The War on Terror has been going on for more than three years, and veterans are beginning to return home and back to school.

Many who have returned from the Middle East and currently attend the University have very different opinions about the United States’ foreign policy and involvement in the Middle East. While some feel that the occupation of Iraq is a success, others see it as a failure.

Joining the Army was “the best decision I ever made,” said Travis Buchanan, senior in LAS. Buchanan is a four-year veteran who served in South Korea and Kuwait, and is a specialist in nuclear, biological and chemical warfare.

Buchanan said that his experience in the Army gave him “direction and discipline.”

He said he felt the occupation of Iraq was necessary.

“While I was in the Army I learned all about how evil these weapons (of mass destruction) can be,” Buchanan said. He added that the fact that the coalition did not find any weapons of mass destruction does not affect the validity of the decision.

He said these weapons can easily be disposed, and “the six months we gave Saddam would have been more than enough time.”

Buchanan said he feels that America needs to send more troops to Iraq in order to accomplish the mission at hand. “If you’re going to do something, do something right,” he said.

He said that he agrees with President George W. Bush on his policies, but not necessarily the implementation of those policies.

“I think it’s ridiculous that we pay private contractors $120,000 a year with three months vacation when you have servicemen to do it for much less,” Buchanan said. He said that the funds that go into private contractors should instead be redirected into the military, which would put more troops in Iraq.

Experiencing the war in Iraq “made me more aware of how the U.S. functions globally and how our foreign policy works,” said Aaron Hughes, senior in FAA and veteran of Kuwait and Iraq. He said that his service “took away the naiveties about American ideals and politics,” and demonstrated American interests.

Hughes said that “capitalist society drives our interests abroad, and how that can foster and grow (abroad); that’s the US’s interest abroad and general.” He said that the spreading of democracy and humanitarian efforts are not the focal point of the United States’ war in Iraq. It is difficult for people to understand that there are very few individuals who are profiting from the situation in Iraq, he said.

“Not anybody in congress will say that Iraq was a good idea,” Hughes said. He said “everyone knows it’s broke,” but people aren’t interested in changing the situation. The United States needs realistic ideas and not simply ideals, Hughes said. He said that politicians are not concerned with affecting the “actual functional process of really changing the situation.”

Hughes said that Democrats are “afraid to make that point and looking weak on terrorism, whatever that means.” Republicans follow Bush’s lead, but that’s not going to change anything, he said. Hughes said that Republicans seek to “‘stay the course,’ but that’s not going to change strategy, that’s just there for rhetoric,” he said. He said “we need not just rhetoric, but some type of actual change.”

People are still dying and people are still being deployed, Hughes said. “I’m not pretending to know the one right answer. These are my thoughts, what do other people think?”