WASHINGTON – Sens. Olympia Snowe and Barack Obama and veterans groups say government officials are obscuring the actual number of wounded in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars by leaving troops who suffer non-combat injuries out of some public documents .

From the Pentagon Web site to press materials handed out at the opening of an amputee center in Texas last week, the publicly circulated number of troops wounded in the wars is often around 23,000.

That number only accounts for those wounded in combat. When troops who were wounded in other ways are counted, the number more than doubles, to about 53,000.

That latter number is not heavily circulated by the Pentagon. Recently, a Defense Department official publicly criticized a researcher who used it and pressured another government agency to change a public document to report the smaller number.

“This is a clear pattern by VA and DOD to conceal the escalating human and financial costs of the two wars from Congress, the press and the public,” said Paul Sullivan, veterans advocacy director with Veterans for America.

Snowe, R-Maine, and Obama, D-Ill., have introduced legislation to require the Veterans Affairs Department and the Department of Defense to “start keeping honest figures on our troops and the potential future costs of the war.”

“The Defense Department and the VA have a responsibility to work together to accurately assess the health care needs of our nation’s returning veterans,” Snowe said.

Non-battle wounds range from injuries in vehicle accidents to illnesses. Some are sports injuries that need care outside the war zone. Many of the wounded return to duty.

“It doesn’t make a difference whether you were hit by enemy fire, or injured because your vehicle crashed, or got sick because of serving in a war zone,” added Obama. “The effects on the soldiers and their families are the same. And the impact in terms of the current fighting force and future demands on the VA are also the same.”

Some non-battle wounds can be just as disabling as those inflicted in combat. Dave Autry, deputy national director of communications for Disabled American Veterans, told the story of a soldier riding in the back of a truck when it went off a bridge and into an Iraqi canal.

This soldier, who suffered crushed legs and an injured spine, is not among those listed in the Pentagon’s more widely circulated tally, Autry said.

The Pentagon updates its casualty totals for the Iraq and Afghanistan wars daily at www.defenselink.mil.

Clicking on “press resources” or “casualties” on the home page leads to a chart that lists the dead and wounded from combat totals but not totals for the non-battle wounded.

A separate, harder-to-find Pentagon Web site that listed casualties by type for each war had all the wounded. Last week, the number of non-combat wounded was dropped from the chart, produced by the department’s Statistical Information and Analysis Division.

Since November, the VA had been reporting about 50,000 wounded from the wars on a Web site fact sheet for media. It changed that number last month to about 21,000 after hearing from the Pentagon, VA spokesman Matt Burns said.

Burns said only combat wounded are supposed to be in the tally.

President Bush’s proposed budget increased funding for veterans’ medical care from $29.3 billion to $34.2 billion. It anticipated VA providing medical care to nearly 263,000 Iraq and Afghanistan veterans in 2008.

All Iraq and Afghanistan veterans are guaranteed two years of health care at VA when they return from the war. Those with injuries connected to their service get health care treatment beyond the two years.

Also, all Iraq and Afghanistan veterans injured while serving in the wars are eligible for monthly disability payments, regardless of whether they were injured in combat. The amount of the payments is based on the level of disability.

On the Net:

Veterans Affairs war statistics: http:///www1.va.gov/opa/fact/amwars.asp

Defense Department full casualty reports: http:///siadapp.dior.whs.mil/personnel/CASUALTY/castop.htm

Deployment Health Support Directorate report: http:///www.legion.org/ppt/kilpatrick.ppt