War in Iraq | 2003-2011

By the time the last mil­it­ary vehicle crossed from Ir­aq in­to Kuwait, 4,484 U.S. ser­vice mem­bers had died in Ir­aq, and 32,200 were wounded. An es­tim­ated 104,000 to 113,000 Ir­aqi ci­vil­ians died. The U.S. leaves Ir­aq with its in­ter­na­tion­al repu­ta­tion stained by a pree­mpt­ive in­va­sion pre­dic­ated on weapons of mass de­struc­tion that nev­er ma­ter­i­al­ized. Hun­dreds of bil­lions of dol­lars were spent, even as Amer­ic­ans des­cen­ded in­to eco­nom­ic misery. Here’s a look at key points in the con­flict: