (37.16% of KIA)
Died in medical facilities due to disease, accidents etc.......99,363
Sum:................................................................................1,812,354
Sum (excluding missing):................................................1,223,494
of which non-combat deaths were......................................132,087 (~average 29,300 annually from fall of 1939)

The last figure: non-combat deaths (132,087) are result of 4½ year warfare period when Germany had had likely average of 8 million men in armed forces where army took majority. The war ended 15 months later. Even if these non-combat deaths relatively were twice more common during last 15 months (some 94,000) the final result of non-combat deaths has not been more than 205,000. If they were three times more common the figure is some 340,000.

Finnish armed forces (not just army) had these figures from 27Nov 1939 to 14Sept 1944, the total number of wounded soldiers little bit over 200,000 (some 43,000 during Winter War)

Killed in action....................57,449
Died in wounds...................16,965 (29.53% of KIA)
non-combat deaths..............9,413

I have to admit now that OKH document revealed very high DIW if comparing it to KIA and taking same figures of Finnish armed forces. Is it possible really that more than 10% of wounded German soldiers did decease even much before 1945? Even in WW1 British statistics according to one web page is giving numbers of wounded of British Army:

Proportion returned to duty: 64%
Proportion returned to duty but only for lines of communication, garrison or sedentery work: 18%
Proportion discharged as invalids: 8% (i.e. approximately 182,000)
Proportion died of wounds received: 7%
Last edited by tramonte on 09 Jun 2018, 22:13, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Are Rüdiger Overmans’ figures of German military fatalities in World War II plausible?

#53

Post by Stiltzkin » 09 Jun 2018, 22:10

We could also talk about the extraordinarily high instance of typhus in the German forces, especially in the East, due to poor sanitary conditions
Top
Inaugural-Dissertation der Medizinischen Fakultät der Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg im Breisgau https://www.freidok.uni-freiburg.de/fed ... E1/content Die Kriegschirurgie von 1939-1945 aus der Sicht der Beratenden Chirurgen des deutschen Heeres im Zweiten Weltkrieg tells a better story, which is based on primary archive material.
Comparing war conditions to the general case makes little sense, in fact here is information of how infections were treated and about the harsh conditions of the EF. Sitting in a comfortable hospital in Straßbourg is one thing, laying in a field in wore torn Ukraine another, Id like to see American surgeons work under such conditions, operating without a roof over their heads. Europe produced 35 Nobel prize winners in medicine till the 40s since the beginning of the 20th century, of which Germany received 9, America 4 of which 3 worked on one and the same project.
Here is the HDI for today: http://hdr.undp.org/en/composite/trends
We could also talk about the extraordinarily high instance of typhus in the German forces, especially in the East, due to poor sanitary conditions
Top
That is exactly what I was stating. This is about the impact of the war and not the "general standards", because it seems that the "general standard" in the US is actually worse, even child mortality is higher. Read before you comment. I am little interested in American late war biased reports, it should be obvious to any person that the situation was horrible. I might as well talk about American "standards" in the mexican war. It would be new to me that American forces fought on the Eastern Front.

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Re: Are Rüdiger Overmans’ figures of German military fatalities in World War II plausible?

#54

Post by tramonte » 09 Jun 2018, 22:21

Quick check of American losses in Pacific revealed that bigger share of wounded soldiers deceased there than in Europe. Conclusions?

The medical treatment of Germans was likely similar in Eastern Front what Finns had in Karelia and Karelian Isthmus. First aid then evacuation to field hospital which normally located 20-25 km behind front line (Germans might have had in steppe further behind?). Then military hospital. So i made database query of wounded Finns who deceased (Nov 39 - Dec 45) and their location was:

-front line: 3827 (21.9%)
-field hospitals: 8 843 (50.7%). Every division had 3 field hospitals. In every field hospital was 150-200 places and 100 people working there.
-military hospitals: 4 778 (27.4%). In home front. Evacuation by buss or by train and was done mostly by night time.

In reality much more than just about 22% of those deceased did decease in front line and likely 3/4 deceased before reaching military hospital.
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Re: Are Rüdiger Overmans’ figures of German military fatalities in World War II plausible?

#55

Post by Stiltzkin » 09 Jun 2018, 22:26

Quick check of American losses in Pacific revealed that bigger share of wounded soldiers deceased there than in Europe. Conclusions?
Superior american medical facilities of course, what else. Not the conditions of the jungle fighting, evacuations issues nor malaria/scrub typhus.
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Re: Are Rüdiger Overmans’ figures of German military fatalities in World War II plausible?

#56

Post by Mori » 09 Jun 2018, 22:28

Richard Anderson wrote: I rather suspect Niklas has a pretty good working knowledge of statistics, given that he worked as an operations research analyst and now teaches mathematics. AFAIK from conversations with him, he never criticized the statistical sampling as too small, and he did not do so in his article (yes, indeed he wrote it).
Well, it does sound that he questions the size of the sample:

"But the sample Overmans has used consists of 3,051 cases from the “Toteskartei” and 1,100 cases from the “Allgemeine Kartei”. Thus in Overmans sample 74 % is taken from the “Totenkartei” and 26 % from the “Allgemeine Kartei”

He then goes on arguing that since the distribution of the variable are different in each of the 2 sets, having different sample sizes is a problem. That's not right: as long as each sample is above a given threshold, it's fine.

+++

I wouldn't confuse teaching mathematics and being good at stats, because stats may well be an untouched discipline in a traditional math course. This is from personal experience: my academic education includes *a lot* of maths, but without any pragmatic class on statistics (e.g., Central Limit Theorem, sure I knew it inside out, but I never had to compute a chi-2). I only got a proper stats course years later when attending a course which had nothing to do with maths...

+++

AFAIR, A definitive shortcoming of Overman's results is not giving the confidence intervals (you know: "this result has a 95% probability to be correct"). It's actually better than guessestimates on margin of errors, like the +/- 200 000 you mention.

And yes, it could have led to some surprises for the monthly losses.

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Re: Are Rüdiger Overmans’ figures of German military fatalities in World War II plausible?

#57

Post by Mori » 09 Jun 2018, 22:40

tramonte wrote: 3) No way was there 410 000 combat German deaths in western front in 1945. More likely the figure is 100 000 at maximum (or more likely little bit over 80 000)
I pick this assertion, which, like the others, is a belief really.

Overmans sums up all the deaths during duty time, and that's more than the "combat" losses fighting Allies ground armies. Overmans also include deaths from non-Werhmacht units, like border control, police, the militia etc.

But let's look at "combat" casualties. Veritable-Grenade is active for one month in Feb-Mar 1945. It's only a fraction of the front line, about 1/3 of the total length of the front. Allies assesment of German losses is 38 000 men (they derive this from PoWs, applying a ca. 60/40 PoW/KIA ratio). An assessment from German sources gives losses 50% higher, which could mean 57 000 KIA.

So I believe German deaths in the West for 1945 are definitively above the 100 000 you guessestimate.
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Re: Are Rüdiger Overmans’ figures of German military fatalities in World War II plausible?

#58

Post by Mori » 09 Jun 2018, 22:48

tramonte wrote: 7) Samples are very controversial methods to do studies like these. Overmans figure of 5.3 million is theoretical maximum and all his errors are leading to one direction: less deaths than Overmans has claimed.
"Overmans discusses these cases, but concludes that they are all of minor importance. Probably his conclusion is correct, for each one of these cases. But since all of them point in the same direction, it is not necessarily true that the combined effect is minor. The effect of this would be a smaller number of deaths compared to Overmans figures. In effect, his methodolgy can be said to establish the upper limit on the number of German soldiers that lost their lives. "
I tend to say samples are the least controversial methods there is, except brute force count of each name :)

The sentences you quote are another of Zetterling's arguments which made me inconfortable. "Minor importance" means, well, "minor". Is that a 0.01% impact on the sum? Summing up 10 of this kind could have a 0.1% impact, and that's still minor.

Had Zetterling _quantified_ at least one of the "minor" cases, finding it, say, at 3%, then I would have followed the reasoning (10 "minor" cases at 3% each do make too much). But as it is, it does not hold. There are too many incomplete / shallow arguments in the Zetterling article to trust the whole, at least when it comes to the statistical part.

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Re: Are Rüdiger Overmans’ figures of German military fatalities in World War II plausible?

#59

Post by Cult Icon » 10 Jun 2018, 03:05

I read:

7 million german dead during the war (including 2.8 million civilian).

And 3 million german dead postwar (due to dislocation). This figure surprises me

from a source cited in "Myth of comradeship". I will look it up later.

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Re: Are Rüdiger Overmans’ figures of German military fatalities in World War II plausible?

#60

Post by Richard Anderson » 10 Jun 2018, 16:24

Stiltzkin wrote:Inaugural-Dissertation der Medizinischen Fakultät der Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg im Breisgau https://www.freidok.uni-freiburg.de/fed ... E1/content Die Kriegschirurgie von 1939-1945 aus der Sicht der Beratenden Chirurgen des deutschen Heeres im Zweiten Weltkrieg tells a better story, which is based on primary archive material.
Thanks for the source, even if it doesn't present any statistical data. It does mention that,

"Das Fleckfieber blieb bis zum Ende des zweiten Weltkrieges als medizinisches Problem bestehen, da die deutschen Truppen aufgrund der Verschlechterung der taktischen Lage keine festen Stellungen besaßen, ständigen Kampfeinsätzen ausgeliefert waren, keine Möglichkeit zur Körperpflege hatten und einen Teil ihrer Entlausungsanlagen verloren. Auch eine Impfung konnte die Morbidität des Fleckfiebers kaum positiv beeinflussen, da einerseits Impfstoffknappheit vorherrschte und andererseits nur eine lückenhafte Impfung des deutschen Ostheeres stattfand."

Which confirms my remark about the typhus problem.
Comparing war conditions to the general case makes little sense, in fact here is information of how infections were treated and about the harsh conditions of the EF.
Who, pray tell, did anything of the sort? The Fifth U.S. Army Medical Corps report compared conditions in the German military hospitals of HG C with those of Fifth U.S. Army.
Sitting in a comfortable hospital in Straßbourg is one thing, laying in a field in wore torn Ukraine another, Id like to see American surgeons work under such conditions, operating without a roof over their heads.
What a remarkably obtuse comment. U.S. Army and Navy surgeons worked under the same conditions as German surgeons at different times. I'd like to see German surgeons work under the conditions of the Pacific or CBI theater, operating in monsoon conditions.
Europe produced 35 Nobel prize winners in medicine till the 40s since the beginning of the 20th century, of which Germany received 9, America 4 of which 3 worked on one and the same project.
Which has what to do with "war conditions"? Isn't that the "general case"? Could you please try to decide where you are moving the goalposts to?
That is exactly what I was stating. This is about the impact of the war and not the "general standards", because it seems that the "general standard" in the US is actually worse, even child mortality is higher. Read before you comment. I am little interested in American late war biased reports, it should be obvious to any person that the situation was horrible. I might as well talk about American "standards" in the mexican war. It would be new to me that American forces fought on the Eastern Front.
So it is not about the "general standards"? Good, glad you cleared that up. Would it be new to you that American forces fought under the same conditions in Italy, which is where the comparison was made?
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