Media's War Images Delude Instead of Inform
'Marlboro Man' in Iraq War Photo Suffers from PTSD
By E&P Staff
Published: January 03, 2006 5:40 PM ET
NEW YORK So whatever happened to Lance Cpl. Blake Miller -- the U.S. Marine pictured as a kind of war-weary "Marlboro Man" in one of the most widely published iconic images of the Iraq war?
See immage at: http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/photos/2006/01/W1/NYPost_L.jpg
Lance Cpl. Blake Miller appeared in numerous newspapers as the "Marlboro Man," including this cover of the New York Post.
The 2004 photograph by Luis Sinco of the Los Angeles Times showing Miller, face dirty under a helmet, a cigarette dangling from his lips, went around the world and back again, hitting front pages everywhere. Now Miller, of Jonancy, Ky., is a civilian "and is having trouble adjusting to civilian life," CBS News reports.
Back home, he got married in June, but on duty during the Hurricane Katrina relief effort, Miller suffered from symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and was granted an honorable discharge from the Marines in November.
Miller told CBS this morning, "For the most part, I mean, it was a big adjustment [when I got home] just trying to get in that mindset of being able to just roam, run around without fear of being shot at or where to look for danger. ... It's unexplainable. I mean, just to go from that mindset to being able to walk around freely and just enjoy it."
He said during his Katrina duties, while on the USS Iwo Jima, a sailor mimicked the whistle of a rocket-propelled grenade (RPG).
"For anybody to duplicate that sound," Miller said, "they've had to hear it. Without even knowing what I'd done until after it was over, I snatched him up, I slammed him against the bulkhead, the wall, and took him to the floor, and I was on top of him."
Miller went into therapy, but knows he is not alone. "A lot of guys have had way worse incidents from being in Iraq," he said. "And I guess it just -- it troubled me due to the fact that their incidents may have been more severe, and they weren't suffering from the same things I was. I just didn't understand how it could affect me so dramatically and not affect some of these guys. But a lot of them deal with different ways.
"The more and more I talk to [other guys], the more I found out there were a lot of Marines that are going through same or similar emotions. It's tough to deal with. Being in Iraq is something no one wants to talk about."
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Cost of War in HUMAN terms...
-symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder ...WARS
make people psychologically affected people
it is dangerous to have psychologically effect people
living in the neighbourhood....one need not know what the person might do...in their fits!!!!
-death of soldiers ...sorrow for the mothers..
-handicapped.....lost and forgotten.
And What about the Iraqi people who died in the war..
here again.....Iraqi fighting Iraqis ....Sunnies
fighting Shites ....etc......This blood shed can
be Avoided if ALL IRAQI resolve "NOT TO FIGHT"
whether Us went to War or did not go to war.....
this Hate between Sunni and Shites was going on....
eg Considering no of Shites and Kurds who disappeared
Unfortunately....media did not have freedom to
follows those stories ........
Now Iraqi is Free so media is also enjoying freedom of
expresion......
etc
Are the soldiers who fight in todays war and those
that fought in other wars in history....any different
in the olden days....how many soldiers must have
died and forgotten....
war also increases widows...so more men die in wars
next .....in the future,ROBOTS need to be sent in dangerous environment.high risk to human attack.
next .....medical treatment to replace damaged cells...
====================================
Some say the war in Iraq costs TRILLIONS of dollars
-now if money moves from one US citizens pocket
to another Us citizen pocket....the net cost to Us is nill
Explanation cost of war
-say buying tanks,armour etc ....money has
shifted from treasury funds to US Defense CO making
such equipment.....
-say paying salaries and wages ....money has
shifted from treasury funds to Us Military Us citizens
etc
-eg If cost of reconstruction is say x amt of $
...but who is getting the contract....Us based Co's
so money is moving from one Us pocket to another
Us pocket....
the ACTUAL cost of War is the Actual spend on
items not earned by Us citizens like imported raw
materials.....or expenses not reimbersed or recovered
from Iraq oil money.....
CONCLUSION : to say the cost of war is Trillion of dollars
is not the correct picture.
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Published on Monday, January 9, 2006 by CommonDreams.org
Media's War Images Delude Instead of Inform
by Norman Solomon
The picture was perfect. It provided a moving portrait, an image that journalists called "iconic." It was true to the moment. Yet the photograph was deceiving in a way that media images often are -- showing us what's more apparent than real.
One day, during the second week of November 2004, millions of Americans saw the photo. Blake Miller's face was grimy, but his eyes were clearly visible. He seemed resolute, unflappable. Wisps of smoke appeared to be rising from the long cigarette that dangled from his lips.
At the time, Marines were fighting their way into Fallujah, and American news outlets went gaga for the picture. At age 20, Miller suddenly became a famous archetype.
The day after the photo was snapped, "CBS Evening News" anchor Dan Rather told viewers: "The picture. Did you see it? The best war photograph of recent years is in many newspapers today, front page in some. Taken by Luis Sinco of the Los Angeles Times, it is this close-up of a U.S. Marine on the front lines of Fallujah. He is tired, dirty and bloodied, dragging on that cigarette, eyes narrowed and alert. Not with the thousand-yard stare of a dazed infantryman so familiar to all who have seen combat firsthand, up close. No. This is a warrior with his eyes on the far horizon, scanning for danger."
And the news anchor urged Americans to take the photo to heart: "See it, study it, absorb it, think about it. Then take a deep breath of pride."
Five days later, when CBS brought members of Blake Miller's family onto "The Early Show," a younger brother named Todd said: "He's just a normal person. Just mellowed out. He doesn't see nothing big about this."
News stories were dubbing Lance Cpl. Miller a wartime "Marlboro Man," the epitome of a rugged American soldier doing his grim duty. But his mother, from a small town in Kentucky, had this to say on the CBS show: "I'm proud and he may be an icon, but to me, he's my baby. He's my son. And I just want him home."
Media outlets were eager for the icon, but not for too much reality. Overall, little of war's terrible fear and suffering and death was apt to come through news coverage.
Around the time of the November 2004 assault on Fallujah, I interviewed a 21-year-old former U.S. Army specialist named Robert Acosta. He'd lost his right hand after a grenade landed next to him in Baghdad. "A lot of people don't really see how the war can mess people up until they know someone with firsthand experience," he said. "I think people coming back wounded -- or even just mentally injured after seeing what no human being should have to see -- is going to open a lot of eyes."
But journalists tend to be enthusiastic about providing icons. And it's unusual when we catch a media glimpse of what happens in human terms.
On the third day of 2006, when the man in the iconic photo returned to the CBS airwaves on "The Early Show," this time the mood was more somber. "Blake Miller made it home from the war," co-host Harry Smith reported. "But like many of his comrades, he wasn't able to completely put it behind him. While on duty during the Hurricane Katrina relief effort, Blake suffered from symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder and was granted an honorable discharge from the Marines."
Blake Miller described what had happened on board a ship when he heard a sailor imitate the noise from an incoming rocket-propelled grenade: "A guy was making a whistling sound. And at that time, I mean, it just -- the sound actually sounded like an RPG." Miller added: "And without even knowing what I'd done until after it was over, I snatched him up, I slammed him against the bulkhead, the wall, and took him to the floor. And I was on top of him."
The real person Blake Miller, not the media icon, said: "I'm continuing my therapy. I continued up until the day I got out, actually." And, speaking of other Americans who had fought in Iraq, he said: "The more and more I talked to them, the more I found out that there was a lot of Marines that were going through same, similar emotions. And I mean, it's -- it's tough to deal with. I mean, being in Iraq is something that no one wants to talk about."
As an American soldier in an "iconic" photo, Blake Miller was newsworthy for a little while. But in sharp contrast to the media enthusiasm that greeted him back in November 2004, there was no major media coverage in the days after "The Early Show" revealed on Jan. 3 that he's suffering from posttraumatic stress. For the warfare state, he has outlived his usefulness.
Norman Solomon is the author of the new book "War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death." For information, go to: www.WarMadeEasy.com.