10 Shocking Photos From The Bitter Heart Of War

ANDREW HANDLEY OCTOBER 8, 2014If the Earth could tell a story, what would it say
? This planet has seen 14,500 wars since 3500 B.C. and watched 3.5 billion human
lives cut short in the bitter arena of organized violence. War is the most endu
ring and tragic aspect of human culture, and at the heart of every blood-soaked
conflict are the people those who wage and those who suffer. We stumble on the bod
ies of the fallen, but we stand on the memory of their sacrifice.10The Japanese
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Photo credit: Ralph Morse Time & Life Pictures / Getty Images
At the swirling center of the Pacific theater, a claustrophobic battle was unfol
ding on the tiny tropical island of Guadalcanal in 1942. Under a cloud of chokin
g humidity, surrounded by swarms of mosquitoes so determined that they sometimes
had to be cut out of a soldier s skin, Allied forces fought an unseen enemy inch
by inch through a nearly impenetrable wall of vegetation.Tagging along with an A
merican patrol unit, LIFE photographer Ralph Morse had an opportunity few civili
ans would ever want: a soldier s-eye view of the caustic brutality of war. During
one patrol, the company stumbled upon a disabled tank on a forlorn stretch of be
ach. Mounted just under the turret was the dessicated head of a Japanese soldier
, mouth stretched wide in an eternal scream. The patrol gave it a wide berth it wa
s most likely booby-trapped.This picture may have finally showed the world the c
asual barbarity that was becoming commonplace in the war. Although atrocities we
re happening all over the globe, the Pacific brought out the stark nature of the
acts. While Japanese soldiers booby-trapped dead bodies, American forces behead
ed corpses and mounted the heads on spikes. Both sides made necklaces of human t
eeth as trophies of war.
9The Bombing Of MassawaERIT031
Photo credit: Greg Marinovich
May 29, 1991 marked the end of Eritrea s 30-year struggle for independence from Et
hiopia. Scarcely a year before that historic day, the Eritrean People s Liberation
Front (EPLF) began a massive offensive against the Ethiopian port city of Massa
wa, hoping to disrupt the Ethiopian army s supply line. After three days of heavy
fighting, the EPLF had managed to secure the city. But Ethiopia wasn t quite ready
to give it up. For days on end, they blanketed the city in napalm and cluster b
ombs that took the lives of hundreds on the ground. A month later, the aerial bo
mbing began again. As food stores and relief aid burned, civilians starved in hu
ddled masses under improvised bomb shelters.Most of the images and videos that c
ame out of the massacre were too gruesome for the media, but this single image o
f an Eritrean man sitting on a bomb casing spoke louder than the most visceral i
mages ever could. The bleak desolation in both the man s eyes and his surroundings
paints the lives of Eritrean citizens at that time with intricate brush strokes
that will never fade from history.8An Innocent MistakePHOTO-2-popup
Photo credit: Chris Hondros / Getty Images
Taken by photographer Chris Hondros in Iraq in 2005, this unforgettable image il
lustrates the far-reaching consequences that can follow any act during wartime,
proving that even accidents can leave you with blood on your hands that will nev
er wash off. Hondros tagged along during a routine patrol in downtown Tal Afar,
a city in northern Iraq, to hopefully grab a few photos of Apache Company doing
their patriotic duty. As dusk settled in and the streets cleared for the 6:00 PM
curfew, the company turned down a street and came across a car heading their wa
y.Edgy from a recent ambush, the soldiers fired a few warning shots with no visi
ble reaction from the car s occupants. It kept coming, so someone opened fire. Eve
ntually, they all opened fire. As the car rolled closer, now just coasting on it
s momentum, they heard something more terrifying than an army of insurgents firi
ng back: children crying.Inside the car had been a family. It was a mother, a fa
ther, and four children, trying to get home before the curfew. They hadn t seen th
e camouflaged soldiers, so they sped up when they heard the warning shots, a nat
ural reaction to gunshots in an area where skirmishes can and do break out at an
y time. The children hadn t been hit, but their parents were almost unrecognizable
. Those children will forever bear the scars of the night their lives were irrev
ocably altered while the soldiers went back to base to play Nintendo.7Rhodesian

InterrogationPULITZER 1
Photo credit: J. Ross Baughman
The Rhodesian Bush War doesn t have a place in many history books. The conflict, w
hich spanned 13 years from 1964 1979, was the climax of social tension that had be
en brewing for nearly two centuries, beginning with the colonization of southern
Africa by white settlers near the end of the 19th century. As the Caucasian gri
p began to slip in the 1960s, African nationalists took up the cry of revolution
and staged a bloody guerrilla war that coalesced into an all-out race war. The
guerrillas saw their cause as one of liberation against foreign oppressors, whil
e the predominantly white government viewed the increasing attacks as terrorist
insurgency. Farms and homesteads in the outskirts were the hardest hit after the f
irst brutal attacks, white farmers settled into a siege mentality. While the men
worked, the women defended the home.The Rhodesian government retaliated mercile
ssly. On many occasions, they killed civilians in their quest to hunt down and e
radicate the slippery guerrilla forces. When guerrillas were captured, they were
put through grueling interrogations that often crossed the line into torture. J
ournalist J. Ross Baughman captured this photo of a government cavalry unit forc
ing prisoners to hold a push-up position at gunpoint for 45 minutes in the scorc
hing midday sun. Each time a man fell shaking to the ground, soldiers took him a
round a corner, knocked him out, and fired a gunshot into the air. By the end of
the interrogation, the remaining prisoners were psychological wrecks.6Clean-Up
At Cold Harborcivilwar7
Photo credit: Library of Congress
Described by the Library of Congress only as African-Americans collecting bones o
f soldiers killed in the battle, this photo offers a morbid glimpse into a war th
at is too often remembered only for its generals. The two weeks of horror that w
ere the Battle of Cold Harbor began on May 31, 1864 and resulted in over 18,000
casualties. And it was all for nothing as General Grant later said, no advantage wh
atever was gained to compensate for the losses we suffered. For four days after th
e battle, the wounded and dying were left to fester under the open sky while the
officers in their tents drafted an agreement to allow medics to venture into th
e wasteland to tend to their wounded. By the time they arrived, it was too late mo
st of the men had died. The medics were recalled and the clean-up crews were sen
t instead. Stretcher after stretcher was filled with soldiers who had fought the
ir last fight.5Siffleet s BeheadingLeonardGSiffleet
When this photo was first published in LIFE magazine, the cry of indignation was
felt around the world. The man in the picture is believed to be Australian Serg
eant Leonard Siffleet. The photo, which was taken after Siffleet was captured du
ring a recon mission in Papua New Guinea, was found in the uniform of a dead Jap
anese soldier the next year. Both of Siffleet s companions were also beheaded.Behe
ading was a fairly common form of execution for the Japanese in World War II, an
d it seemed that every falling blow rippled through the moral consciousness of t
he West. From single executions such as this to the three-day massacre at Changj
iao, where 30,000 Chinese civilians were executed at the hands of Shonruko Hata,
it began to seem like Japan was going to outpace Hitler as the most evil force
at work in World War II. 4James E. CallahanVIETNAM WAR MEDIC CALLAHAN
Photo credit: AP Photo / Henri Huet
During the Vietnam War, a lethal section of Vietnam 80 kilometers (50 mi) north
of Saigon called War Zone D served as a hiding spot for untold numbers of Viet Con
g forces. Ambushes and firefights were common in the zone, and surprise skirmish
es could easily turn into days-long battles amid the dense jungle undergrowth an
d rubber plantations. On June 17, 1967, medic James E. Callahan was deep in War
Zone D with a battalion of infantrymen when an ambush drove them to cover. The b
attle dragged on for three hours, and by the end of it, 31 men in the division h
ad been killed and over 100 had been wounded.As the bullets whistled overhead, C
allahan sprang into action. Photographer Henri Huet captured the above photo as
Callahan tried to save a dying soldier. The frantic desperation evident in Calla
han s face mirrored the popular American opinion of the war in Vietnam at the time
, and the photo became one of the most famous to come out of Vietnam between 195
5 and 1975.3Invasion Of InchonA_small_South_Korean_child_sits_alone_in_the_stree

t,_after_elements_of_the_1st_Marine_Division_and_South_Korean..._-_NARA_-_531374
Every battle in every war comes at a terrible cost. Unfortunately, those most af
fected are usually the civilians who just want the fighting to end. This heart-w
renching photo from the invasion of Inchon, South Korea is a perfect testament t
o that fact.The Korean War began on June 25, 1950, when the North Korean People s
Army (NKPL) launched an invasion of South Korea. Although the United Nations qui
ckly stepped in to back South Korea, the North Korean forces secured victory aft
er victory in their merciless push to the south. For months, the NKPL proved an
unstoppable onslaught, and both the UN and South Korean forces were pushed all t
he way to the Pusan Perimeter at the lower edge of the Korean Peninsula.Backed i
nto a corner, the UN tried a desperate gamble an amphibious assault on the port ci
ty of Inchon, right below the North Korean border, on September 15. With Inchon
as a foothold, South Korea was able to recapture Seoul and turn the tide of the
war, although there were still months of bloodshed to follow.2Orange Legacy20140
718103403-1
Photo credit: James Nachtwey
One of the continuing legacies of the senseless brutality of the Vietnam War was
the use of Agent Orange, the infamous herbicide that was sprayed over Vietnames
e foliage to flush out Viet Cong forces and destroy their food sources. The US a
rmy dropped approximately 75.5 million liters (20 mil gal) of Agent Orange over
Vietnam and parts of Cambodia. Although the end of the war seemed to signal the
end of suffering, life doesn t always play fair.Four and a half decades later, the
people in the spray zone are still dealing with the debilitating effects of the
dioxin contamination that seeped into their bodies and land. While Washington s
teadfastly refuses to take responsibility for the damage, the children and grand
children of women who were exposed are being born with birth defects. The photo
above shows a veteran of the Vietnam War bathing her 14-year-old son in 2006.1Fu
neral For A Fatherboy-mourns-father
Photo credit: Daily News Journal, Aaron Thompson, File / AP
There s no violence or gore in this picture. It s not shocking in the usual, glaring
sense of the word. It s just a young boy with his head high and his chin strong,
holding back tears as a soldier hands him a flag at his father s funeral. But in i
ts own way, it s just as shocking as any photo snapped in the aftermath of a battl
e because it defines the people who still have their entire lives to feel the pi
ercing heartbreak of loss.The boy is Christian Golczynski, and he s eight years ol
d. His father, Marine Staff Sergeant Marc Golczynski, had been shot down while o
n a patrol in Iraq s al-Aanbar province just a week before his tour of duty was su
pposed to end. With the whir of a shutter, Christian became the trembling face o
f a people without brothers, fathers, or sons. But hope is an indomitable force in
spired by his own loss, Christian has become involved in A Soldier s Child, a char
ity organization that sends Christmas gifts to children who have lost parents in
the line of duty.