How to show a war story

This week while cruising the interwebs, I came across a media section on the New York Times. A certain link titled An Ambush and Comrade Lost caught my eye which turned out to be a slideshow of pictures taken before, during, and after an ambush in Afghanistan. The story is remarkably similar to the one O'Brien tellls of the booby trap. The first time I watched it was at school, so there was no sound, but upon watching it at home, I was surprised to find that accompanying the pictures was the story being told by a soldier who was there through a sound clip which matched up with the pictures. This simple addition dramatically altered the feeling I got while watching again. The voice gave the story a background, meaning, and emotion. Pictures alone lacked a certain something which made the story feel real and tangible. Hearing the story through the voice of a soldier who was there made you feel some of the same emotions he felt during and after the attack, which brings me to my question. When depicting a war story such as O'Brien's or this slideshow, is it better to tell the story through pictures or words. Everyone knows the saying a picture is worth 1000 words, but those words may lose their meaning and effect when the reader is left to interoperate the images and story for themselves. With a primary source spoken story, tone and emotion paints an image in the mind which goes deeper than simple photographs can. Pictures also somehow lose the meaning a story may hold. Like O'Brien says, war stories can be true stories that never happened. When a story is based off of pictures, you know it happened, and there is little room for details to be varied. I may be wrong, but when it comes to a war story, I think the right way for a soldier to tell theirs through the most original form of storytelling.