Former U.S. marine lieutenant Andrew Borene argues in this Alternet commentary it's time to show the human cost of the Iraq war to the American people.

He started by noting that in the Second World War, the White House wanted the pictures of dead U.S. troops shown to drive home the sacrifices that were being made.

In comparison, the Russians, Japanese and Germans lied about their casualties, he said.

An excerpt:

The current majority in Washington is doing everything it can to avert the public's attention from Iraq and Afghanistan. They don't want to ask for real sacrifice in support of the global war on terror, much less spending to support the troops. They are more than happy to maintain the perception that the biggest issues in America are Social Security reform, Tom DeLay's ethics investigation and judicial filibusters.

The kind of examples they set for future leaders to emulate are guys who skipped out on military service and served as tie-wearing, pamphlet-passing, college cheerleaders for the conflict in Vietnam. The hypocrisy of senior citizen draft dodgers talking tough about national security and combat should be exposed in a time of war. Instead, we promote them to the highest levels of American diplomacy.

All of this perpetuates a growing "chickenhawk culture" in which young Americans with the most to offer in uniform feel quite comfortable taking civilian jobs or going to graduate school without so much as a thought about taking care of the young soldiers, Marines, airmen and sailors who are fighting a very real and growing war.

A continued refusal to honestly show the real human cost of the war will only alienate the troops from the American people and civilian leadership. This is hardly what we need at a time when North Korea actually has nuclear weapons, Iran seems hell-bent on obtaining them, and Russia is busy crushing any semblance of freedom within its borders.