War Surgery in Afghanistan and Iraq: A Series of Cases, 2003–2007 is a medical textbook published in July, 2008 by the United States Army and the Walter Reed Army Medical Center's Borden Institute, with a foreword by reporter Bob Woodruff, who was severely injured in the Iraq War in 2006.
In 2008, some in the U.S. Army Medical Department sought to censor the book and to keep it out of civilian hands, largely due to the graphic nature of some of its photographic content, specifically gruesome photos of war wounds which might be used for political purposes.
It is an edited work consisting of more than 70 trauma surgery cases illustrated with amateur digital photos taken by the deployed attending surgeons and staff.
Cases are categorized according to type of injury (e.g. soft-tissue & burns, bone, vascular) or anatomical region (face & neck, brain & spine, chest, abdomen).
The textbook is first and foremost devoted to the acute management of the polytrauma (blast, burns, and high-velocity penetrating injuries) unique to the modern battlefield.