Every Sunday for the past three months, members of the Los Angeles chapter of Veterans for Peace have placed a field of white crosses on the beach at Santa Monica, California, next to the famous pier. Each cross represents a soldier killed in Iraq since the beginning of the conflict. Each Sunday there are more crosses.

The field of crosses takes on the appearance of a military cemetery. At the front of the crosses is a casket draped with an American flag. On a long wooden stand to the right of the casket are the names of those killed in Iraq - along with their hometown, age, and how they were...