Battle and Other Combatant Casualties in the Second World War, I

TOTAL LOSSES OF SOME BELLIGERENTS. Rather more often than losses of a tactical nature, may strategical or medical interpretations be adduced from the statistics, such as several of the belligerents have given out, concerning their total losses up to certain dates. The United States armed forces, through various agencies, made announcements about their casualties from the outbreak of the war to dates preceding the statements by two or three weeks, covering all theaters of war and not specific actions, but sometimes definite as to theaters. An early analysis of casualties according to area includes the following, arranged in importance according to their "costliness": North African, Philippine, European, South Pacific, Southwest Pacific, North American, Middle Eastern, Central Pacific, Asiatic, and Latin American (for the period up to January 31, 1944).1 American casualties through March 15, 1944, not long before the landing in Normandy, are given as follows, with a total of 173,239