80% of the Deaths: "Noncombat Related"

Eighty percent (that's right: 80%) of the deaths of our soldiers in Iraq listed in Wednesday's Washington Post (p. A14) were caused by "noncombat related" reasons.

Why?
How?
Accidents?
Illness?
Heart attacks?
Suicides?
Are soldiers shooting soldiers in "friendly fire"?
Are guns going off inside tents?
Food poisoning?
More of the poisonous showers we heard about last winter?

We should be outraged!

In June, 2007 when I inquired about these "noncombat related" deaths from Mary Hadar, the Post's editor of "Faces of the Fallen" which, sadly, run too often, she wrote me that the Defense Department frequently spends six months investigating "noncombat related" deaths, and reasons for them are seldom supplied quickly. The Post tracks them in local newspapers to try and determine why and how soldiers die.

Who tracks these "noncombat related" deaths cumulatively and the causes? Anyone? Does anyone care? Hello! Hello! Anyone there?

Certainly it seems that some of the causes of "noncombat related" deaths would help to prevent others. Does the Defense Department try to cover them up to spare embarrassment? Dereliction of duty?

We taxpayers and families demand to know. We are footing the bill not only in dollars but, more importantly, in lives, past and present.

Names of the soldiers listed November 12, 2008 in the Post who died for "noncombat related" reasons are:

Pfc. Bradley S. Coleman, 24, Martinsville, Virginia

Sgt. Scott J. Metcalf, 36, Framingham, Massachusetts

Spec. Adam M. Wenger, 27, Waterford, Michigan

Pfc. Theron V. Hobbs, 22, Albany, Georgia

and Staff Sgt. Timothy H. Walker, 38, Franklin, Tennessee was killed November 8 in Baghdad.

For what did they die?