Contractor deaths increase in Iraq

WASHINGTON – As the nation focused last week on the 2,000th U.S. soldier who died in Iraq, Gloria Dagit of Jefferson, Iowa, got a box filled with the belongings of her son, Keven, who was killed when his convoy of trucks was ambushed in northern Iraq.

Keven Dagit’s death Sept. 20 – along with two other truckers – didn’t register on the tally of Iraq deaths broadcast daily. That’s because they were civilians working for U.S. defense contractors.

As the violence of the protracted war continues and some 75,000 civilian employees struggle to rebuild the war-torn nation and support the military, contractor casualties mount. Their deaths have more than tripled in the past 13 months.

As of Monday, 428 civilian contractors had been killed in Iraq and another 3,963 were injured, according to Department of Labor insurance-claims statistics obtained by Knight Ridder.

Those statistics, which experts said were the most comprehensive listing available on the toll of the war, are far from complete: Two of the biggest contractors in Iraq said their casualties were higher than the figures the Labor Department had for them.

The dead and injured come from many walks of life, drawn by money and patriotism. Some are American citizens. Most are not. They are truckers, police officers and translators. They’re counted only if they were paid by companies hired by the Pentagon.

The Labor Department lists 156 dead for an L-3 Communications subsidiary in Virginia. The company, which provides translators who work with the military, puts the death toll at 167, of whom 15 were Americans.

Rick Kiernan, a spokesman for L-3 Communications, said his firm had had so many losses because its translators were “with the combatants; they’re with the special forces; they’re with the infantry units. That probably puts them out in the most dangerous places.”

The government’s listing shows the contractors’ casualty rate is increasing. In the first 21 months of the war, 11 contractors were killed and 74 injured each month on average. This year, the monthly average death toll is nearly 20 and the average monthly number of injured is 243.

“You’ve got a greater number of contractors on the ground carrying out a greater number of roles putting them in danger,” said Peter Singer, a contracting expert at the Brookings Institution, a Washington research center. “And issue No. 3, you’ve got a much more dangerous environment.”