USATODAY.com: Return of U.S. war dead kept solemn, secret

An honor guard removed the aluminum "transfer case" containing the body from the aircraft, as other military officers present to receive the slain servicemember snapped salutes. The honor guard process here at Dover -- repeated hundreds of times since the Iraq war began -- is dignified and reverent. And it's carried out in secret, off-limits to the media.

This wasn't always the case. Photographs and film footage of caskets coming home from battlefields have been a stark reminder for Americans of the toll of war. During the Vietnam War, the image of caskets arriving at Dover became a staple of the nightly news. The phrase "Dover Test" later came to signify public tolerance, or lack of it, for mounting war casualties.

...

The result is that images of caskets being returned to U.S. soil are not shown to the American public. This policy contrasts with Italy's national display of grief last month when 19 of that country's troops died in an Iraq suicide bombing and received a state funeral through the streets of Rome.

...

President Bush also hasn't attended funerals or special ceremonies for the military men or women killed in Iraq.

Since 1991, the media have been banned from covering the arrival of remains at Dover. The air base houses the military's largest mortuary, where bodies are prepared for burial before they are sent to the families' hometowns.