One Soldier's Quest to Lift the Censor's Veil of Shame on the Iraq War

Pictures of wounded, barely living children, a close-up of a soldier holding someones severed leg, pictures of soldiers happily posing with the bodies of dead Iraqis, photos showing a soldier leaning over a body bag with a spoon in his hand as though he's about to scoop up a portion of the dead man's flesh, all circulated like trophies or posted in command headquarters, viewed by some as acceptable -- even admirable -- behavior.

The extraordinary proliferation of photos taken by soldiers -- many of which are available on line such as these, these, and these (caution: graphic images) -- documenting the gruesome realities of modern warfare, and in many cases, the degradation of Iraqi civilians by American troops.

Aidan Delgado, a 23-year-old Iraq vet who returned to Florida from a tour of Iraq that reportedly included a traumatic stint with a military police unit at Abu Ghraib prison, figured he could easily resume some semblance of an ordinary life as a college student and leave his troubling war experiences behind. He was wrong.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are not necessary

People kept asking him about Iraq and he had a lot of photos, some that are difficult to look at, that were constant reminders of events that will probably stay with him for the rest of his life.

There are pictures of wounded, barely clinging to life children and some who appeared to be dead. There was a close-up of a soldier holding someones severed leg, and photos of Iraqis with what the NYT report calls the deathlike stare of shock, stunned by the fact that something previously unimaginable had just happened to them, and there were photos of soldiers happily posing with the bodies of dead Iraqis.

This is what more than seven years of illegal war has resulted in, and what has been done in America's name. The reality of the Iraq war has been heavily censored and sanitized by the government and the media.

If the government and the media told the American public the truth about the war in Iraq -- not to mention the war in Afghanistan -- and the public was able to sustain a close look at the horrors and bloodshed that continue unabated, there would be little if any support for it unless it was necessary. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are not necessary. In reality, neither war is legal either. Both wars were started by a corrupt, appointed President.

Abuse of innocent Iraqi's not limited to "a few bad apples"

Mr. Delgado, 23, is one of several U.S. soldiers repelled by the violence and dehumanization of war that are beginning to come forward. He completed his tour in Iraq, but sought and received conscientious objector status and was honorably discharged last January.

When Mr. Delgado's unit was first assigned to Abu Ghraib, he, like most of his fellow soldiers, believed that the prisoners were among the most dangerous people in Iraq. While working in a headquarters office, he learned that most of them weren't. In fact, most of the detainees had committed very minor nonviolent offenses, or no offenses at all.

Now Mr. Delgado's goal is convincing listeners that the abuse of innocent Iraqis by the American military is not limited to "a few bad apples," as the military would have you believe. "At what point," Mr. Delgado asked, "does a series of 'isolated incidents' become a pattern of intolerable behavior?"