With support from the University of Richmond

History News Network

History News Network puts current events into historical perspective. Subscribe to our newsletter for new perspectives on the ways history continues to resonate in the present. Explore our archive of thousands of original op-eds and curated stories from around the web. Join us to learn more about the past, now.

Pentagon withholds Iraq War photos showing detainee abuse

Related Link NYT Editorial backs ACLU demand that the Pentagon release all Iraq War photos

After more than a decade of fighting to keep them out of public view, the Pentagon released 198 photographs on Friday, mostly showing close-ups of tiny cuts, bruises, and scars on a series of anonymous men. But the real story is what the Obama administration decided to keep hidden. Friday’s photos are an innocuous fraction of a much larger cacheof 2,000 images, detailing the abuse of detainees in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Some of the most graphic images are said to show American troops posing with corpses. Others depict U.S. forces holding guns to people’s heads or simulating forced sodomization. In one, a large man rides an elderly woman as if she were an animal and whips her with a stick. The mistreatment of corpses and prisoners are widely considered to be violations of the international rules of war.

Those grotesque photos aren’t any closer to seeing the light of day, thanks to persistent efforts by Obama administration officials to prevent their release.

Read entire article at Daily Beast