Just as US Tomahawk missiles rain down on another Muslim nation,we’re about to give the entire Muslim world another reason to distrustand even hate Americans. A cache of photographs published by DerSpiegel show an Army Stryker “kill team” in Afghanistan posing with dead bodiesthey recently killed. Many of the members of this team are alreadyunder trial for, among other things, the murder of the Afghans in thephotos.
Some of the activities of theself-styled “kill team” are already public, with 12 men currently ontrial in Seattle for their role in the killing of three civilians.
Five of the soldiers are on trial for pre-meditated murder, afterthey staged killings to make it look like they were defendingthemselves from Taliban attacks.
Other charges include the mutilation of corpses, the possession of images of human casualties and drug abuse [...]
An investigation by Der Spiegel has unearthed approximately 4,000 photos and videos taken by the men.
The magazine, which is planning to publish only three images, saidthat in addition to the crimes the men were on trial for there are“also entire collections of pictures of other victims that some of thedefendants were keeping”.
These are not the pictures that President Obama tried to blockin 2009, because the incidents from this Army Stryker unit Der Spiegeldescribes in their story are from 2010. So the change incommanders-in-chief has not occasioned a halt to atrocities and warcrimes in Afghanistan. While Der Spiegel may publish only threephotographs for now, I wouldn’t be surprised if more became available.But there’s plenty of detail in the article, according to the Guardianaccount, to cause outrage in Afghanistan and throughout the world aswell, in addition to the photos. In one incident, a staff sergeantthrew a grenade at an Afghan civilian, killing him, then cut off afinger and took a tooth as trophies.

I cannot find the article as of press time at the Der Spiegel website. But the pictures are available here, here and here. The AP names the soldiers in the photos holding the corpse by the hair, as well as the corpse:
One shows a key defendant, SpecialistJeremy N. Morlock of Wasilla, Alaska, grinning as he lifts a corpse’shead by the hair. Der Spiegel identified the body as that of Gul Mudin,whom Specialist Morlock claims to have killed with Pfc. Andrew H.Holmes in Kandahar Province. Another shows Private Holmes, of Boise,Idaho, lifting the same corpse by the hair.
“Today Der Spiegel published photographs depicting actions repugnantto us as human beings and contrary to the standards and values of theUnited States Army,” the Army said in a statement released by Col.Thomas Collins. “We apologize for the distress these photos cause.”
As I said, the men in this Stryker unit have been charged withmurder and conspiracy, and not after the publication of these photos,but well before. In fact, the photos were part of evidence being usedin those court-martial cases, and were kept by the judge under aprotective order until the Der Spiegel publication. That makes this aslightly different situation than Abu Ghraib.

But that difference is fairly subtle given the depictions involved.This brutality adds to the long list of actions that can be used toinflame passions in the Muslim world. It makes any talk by the UnitedStates of a humanitarian mission to protect civilians ring extremelyhollow. And it is a natural consequence of a long and confusing war,with untold pressures put on soldiers that often manifest in despicableways.

These activities can no longer be seen as coincidental or the resultof a “few bad apples” in the military. They have happened so often,with such regularity, as to be a by-product of a war machine thatcontinues to invade and occupy foreign countries.