Conflict Casualties

US withdrawal completed 2003 – 2026

Twenty-three years

US Central Command declared its withdrawal from Iraq complete on September 30, 2026, twenty-three years after the invasion. The Iraqi dead were never fully counted, and estimates still differ by hundreds of thousands. This page sets out what is known, and where each number comes from.

Read it as a story

Baghdad seen from orbit on March 31, 2003, eleven days into the invasion, in false color: vegetation shows red and black plumes of burning oil drift across the city.
Baghdad from orbit, March 31, 2003, eleven days into the invasion. Black plumes are burning oil. False color: vegetation shows red. NASA/METI/AIST/Japan Space Systems and the U.S./Japan ASTER Science Team · via Wikimedia Commons · public domain

Since the invasion of March 2003

Killed by the war’s direct violence, all sides
 – 
Costs of War, Brown UniversityMarch 2003 – March 2023
Civilian deaths documented
 – 
Iraq Body Count2003 – March 2026
Iraqis displaced
9.2 million
refugees and internally displaced
Costs of WarSince 2003, as of 2020
US service members killed
32,000+ wounded3,650 US contractors killed

Sources: Costs of War (Brown University) · Iraq Body Count · The Lancet · PLOS Medicine · WHO · UNHCR. Each figure is its source’s own count over the period shown; estimates differ, and they aren’t added together.

On March 20, 2003, the United States and Britain invaded Iraq, citing weapons of mass destruction that were never found. Saddam Hussein’s government fell within three weeks. What followed was two decades of war: an insurgency against the occupation, a sectarian civil war, and the rise and defeat of the Islamic State.

On September 30, 2026, US Central Command announced that its last 2,500 troops had left, ending the coalition’s mission against ISIS. A small contingent stays to guard American diplomats. The United States had withdrawn once before, in December 2011, and came back in 2014.

Brown University’s Costs of War project counts 280,771 to 315,190 people killed by the war’s direct violence from March 2003 to March 2023. About two in three were civilians. Iraq Body Count has documented 200,065 to 226,628 civilian deaths, case by case. Household surveys, which also find deaths no one reported, run higher: one estimated 654,965 excess deaths in the first forty months alone.

You may have seen figures near a million. A 2007 poll put violent deaths at just over a million, a number most researchers treat as an upper bound. And the Costs of War estimate of more than 940,000 is the direct toll of all the post-9/11 wars, from Afghanistan to Yemen. Counting deaths from disease, hunger and collapsed health care, that total reaches 4.5 to 4.7 million. Iraq is about a third of the direct toll.

Part one

The toll

Twenty-three years, counted one death at a time

Civilian deaths documented by Iraq Body Count from press reports, hospital and morgue records, and official figures. Point at a year, or use the arrow keys, to read it.

42%of documented deaths came in the first five years, 2003 – 2007
29,526in 2006, after the bombing of the al-Askari shrine in Samarra set off civil war
69,527during the war with ISIS, 2014 – 2017

Iraq Body Count monthly totals (upper bound), summed by year; 2026 covers January to March. IBC counts civilians only, and only deaths it can document. It says even its highest totals miss many.

Show as a table
YearCivilian deaths documented
200312,153
200411,737
200516,583
200629,526
200726,112
200810,286
20095,382
20104,167
20114,162
20124,622
20139,852
201420,218
201517,578
201616,393
201715,338
201813,427
20193,319
20202,393
2021908
2022669
2023740
2024537
2025419
2026 (Jan–Mar)214

Why the numbers differ by hundreds of thousands

Counts list the dead someone recorded. Surveys ask a sample of households who died, then estimate for the whole country, so they also find deaths no one reported. They measure different things over different years.

  1. Iraq Body CountCivilian deaths, documented case by case · 2003 – 2026200,065 – 226,628
  2. Costs of War, Brown UniversityDirect deaths, all sides, compiled · 2003 – 2023280,771 – 315,190
  3. Iraq Family Health SurveyViolent deaths, WHO-backed household survey · Mar 2003 – Jun 2006151,000
  4. The Lancet (Burnham et al.)Excess deaths, household survey · Mar 2003 – Jun 2006654,965
  5. PLOS Medicine (Hagopian et al.)Excess deaths, household survey · Mar 2003 – Jun 2011~461,000
  6. Opinion Research BusinessViolent deaths, opinion poll · Mar 2003 – Aug 20071,033,000

Counts are a floor. In a war zone many deaths never reach a journalist, a hospital or a morgue. Iraq Body Count records civilians only; Costs of War adds soldiers, police, insurgents and contractors, from many sources.

Surveys reach further but are less certain. The 2006 Lancet study’s range ran from about 393,000 to 943,000. The WHO-backed Iraq Family Health Survey, covering the same months, estimated 151,000 violent deaths, about a quarter of the Lancet’s 601,027. Researchers still debate why.

Later work landed between them. A 2013 study in PLOS Medicine estimated about 461,000 excess deaths from 2003 to 2011, more than 60 percent from violence. The 2007 ORB poll’s 1,033,000 drew criticism of its sampling and is usually read as an upper bound.

Two in three of the dead were civilians

Killed by direct violence in Iraq, March 2003 to March 2023, by group. Where sources disagree, the lighter bar runs to the high estimate.

  1. Iraqi civilians186,694 – 210,038
  2. Iraqi military and police48,337 – 52,337
  3. Opposition fighters36,806 – 43,881
  4. US military4,599
  5. US contractors3,650
  6. Other allied troops324
  7. Journalists and media workers282
  8. Humanitarian workers64
  9. US Department of Defense civilians15
40+Iraqi civilians killed for every US service member
7,043civilians killed by coalition forces in the war’s first month, a third of them in air strikes

Costs of War, “Costs of 20 Years of Iraq War,” Table 2 (2023). Counts of Iraqi forces and opposition fighters are especially uncertain: each side had reasons to inflate the other’s losses and hide its own. First-month figure from Iraq Body Count data, March 19 – April 19, 2003.

The deaths that are hardest to count

War kills long after the shooting, through destroyed hospitals, unsafe water, hunger and displacement. These deaths are rarely recorded as war deaths, and no one has counted them for Iraq.

9.2 millionIraqis displaced by the wars since 2003, as refugees or inside Iraq (Costs of War, 2020)
3.4 millionhad fled their homes by late 2006: 1.8 million abroad, 1.6 million inside Iraq (UNHCR)
4.5 – 4.7 milliondead, directly and indirectly, across all the post-9/11 war zones, 2001 – 2023
Read more

Costs of War estimates that more than 940,000 people were killed by direct violence in the post-9/11 wars in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Syria and Yemen from 2001 to 2023, and that another 3.6 to 3.8 million died indirectly. It does not divide the indirect deaths by country. For Iraq and Syria together, it says only that perhaps two, three or four times the direct toll died of indirect causes such as displacement, unsafe drinking water, lack of health care and preventable disease.

As of 2023, more than 7 million people from Iraq and Syria were refugees, and nearly 8 million were displaced inside the two countries.

Sources: Crawford, Costs of 20 Years of Iraq War (2023) · Costs of War · Human costs · Vine et al., Creating Refugees (2020)

What the war cost the United States

US deaths in Iraq are known almost exactly. The cost in money is still growing, because the largest part is care for veterans that runs to mid-century.

Service members killed
4,599
Service members wounded
32,000+
US contractors killed
3,650
Spent, FY2003 – FY2023
$1.79T
With veterans’ care to 2050
$2.89T

Costs of War (2023). Dollar figures cover Iraq and Syria together, in current dollars, and include interest on war borrowing. UK forces lost 179 service members in Iraq.

Part two

Timeline

  1. 1990 – 2003

    Before the invasion

    Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990, and a US-led coalition drove it out in 1991. Thirteen years of UN sanctions followed. A widely repeated claim that sanctions killed 500,000 children rested on Iraqi government surveys later shown to be manipulated; the true toll is unknown.

  2. March 20, 2003

    Invasion

    US and British forces invade on the claim that Iraq holds weapons of mass destruction. Baghdad falls on April 9. No such weapons are found.

    7,043 civilians killed by coalition forces in the first month
  3. 2004

    Insurgency

    Photographs of US soldiers abusing prisoners at Abu Ghraib are published in April. US forces fight two battles for Fallujah, in April and November.

  4. February 22, 2006

    Civil war

    The bombing of the al-Askari shrine in Samarra sets off a sectarian war between Sunni and Shia militias. Bodies turn up daily in Baghdad’s streets.

    29,526 civilian deaths documented in 2006, the deadliest year
  5. 2007

    The surge

    About 30,000 more US troops deploy. In September, Blackwater contractors kill 17 Iraqi civilians in Baghdad’s Nisour Square. Violence falls sharply by 2008.

  6. December 18, 2011

    First withdrawal

    The last US troops leave under the 2008 Status of Forces Agreement.

  7. A street in Mosul's old city lined with collapsed and gutted buildings, rubble piled along both sides
    Mosul’s old city, July 9, 2017, as Iraq declared the city retaken from ISIS. H. Mourdock / Voice of America · via Wikimedia Commons · public domain
  8. June 2014

    ISIS takes Mosul

    The Islamic State seizes Iraq’s second city and much of the north and west. In August it attacks the Yazidis of Sinjar, killing thousands of men and enslaving thousands of women and girls, which a UN investigation later called genocide. US airstrikes begin on August 8, and American troops return.

  9. 2016 – 2017

    The battle for Mosul

    Iraqi forces, backed by US-led air power, retake Mosul street by street over nine months. An Associated Press investigation counted 9,000 to 11,000 civilians killed. Iraq declares victory over ISIS on December 9, 2017.

  10. January 2020

    A vote to expel

    A US drone strike at Baghdad airport kills Iranian general Qasem Soleimani and the Iraqi militia leader Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis. Iraq’s parliament votes for foreign troops to leave.

  11. September 2024

    An end date

    Washington and Baghdad agree to end the coalition mission in two phases: federal Iraq by September 2025, the Kurdistan region by September 2026. The US hands over Ain al-Asad air base in January 2026.

  12. September 30, 2026

    Second withdrawal

    US Central Command announces that the withdrawal is complete. Iraq marks it with a national holiday, Sovereignty Day. A small US contingent remains to protect diplomats.

Source comparison

Each source counts something different, over a different stretch of the war. None is the whole truth; together they bound it.

SourceDeathsWhat it counts & howPeriod
Iraq Body Count200,065 – 226,628Civilians killed by violence, documented incident by incident from media, hospital, morgue and official records2003 – 2026
Costs of War (Brown)280,771 – 315,190Direct deaths on all sides, compiled from IBC, military records and other sourcesMar 2003 – Mar 2023
Iraq Family Health Survey151,000Violent deaths, nationwide household survey with the WHO; range 104,000 – 223,000Mar 2003 – Jun 2006
The Lancet (Burnham et al.)654,965Excess deaths from all causes, household survey; 601,027 from violence; range 392,979 – 942,636Mar 2003 – Jun 2006
PLOS Medicine (Hagopian et al.)~461,000Excess deaths, household survey; more than 60% from violenceMar 2003 – Jun 2011
Opinion Research Business1,033,000Violent deaths, opinion poll of adults; range 946,000 – 1,120,000; sampling widely criticisedMar 2003 – Aug 2007

Notes & caveats

  • These figures are not comparable as a series. They cover different years and measure different things: documented civilian deaths, compiled deaths on all sides, violent deaths estimated from surveys, and excess deaths from every cause. Read each with its period and method.
All notes and sources
  • Iraq Body Count’s yearly figures are its monthly upper-bound totals, summed. Its overall range is 200,065 to 226,628. IBC’s day-by-day database is published through February 2017; monthly totals continue to 2026.
  • The Costs of War breakdown is Table 2 of Neta C. Crawford’s 2023 report. Figures for US forces and contractors are close to exact; figures for Iraqi forces, opposition fighters and civilians are estimates, some very uncertain.
  • “More than 940,000” and “4.5 to 4.7 million” are Costs of War totals for all post-9/11 war zones (Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen), not for Iraq alone.
  • Displacement: 9.2 million is the Costs of War estimate of Iraqis displaced since 2003 (2020). The 2006 figures are from UNHCR.
  • US figures cover Iraq from 2003 to 2023, including the war against ISIS. Wounded: “more than 32,000” per Costs of War.
  • The withdrawal: US Central Command, September 30, 2026, as reported by ABC News, AP and Al Jazeera.
  • The sanctions claim: Dyson and Cetorelli, “Changing views on child mortality and economic sanctions in Iraq,” BMJ Global Health (2017).

Sources: Costs of War · Iraq and Syria, 2003–2023 · Costs of War · Human costs · Iraq Body Count · Wikipedia · Casualties of the Iraq War · ABC News · Al Jazeera

200,065

civilians, at the least, whose deaths in Iraq since March 20, 2003 someone documented. Many more were never recorded.

Built to honor the dead with accurate counts. Every source has limitations.