The War on Terror began almost as soon as the 9/11 plane attacks happened and in October 2001 the official invasion of Afghanistan was launched by US and British forces. Reasons for the invasions were said to have been that the Taliban government of Afghanistan failed to turn over Osama bin Laden, the alleged mastermind behind 9/11, and al-Queda leaders operating in the country.
The 2003 invasion of Iraq began on March 20th and ended on the 1st May of the same year. It was led by US forces but heavily backed by British forces under Tony Blair’s labour government and marked the beginning of the current Iraq War. According to Blair the reasons for the invasion were ‘to disarm Iraq of weapons of mass destruction, to end Saddam Hussein's support for terrorism, and to free the Iraqi people.’
As the pressure now mounts on current Prime Minister Gordon Brown to withdraw troops from Afghanistan and Iraq I have come up with a bar chart representing the amount of British soldiers that have died since the War on Terror began using the data-store section on the Guardian website.
To view the data yourself and more visit the Guardian data-store website at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2009/sep/17/afghanistan-casualties-dead-wounded-british-data
To read the Daily Telegraph's story on number of deaths in Irag/Afghanistan reaching 300 visit: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/onthefrontline/3453048/The-300-British-dead-in-Afghanistan-and-Iraq.html
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