Let me go to war Sir (statistically it is safer). More American civilians died from injury, gun-shots, knifings, traffic accidents, drug-overdose, and work-place injury on the home front during the war years (Jan. ‘42-Dec. ’45) than were killed in battle. Between Dec. 7th 1941 and Dec. 31st, 1946 (it is extended as some servicemen died post-war from wounds), the total American battle casualties numbers stood here: KIA-186,698. Died later from battle wounds and injury-26,225. And ironically there were some who died of wound and injury after they had been shipped home to the USA, only 84, but they are still in the total. This does NOT include those who died while POWs (I don’t think). This gives us a total for those five years, one month of 213,005 of deaths from battle, all non-disease causes, all branches of the military in combat zones. This doesn’t include military deaths in the states from training mishaps, lost in transit ship sinking, nor as I mentioned does it include the POW numbers. Those missing servicemen (106,995) are however included in the more "generally accepted" military fatality number usually posted at approximately 320,000. I don't believe that either the civilian nor the military numbers reflect those men who lost their lives in the United States Merchant Marine branch, which was one of the deadliest areas of service. I do NOT believe these numbers reflect those service personnel who succumbed to non-combat related disease, like malaria or cholera or anything; but they may well do so I’ve just never seen it broken down to that extent. See: HyperWar: Army Battle Casualties and Nonbattle Deaths in WW II [Battle Casualties] On the civilian side, 35,000 more Americans died in the war-years. Stateside the number is rounded off at 355,000 deaths among civilians between the years of 1942-1945 (stateside only) since these numbers have only been recorded in full year amounts. Those civilians who perished in "war related" work before America was "at war" are NOT included. These numbers include deaths by suicide, homicide, and traffic fatalities as well as deaths in the workplace, but excludes deaths by disease, non-work related illness/infection, old-age, and farm workers as well as those American civilians who died outside of the States. These civilian numbers come from crime statistics, traffic reports, and the Bureau of Labor Statistics (1942-'45). Sadly this does NOT include farm statistics, and historically farming is one of the most dangerous jobs in America. Farming in America still today ranks 5th deadliest with about 40 deaths per 100,000 workers yearly. See: America's Most Dangerous Jobs - Careers Articles And I also referred to; The Crucial Years; 1940-1945, a book by William Kenney, PhD. Copyright 1962 (p.23) I also recall reading that during the First Gulf War, more American service personnel perished while stateside than while they were stationed "in country". Murders, suicides, traffic accidents, training accidents, spousal abuse, drugs, etc.
How do things look when you look at deaths per capita. Military population of about 12 million and a civilian population of (wild guess) 100 million.
