Editing World War I casualties (section)

== Classification of casualty statistics ==
[[File:Douaumont ossuary3.jpg|thumb|upright=1.1|Douaumont French Army cemetery seen from [[Douaumont ossuary]], which contains remains of French and German soldiers who died during the [[Battle of Verdun]] in 1916]]
Casualty statistics for World War I vary to a great extent; estimates of total deaths range from 9 million to over 15&nbsp;million.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://necrometrics.com/20c5m.htm |title=Twentieth Century Atlas – Death Tolls |website=necrometrics.com |access-date=14 April 2018}}</ref> Military casualties reported in official sources list deaths due to all causes, including an estimated 7 to 8 million combat related deaths (killed or died of wounds) and another two to three million military deaths caused by accidents, disease and deaths while [[prisoners of war]]. Official government reports listing casualty statistics were published by the United States and Great Britain.<ref>Military Casualties – World War – Estimated. Statistics Branch, GS, War Department, 25 February 1924</ref><ref>The War Office, Statistics of the Military Effort of the British Empire During the Great War 1914–1920</ref> These [[secondary sources]] published during the 1920s, are the source of the statistics in reference works listing casualties in World War I.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.firstworldwar.com/features/casualties.htm |title=Military Casualties of World War One |access-date=2 May 2015}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.pbs.org/greatwar/resources/casdeath_pop.html |title=World War One Casualty and death tables |website=[[PBS]] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161016014336/http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/resources/casdeath_pop.html |archive-date=16 October 2016 |url-status=dead |access-date=2 May 2015}}</ref><ref name="EPFW">The European Powers in the First World War: An Encyclopedia Spencer C. Tucker Garland Publishing, New York 1999 {{ISBN|978-0815333517}}</ref><ref name="Ellis 2001 269 70">John Ellis, The World War I Databook, Aurum Press, 2001, {{ISBN|1-85410-766-6}} pp. 269–70</ref><ref name="World War I 2010 p. 219">World War I: People, Politics, and Power, published by Britannica Educational Publishing (2010) p. 219</ref> This article summarizes the casualty statistics published in the official government reports of the United States and Great Britain as well as France, Italy, Belgium, Germany, Austria and Russia. More recently the research of the [[Commonwealth War Graves Commission]] (CWGC) has revised the military casualty statistics of the UK and its allies; they include in their listing of military war dead personnel outside of combat theaters and civilians recruited from Africa, the Middle East and [[Chinese Labour Corps|China]] who provided logistical and service support in combat theaters.<ref name="CWGCAR">{{cite web |title=Commonwealth War Graves Commission Annual Report 2014–2015 p. 38 |url=https://issuu.com/wargravescommission/docs/ar_2014-2015?e=4065448/31764375 |website=Commonwealth War Graves Commission  |access-date=24 May 2016}}Figures include identified burials and those commemorated by name on memorials</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.greatwar.co.uk/ypres-salient/cemetery-lijssenthoek.htm |title=World Lijssenthoek Military Cemetery, Poperinge, Ypres Salient Battlefields, Belgium (The Chinese Labour Corps was used to clear battlefields, dig graves, trenches and carry out other such tasks which were often difficult and dangerous.) |access-date=2 May 2015}}</ref><ref name="MOMBASA AFRICAN MEMORIAL">{{cite web |url=http://www.cwgc.org/find-a-cemetery/cemetery/4007267/MOMBASA%20AFRICAN%20MEMORIAL |title=Mombasa African Memorial (The non-combatant porters, stevedores and followers of the Military Labour Corps 600,000. Almost 50,000 of these men were lost, killed in action died of sickness or wounds) |access-date=26 April 2015}}</ref><ref name="The Long, Long Trail is a personal website written by Chris Baker">{{cite web |author=The Long, Long Trail is a personal website written by Chris Baker |url=http://www.1914-1918.net/labour.htm |title=The Labour Corps of 1917–1918 |date=26 April 2015 |access-date=26 April 2015}}</ref><ref name="skycitygallery.com">{{cite web |url=http://www.skycitygallery.com/japan/wwi_chinese_1.pdf |title=The Chinese Labour Corps at the Western Front (In all, nearly 2,000 men from the Chinese Labour Corps died during the First World War, some as a direct result of enemy action, or of wounds received in the course of their duties but many more in the influenza epidemic that swept Europe in 1918–19 |access-date=26 April 2015}}</ref> The casualties of these support personnel recruited outside of Europe were previously not included with British war dead, however the casualties of the [[Royal Pioneer Corps|Labour Corps]] recruited from the British Isles were included in the rolls of British war dead published in 1921.<ref name="familysearch.org">{{cite web |url=https://familysearch.org/search/catalog/292837?availability=Family%20History%20Library |title=Soldiers died in the great war, 1914–1919, London : Her Majesty's Stationery Office, 1920–1921, 80 pts. in 17 v (pt. 80. Labour corps, Royal army ordnance corps, veterinary corps and pay corps, Channel Isles militia, corps of army schoolmasters, military mounted police, military foot police) |website=[[FamilySearch]] |access-date=21 November 2014}}</ref> The methodology used by each nation to record and classify casualties was not uniform, a general caveat regarding casualty figures is that they cannot be considered comparable in all cases.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://encyclopedia.1914-1918-online.net/article/war_losses |title=International Encyclopedia of the First World War, Antoine Prost, War Losses |access-date=2 May 2015}}</ref> First World War civilian deaths are "hazardous to estimate" according to Micheal Clodfelter who maintains that "the generally accepted figure of [[noncombatant]] deaths is 6.5&nbsp;million."<ref name="Clodfelter, Micheal 2002 p. 479">Clodfelter, Micheal (2002). Warfare and Armed Conflicts – A Statistical Reference to Casualty and Other Figures, 1500–2000 2nd Ed.. {{ISBN|978-0-7864-1204-4}}. p. 479</ref>