The Iraq war began on March 20, 2003, to rid Iraq of a dictator and eliminate his weapons of mass destruction. The images remain fresh even as the memories fade - the blinding flash of "shock and awe" bombing, the square-jawed confidence of an American president leading his people into war, the cowering prisoner trembling on the ground in the face of a small piece of American power.
(FILE - U.S. Marine Lance Cpl. Timothy Dupuis, of Dover, N.H., climbs the stairs at an outpost in Fallujah, Iraq, 65 kilometers (40 miles) west of Baghdad, on Tuesday, May 2, 2006. (AP Photo/Jacob Silberberg, File))