ABOUT

Infidel is an intimate portrait of a small battalion of US soldiers posted to an outpost in the Korengal Valley, an area considered to be one of the most dangerous Afghan postings during America and its allies’ war against the Taliban. Hetherington was joined by writer Sebastian Junger, spending one-year capturing images.

Hetherington’s photographs prove surprisingly tender – arguably the strongest among them a series of the men asleep – this is a book as much about love and male vulnerability as it is about bravery and war. With revealing interviews by Junger (with whom Hetherington co-directed the film Restrepo), the book is also illustrated with graphics of the tattoos the soldiers gave each other in the camp. Provocatively designed in the manner of a Bible, Infidel is warm, moving and full of humour; it is both a tribute to the “rough men ready to do violence on our behalf,” and a provocative contribution to the documentation of war in our time.