The numbers are precise in the way the military insists on, and inadequate in the way numbers always are when they represent people. As of this week, 15 U.S. service members have been killed in the Iran war. Another 348 have been wounded. CENTCOM reports that approximately 315 of the wounded — about 90 percent — have returned to duty [1].

The 15 dead include the six Army reservists killed on March 1 when Iranian missiles struck a command center, the seventh soldier who succumbed to wounds from an attack in Saudi Arabia, and eight others killed in subsequent engagements including a refueling aircraft crash in western Iraq [2]. All seven of the initial casualties were Army soldiers. Their names are public. Their ages ranged from 22 to 41.

The "returned to duty" statistic, while factually accurate, has drawn criticism from veterans' groups and medical professionals who note that traumatic brain injuries, the signature wound of modern Middle Eastern conflicts, often do not present symptoms for weeks or months [3]. The true toll of 348 casualties will not be known for years.

At least 17 U.S. military sites across the Middle East have sustained damage since the war began, with losses estimated at $800 million in equipment and infrastructure. The human cost, measured in funerals at Dover and rehabilitation at Walter Reed, defies spreadsheet accounting.

Thirty-three days. Fifteen families notified. Three hundred forty-eight purple hearts, and counting.

-- SAMUEL CRANE, Washington