Temple: War's front lines must be shown

Published June 9, 2007 at midnight

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How to depict the Iraq war accurately?

That is a challenge we're always wrestling with. A couple of months ago we launched a daily slide show on our Web site called "Frontline in the war on terror." You'll find it here and on our home page, in the box with tabs on top. It's under the tab marked "multimedia."

We decided to compile this regular report because we had become increasingly frustrated that we weren't able to show you what was really happening in a war that was at the center of our national debate. The key word is show.

Beginning reporters are always told that a secret to great writing is, "Show, don't tell." The secret applies to great photojournalism.

Listen to America's greatest war correspondent, Ernie Pyle, describe the scene at Normandy two days after D-Day:

"I took a walk along the historic coast of Normandy in the country of France.

"It was a lovely day for strolling along the seashore. Men were sleeping on the sand, some of them sleeping forever. Men were floating in the water, but they didn't know they were in the water, for they were dead."

Chilling imagery.

There are many reasons we struggle to show you a full range of views of the Iraq war, the way Ernie Pyle did for World War II. Some of the pictures we receive are too gruesome. Daily suicide bombings produce unimaginable carnage and grief. We also are limited in how many pictures we can run in the newspaper, period. So generally, unless there's a huge story, on any given day we run at most one or two photos from Iraq, not nearly enough to give a rounded picture.

But probably the biggest obstacle is the danger faced by photojournalists in Iraq. It's not a place where journalists can roam. And the U.S. military has placed restrictions on "embedded" journalists that hobble their ability to show you the reality of war.

The rules require embedded journalists to obtain permission before publishing photos of wounded soldiers. Photos that show the dead are barred.

The embedding agreement states: "Names, video, identifiable written/oral descriptions or identifiable photographs of wounded service members will not be released without the service member's prior written consent." It also says, "images clearly identifying individuals 'killed in action' will not be released."

War is not the place to hide the truth from a free people. Yes, combat photos can be disturbing. But I believe it's much better to allow journalists to make the decision as to what crosses the line of decency than to have the government essentially make the decision for the people.

Just before writing this on Thursday night, I looked at the 200 or so photographs connected to the Iraq war we had received from wire services that day. Few actually showed U.S. troops in action, roughly 10 percent. The largest block, more than a third, were political, essentially showing key figures in this country debating the war. The second-largest group portrayed grief in the United States. A handful showed daily life in Iraq.

So right off the bat the pool of pictures we choose from is skewed.

Then, at the Rocky, we give extra weight to local pictures, because our franchise is covering Colorado and, as it relates to Iraq, covering the impact of the war at home. We try as best we can to recognize the loss of every Coloradan, in pictures and words. That means our coverage is weighted toward sorrow.

If you look at our front pages from the past month, four have been connected to war. All four featured local photographs, and all four showed grief. Inside, we printed many devastating local pictures. Perhaps the most powerful, taken by our Barry Gutierrez, came Tuesday. It showed Sgt. Ryan Baum in his open casket, a photograph of his baby daughter tucked into his uniform jacket. Click here to see the photograph.

"The photo is a heartbreaking masterpiece, although I am so, so sorry for the occasion to take it," Kathee Jones, of Golden, wrote in an e-mail. "What a particularly powerful reminder of the terrible personal cost being paid by military families. And we should continue to be reminded - each of those numbers in the news every day creates a loss such as this. I am grateful for a photo that cuts straight to the heart, demands contemplation and prayers."

This is what a photograph can mean. It is why news photography is so important.

To do our job fully, we cannot show the photos only of loss at home. Yet that is increasingly where we find ourselves - at least in print - as we struggle to tell the story of Iraq. And I worry that there is a cost to that, too.

John Temple can be reached at editor@RockyMountainNews.com or by mail at 101 W. Colfax, Suite 500, Denver, CO 80202.

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