The seriously wounded are harassed and forced to do hard labor.

Part 2: Left Behind

Above: Sgt. Jerrald Jensen guards the Kunar River Valley at outpost Bari Alai in 2009. He deployed to Afghanistan 21 months after a bomb blast in Iraq in 2007 shattered the lower half of his face and Army doctors rebuilt his jaw.

Courtesy Jerrald Jensen

Left Behind

No break for the wounded

A roadside bomb hit Sgt. Jerrald Jensen's Humvee in Iraq, punching through heavy armor and shooting a chunk of hot metal into his head at several times the speed of sound, shattering his face and putting him in a coma. "I wasn't supposed to live," the veteran lisped with half a tongue through numb lips. "No one knows why I did. It's shocking." Even more shocking is what Jensen did next. After 16 surgeries, the sergeant volunteered to go back to combat in one of the most savage corners of Afghanistan, where he was injured again. Perhaps most shocking, though, is what happened when he got home.