The First Guy to Die in "Post-Combat" Combat vs. the Last Guy to Die in Combat (And Other All-Too-Fine Distinctions)
No soldier wants to be the last casualty in a war, but that designation pales in comparison to being the first fataliyy in a combat mission that has already been declared “over.” One week after “turning the page” on Operation Freedom two unidentified U.S. soldiers were killed by Iraqi...
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Coming Around Again
With the ability to score all the cash he needs, the fact all proceeds from the book are going to injured war veterans has led many English to call it blood money.
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Obviously, the "Iraqi Mind" Has yet to Catch Up with the "Iraqi Opportunity"
The invasion of Iraq has caused untold suffering in both the US and Iraq, and no amount of economic development and nation building can undo that damage. Nor is this a matter of finally making right. It's about accepting a common history of pain.
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Will the Last Regiment to Leave Iraq Please Turn ON the Lights
Looking at this photo from the brilliant AP propaganda slideshow of the U.S. leaving Iraq last week, I could help thinking of this cartoon.
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Jeremy Lange: The War At Home
Photographer Jeremy Lange photographs the war at home, near his home in North Carolina.
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Go Tell it on a Mountain: An Update on One Wounded Warrior
I guess the caption, detailing Sgt. Duncan's exploits (left), is supposed to set minds to rest?
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In a Picture, Why the Afghan Mission is Failing
We see a dead Taliban. They see a dead farmer.
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Blowback from the War Logs: The (Visual) Vendetta against Julian Assange
At this point, it's truly a case of "shoot the messenger."
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Beyond the Cover: Further Thoughts on TIME’s "Women of Afghanistan"
I'm wondering how much the wildness and sensuality in a photo like this serves to foster empathy for a child in today's Afghanistan versus how much as it lifts Zohal from the world she occupies and splices her into a stylish, Westernized fantasy scene that hip Western media consumers...
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What Happens if We Leave Afghanistan?? …Try, What’s Happening on this Cover?
Any surprise this "tug at your heart" cover comes out just days after Wikileak brings the failure of the Afghan campaign into the light -- and just as the campaign against Wikileak and Julian Assange gets going in the MSM? And, isn’t the cover title applying emotional blackmail and...
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Afghanistan through the Wiki Glass
After the triple-helping of reality imparted by the massive Wikileak cyber-drop, the government's Afghan war propaganda -- hard enough to digest before -- looks flat-out preposterous now.
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The Fog(ging) of War
The fact of the matter is that we have been shown evidence of virtually every one of these concerns over the past, long, ten years and we have chosen not to see them. Like the soldier in the photograph above, caught in the rotor wash of a MEDEVAC helicopter...
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Behind the Afghan War Logs: Can’t Forgive, Won’t Forget?
With the massive release of the leaked Afghan War Logs, I was reminded of this photo taken last January. If the photo is clear about why we got into this, I'm just not sure what it speaks to now.
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Your Turn: Vets Armed and Dangerous
I was interested in your read on this U.S. veteran/survivor of the Afghan miasma.
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Afghanistan: Across The Chasm
It's not like this "through-the-window" effect hasn't been used before. The way Chris Hondros is employing it now, though, in Afghanistan, emphasizes a slightly different point.
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July 4th: Dover and New York
The Fourth of July in America: Scenes from Dover and New York
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Waiting Your Turn in the Machinery of Death
This photograph from Kabul, Afghanistan could have been captioned “Return of the Body Snatchers.” Gallows humor is pretty cheap, but it may be as sane a response as any other to another suicide bombing. The attack last week killed 18 people, wounded at least 47 others, and generally made...
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Peter Van Agtmael: The Ground War
FOCUS ON THE WAR: Peter Van Agtmael covering ground combat in Afghanistan.
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