I do not feel the Iraqi journalist who spoke at Coffman Union this week was a good representation of the Iraqi people or the Iraq war. He admitted that there are many good things going on in Iraq but that he chose not to talk about them because they did not cause enough controversy to cause attention. This is the real reason that the American people do not know what is going on over there. It is because he is part of the media, just like CNN or Fox News. He tells the same stories that they tell, but what about the every-day Iraqi who thanks the soldiers endlessly for being there to protect their lives. Nobody wants to hear about the Iraqi people who praise us for our work in Iraq. Nobody wants to hear about the Iraqi civilians who we care for in our hospital, receiving medical care that would otherwise not be available. The ugly truth of the Iraq war is not the deaths of soldiers or civilians. The ugly truth of the Iraq war is that there are good things going on. In my opinion, nobody wants to hear about the good things going on over there because then it would be too hard for them to protest the war. First and foremost, this article implies that the Iraqi citizens in jail are innocent. They are not. They are there because we have proof that they have committed illegal offenses. If there is not enough evidence that they have committed a crime then they would not be in jail. There was a terrible incident that took place at Abu Ghraib, but that does not mean that everyone there was treated poorly. The soldiers responsible for that incident were prosecuted and are in jail. There are systems in place now to keep these incidences for happening again. If Hillel wanted to raise awareness of what was actually going on, they should have brought an Iraqi citizen that had no connections to the media, which means no alterior motive. The question, âÄòWhat can soldiers do to prevent violence?âÄô is not a new question and has been answered by the military already. It is to not repeat any mistakes we have made in the past. It is also to follow the strict guidelines. However, the American public does not know that the majority of violence and civilian casualties are caused by Iraqi to Iraqi violence (or caused by terrorists who flooded in to Iraq from neighboring countries to take part in the war). This type of violence is harder for the military to control, and we are still looking for solutions. As the campus ROTC adviser stated, âÄúOne [violent] act can undo 100 good acts.âÄù This is extremely true in the case of the U.S. Soldier. We will never receive recognition for the good things we are doing in Iraq because of Abu Ghraib and Haditha. I was not involved in either of these two incidences nor was anyone I know in the military, yet we all feel the burden. I do not agree with the ROTC adviser when he stated that much of the violence and death happened after the fall of Saddam Hussein because we did not have a concrete plan of action. Our plan was to help them form a new, working government in Iraq that had equality for the Shiites, Kurds and Sunnis. With the capture of a leader like Saddam Hussein there is, of course, going to be a back-lash by his followers. As an Operation Iraqi Freedom veteran, I ask that the next time you think about Iraq please think of all the schools we have built, the jobs we have created for the citizens and the clean water we have supplied. Morgan Hennessy University student Iraq veteran