Why does the US death toll from WWII keep rising?

Factual Questions
1

Although I am not old enough to have fought in WWII, I am old enough to
remember that when Studs Terkel’s book about it, The Good War, came out,
the generally accepted death toll of US soldiers in WWII was about a quarter
million. More recently, a quick glance at the Encyclopaedia Britannica
edition of 2000 gives a figure of 292,000 soldiers and 6000 civilians for a
round total of about three hundred thousand. In the recent Memorial Day
speechifying, however, everyone from the President on down seemed to be
bandying about a figure of 400,000 US deaths in WWII. What’s going on?
Where are all these new WWII casualties coming from? At this rate WWII is
killing Americans faster than al Qaeda.

2

I have no idea what the answer is, but I just wanted to post to say that I like the way you abuse statistics. :wink: Very Mark Twain-esque; he would say that, at this rate, in 100 years, the population of the US will be wiped out and the Axis will declare complete victory.

3

…Or they will receive an “unconditional surrender”, to use the contemporary term.

4

Two possible answers:

  • Better and more accurate information.

  • Some old soldiers lived a very long life but eventually died of battlfied-related injuries.

5

Land mines!

6

Yeah, I considered those too, but…

  • I think it would have been in the news if someone had dug up a mass grave with the remains of 100k US soldiers in it.

  • When anyone dies in their 70’s or 80’s who fought in a war in their 20’s or 30’s, I think it is too late to attribute cause of death to “battlefield-related injuries”.

7

WAG - the 300,000 figure are battlefield casulties. The additional deaths are from nonbattlefied causes such as disease, accidents, etc.

8

You miss my first point. It is very possible a recheck of the paperwork bumps up the figures.

Well, they are still adding names to the Vietnam Memorial. It is entirely possible for the same to be occurring with WWII vets as well.