Imagine you are a U.S. Marine.

Item: U.S. Marines appearing to urinate on Taliban corpses."

This is "inhumane", It's "entirely inappropriate for members of the U.S. military". It's "deplorable", "shocking", and "an indignity against the Afghan people."

Have we forgotten these are two forces at war?

Let me explain something here. If you are part of a fighting force, and you have been trained for years to hate "the enemy" enough to kill him on sight--especially since if you don't, he's apt to kill you first--a wee-wee little thing like pissing on his corpse doesn't really amount to such of a much. Not after you've, you know, killed the guy. Do you really believe you can, ahem, piss him off any further by pissing on him? Tell you what, folks: when I go, everybody feel free to pee on me. Somehow I don't think I'll care. Or notice, for that matter. I'm dead.

Are you, a soldier trained to hate and kill, supposed to stop hating as if by magic after you've killed? I think urinating on a corpse is a perfectly legitimate way to express hatred and disdain. Which is what we're supposed to feel, right?  These aren't human beings, they're Taliban animals.

Newsflash: you're an animal. I'm an animal. Human beings are animals. Why are we surprised that human beings act like animals?  

The sad thing is that this hatred cuts both ways. I've little doubt a few Marines have been posthumously pissed on. Or maybe the Taliban play games with heads. That's a pretty common thing, throughout history, playing games with heads.

The Taliban aren't born evil: they're made that way through careful cultivation. They believe every bit as strongly in their way of life as we do in ours, and that's a point I think often gets lost. Perhaps they believe more strongly, in fact: they seem to have little compunction about dying for their cause. Does that make them better human beings than us? I'd argue not. If I'm going to judge a human being--something I try very hard not to do, not knowing the lifetime that led to the action I'm judging--I'd suggest the only sane criterion to use is: how does this human being treat other beings? The Taliban do not treat their young, or particularly their women, with anything resembling respect. But this too is part of an engrained culture that goes back centuries.

I sometimes wonder if the Marines who kill Taliban--and apparently desecrate their corpses--ever imagine what their lives would be like if they were born in Afghanistan instead of America. It's a variant of the "good little Nazi"  thought experiment I've conducted with people for many years. I ask people to imagine themselves as young adults in Hitler's Germany. What would they do?  Most people say without hesitation that they'd be good, moral, upstanding young adults and would seek to thwart Hitler by various means. I've had several people tell me they'd do anything in their power to kill the man.
With all due respect: I doubt it.
Oh, sure, there were a fair number of people living in Hitler's Germany who resisted him by various means. And you, fine, upstanding adult that you are, no doubt imagine you'd be one of them. But those resistors were vastly outnumbered by people who believed in the essential justness of the Final Solution, and sought to advance it in any way they could. Don't forget: Hitler was a persuader, in an environment where people were very eager to be persuaded.
And those aggressive people, in turn, were vastly outnumbered by ho-hum types just trying to live their lives. It's amazing what you can live cheek-by-jowl with if all you're interested in is keeping your head down and staying out of trouble.  Statistically, I think it more likely that people would either Sig Heil all over the place--or just ignore it and work their office job, come home and play with the kids, and sleep easy at night.

What's worse? I have no answer for that. I do believe, however, that killing someone, for whatever reason, is considerably worse than urinating on their corpse.

Imagine you are a U.S. Marine. You've just shot a few towelheads before they could shoot you. You're feeling full of, again pardon me, piss and vinegar: in the prime of your life. All's right with your world: enemy vanquished, threat eliminated.  And you did it. Now tell me again how it would never even cross your mind to piss on that corpse.