WASHINGTON -- A new study asserts that roughly 600,000 Iraqis have died from violence since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003, a figure many times higher than any previous estimate.The study, to be published Saturday in the British medical journal the Lancet, was conducted by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health by sending teams of Iraqi doctors across Iraq from May through July. The findings are sure to draw fire from skeptics and could color the debate over the war ahead of congressional elections next month.
Yes, the new death figure will be debated extensively over the coming months. Good human beings, confronted with warsGÇÖ horrors, ask themselves whether a certain action or war was necessary even when on the winning side. Here are a few examples:
Was Hiroshima necessary?
On August 6, 1945 a nuclear weapon was dropped on Hiroshima, killing directly an estimated 80,000 people and completely destroying approximately 2/3GÇÖs of the city's buildings. An estimated 60,000 more people died from injuries or radiation poisoning soon thereafter. 
Was Nagasaki necessary?
On 9 August 1945, Nagasaki was bombed. About 39,000 people were killed outright. According to Japanese statistics, the dead totaled 73,884. 
The debate over whether there was military necessity still goes on, and one can easily find scores of erudite treatises on the subject. http://en.wikipedia.... is one example. In its GÇ£conGÇ¥ section it notes that major WWII military figures disputed the need for the atomic bombings:
One of the most notable individuals with this opinion was then-General Dwight D. Eisenhower. He wrote in his memoir The White House Years:"In 1945 Secretary of War Stimson, visiting my headquarters in Germany, informed me that our government was preparing to drop an atomic bomb on Japan. I was one of those who felt that there were a number of cogent reasons to question the wisdom of such an act. During his recitation of the relevant facts, I had been conscious of a feeling of depression and so I voiced to him my grave misgivings, first on the basis of my belief that Japan was already defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary, and secondly because I thought that our country should avoid shocking world opinion by the use of a weapon whose employment was, I thought, no longer mandatory as a measure to save American lives."[47][48]
Other U.S. military officers who disagreed with the necessity of the bombings include General Douglas MacArthur (the highest-ranking officer in the Pacific Theater), Fleet Admiral William D. Leahy (the Chief of Staff to the President), General Carl Spaatz (commander of the U.S. Strategic Air Forces in the Pacific), and Brigadier General Carter Clarke (the military intelligence officer who prepared intercepted Japanese cables for U.S. officials),[48] Major General Curtis LeMay,[49] and Admiral Ernest King, U.S. Chief of Naval Operations, Undersecretary of the Navy Ralph A. Bard,[50] and Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, Commander in Chief of the Pacific Fleet.[51]"The Japanese had, in fact, already sued for peace. The atomic bomb played no decisive part, from a purely military point of view, in the defeat of Japan." Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, Commander in Chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet.[52]
"The use of [the atomic bombs] at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan. The Japanese were already defeated and ready to surrender." Admiral William D. Leahy, Chief of Staff to President Truman.[52]
Were Dresden, Tokyo, necessary?
The British bombing of Dresden in 1945, ordered by Winston Churchill, was highly controversial. About 25,000 people died. 
The 1945 firebombing of Tokyo destroyed around one square mile of the city. GÇ£After 2 hours of bombardment, Tokyo was engulfed in a firestorm. The fires were so hot they would ignite the clothing on individuals as they were fleeing. Many women were wearing what were called 'air-raid turbans' around their heads and the heat would ignite those turbans like a wick on a candle. The aftermath of the incendiary bombings lead to an estimated 100,000 Japanese dead. This may have been the most devastating single raid ever carried out by aircraft in any war.GÇ¥ http://en.wikipedia.... 
Was Iraq necessary?
Millions, perhaps billions of words have been written on the subject, and on the related subject GÇô what do we do now?
GEORGE ALLENGÇÖS VIEWS:
George AllenGÇÖs soundbite: DonGÇÖt tuck tail and run.
The entirety of a discussion of Iraq on GeorgeGÇÖs AllenGÇÖs re-election website:
In Iraq, our troops have done a tremendous job helping Iraqis build a democracy in a formerly oppressive, terrorist-friendly dictatorship. Immediately withdrawing our military from Iraq would be forfeiting to the terrorists, and I disagree strongly with those who suggest that we should leave precipitously.
JIM WEBBGÇÖS VIEWS:
What I would like to do today is to talk specifically about our national security
and 2,770 words later Jim Webb concludes. . .
We must forgo the slash-and-burn politics that have marked too much of our foreign policy in recent years, and reach for a true solution to the war in Iraq and the chaos in the Middle East. Thank You.
665,000 people dead, and all George Allen has is a soundbite.