As We Segue Away: The Three Top Images of the Iraq War

Obtained by A.P. – 2003

Between the NYT and the MSNBC slideshows featuring key images of the war, neither offers the prisoner on the box at Abu Ghraib, the signature photo of one of the most misbegotten episodes in American history. Not sure why that is. Could it have anything to do with the shame, and/or the fact the Administration banished the larger set of photos from Abu Ghraib?

The NYT has the incredibly photo by Chris Hondros of the young girl at a checkpoint right after her parents were killed by U.S. forces, but they don’t have the (staged) photo of the statue of Saddam Hussein coming down in Firdos Square. MSNBC has Firdos, but they don’t have the image of the girl from the checkpoint.

I can’t take all that much credit for this grouping, though, as BagReaders pretty much had the list down back in July 2006 in response to a prediction that the U.S. contractors hanging from the bridge in Fallujah would emerge as the war’s defining shot.

What energizes these photo as well as binds them together now that Obama has officially put us on a “post-war” war footing?  It’s our culpability.