www.mtv.com/news/articles/1583969/20080324/id_0.jhtml -
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Published on: 3/20/2008
Last Visited: 3/24/2008
"When taken into context - and you think about other major wars, like the world wars, where hundreds of thousands died, or Vietnam, where it was close to 60,000 - in that context, 4,000 is a much lower number," said Jason Campbell, research analyst at the Brookings Institution.
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While the surge seems to have worked - the average death toll in January 2007 was around 100 per month and by the end of 2007 and beginning of 2008 it was closer to 35 per month - Campbell said death counts are not the best indicator of how the U.S. is doing in Iraq.
"When the death-toll numbers became more publicized in recent weeks, a very low percentage of people knew where we were in that count," he said.