U.S.
Journalist Photographs Grisly Aftermath of Attack in Iraq, Gets Booted by Military

By Dahr Jamail, IPS News. Posted July 5, 2008.

An embedded U.S.
journalist said the military tried to censor him after he posted photos from
Fallujah.
U.S. journalist Zoriah
Miller says he was censored by the U.S.
military in the Iraqi city of Fallujah
after photographing Marines who died in a suicide bombing.
On Jun. 26, a suicide bomber attacked a city council meeting in Fallujah, 69
kms west of Baghdad,
between local tribal sheikhs and military officials.
Three Marines, Cpl. Marcus Preudhomme, Capt. Philip Dykeman, and Lt. Col.
Max Galeai, assigned to 2d Battalion, 3rd Marine Division based in Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii,
died in the attack.
The explosion also killed two interpreters and 20 Iraqis, including the
mayor of the nearby town of Karmah,
two prominent sheikhs and their sons, and another sheikh and his brother. All
were members of the local "awakening council," one of the U.S.-backed
militias that have taken up arms against al Qaeda in Iraq,
according to U.S.
and Iraqi authorities.
Miller was embedded with Marines on a patrol one block from the attack when
it occurred. He had originally turned down the option of going to report on the
city council meeting that was bombed.
Miller ran with the Marines he was with to the scene of the attack. "As
I ran I saw human pieces...a skull cap with hair, bone shards," he told
IPS during a telephone interview from the so-called Green Zone in Baghdad. "When we
arrived at the building it was chaotic. There were Iraqis, police and civilians
running around screaming. Bodies were being pulled out of the building."
"I went in and there were over 20 people's remains all over the
place," Miller continued, "Of the Marines I jogged in with, someone
started to vomit. Others were standing around, not knowing what to do. It was
completely surreal."
"At that moment I realized this was far beyond anything I'd
experienced, and I realized I wanted to focus and make sure I could capture
what it felt like, and the visual horror," Miller explained.
"I thought, 'Nobody in the U.S. has any idea what it means
when they hear that 20 people died in a suicide bombing.' I want people to be
able to associate those numbers with the scene and the actual loss of human
life. And to show why soldiers are suffering from PTSD [post-traumatic stress
disorder]," Miller told IPS.
Miller was taken out of the building by Marines, but then allowed back
inside where he took one last photo of the carnage before they closed the scene
to him.
"We spent most of the rest of the day as Marines picked up body parts
and put them in buckets and bags," he said.
In an Iraqi Police station in Karmah, the Naval Criminal Investigative
Service (NCIS) was brought in to investigate the bombing. Millers' photos were
the only ones of the scene, so the NCIS team asked for them.
"I made them copies, but then one of the Marines came in and told me to
delete my memory card after I give them the photos, and I refused," Miller
told IPS, "I told the NCIS that if they forced me to delete them, I would
stop sharing them. So they stopped pressing that issue."
Miller said that he was following the rules for embedded journalists.
"That evening, during the debriefing, the guys [Marines] I was with told
me that the higher-ups had said I was a stand-up guy and behaved well and to
treat me well. The guys I was with were all very much on my side."
Miller explained to IPS that he meticulously showed his photos to the
Marines he was with to make sure he was not going to show any photos that would
upset the family members of the deceased Marines. "They were all okay with
them, so then about 96 hours after the bombing I published the photos on my
blog."
Then things got interesting.
"Tuesday [Jul. 1] I awoke to a call in their combat operations centre,
and the person on the phone told me they were a PAO (Public Affairs Officer) at
Camp Fallujah, and he wanted me to take my
blog down right away," Miller told IPS. "I asked them why, and was
then called back after five minutes by a higher ranking PAO who claimed I had
broken my contract by showing photos of dead Americans with U.S. uniforms
and boots."
Miller said the PAO claimed he was not allowed, by the embed contract, to
show dead or wounded U.S.
citizens or soldiers in the field. "I never signed any contract for
that," Miller said.
He was called back after another five minutes and told his embed was
terminated and they would send him back to Baghdad on the next flight. He was then taken
back to Camp Fallujah where he said, "Everyone
was extremely angry and fired up at me."
Nevertheless, the lower ranking Marines he had embedded with "were on
my side, and they told me they thought that what was happening was wrong."
Miller explained that he grew nervous when the flight was canceled due to a
sandstorm, and then a security guard was assigned to him.
"I started to feel uncomfortable with this," Miller explained.
"The next day, Gen. Kelly, [Major General John Kelly, who is the
Commanding General of the I Marine Expeditionary Force] wanted to have some
words with me. I was to meet with him at 3 pm, and we sat outside in the sun
for two hours and he never showed."
Miller was told he would be flown out that night, but he was deleted from
the flight and told that General Kelly wanted to see him, so he waited again
until Thursday, Jul. 3. Again the general did not appear, so Miller was given
an official letter about the grounds for the termination of his embed, signed
by Gen. Kelly, and flown to Baghdad.
"Now, as I think about it, I think they needed the extra time to figure
out what they were going to say about my dismissal," Miller said.
"Their original reason ended up being bogus, so they had to figure
something else out."
The letter he was given stated reasons for his dismissal as "you
photographed the remains of U.S. soldiers", "you posted these images
along with detailed commentary", and "by posting the images and your
commentary you violated 14 H and O of the news media agreement you
signed."
In addition, the letter, which Miller read to IPS, stated, "By
providing detailed information of the effectiveness of the attack and the
response of U.S. forces to
it, you have put all U.S.
forces in Iraq
at greater risk for harm."
Miller feels the reason for his dismissal is otherwise.
"The bottom line is that the thing they cited as the reason for my
dismissal was 'information the enemy could use against you.' They realized,
probably from keeping track of my blog, that I was not showing identifiable
features of a soldier ... and they couldn't find a reason to kick me out.
Because it was a high ranking person who got killed, they were all fired
up."
Miller concluded, "Up to that point they said it was because I showed
pictures of bodies with pieces of uniform and boots. The letter, though,
doesn't mention that at all. I checked the document I had about ground rules
for media embeds, and I followed them."
The Pentagon would not comment on the story when contacted by IPS, saying
they had no information on Miller's case beyond what Central Command had
already posted.