Four of the senators who will vote next week on putting more troops in Iraq bear the scars of another war in another time, in a place called Vietnam. Three will vote against sending more troops. One will vote the other way.

John McCain, a former Navy fighter pilot, was captured by the Vietnamese, tortured and imprisoned for more than five years. Knowing what it's like to have fought before and lost, he's with President Bush on sending 21,500 more troops to Iraq.

Chuck Hagel, an infantryman in Vietnam, was seriously wounded by an enemy mine explosion beneath the armored personnel carrier he and his brother were in. He opposes the troop increase.

So does Senate newcomer Jim Webb, an ex-Marine who speaks Vietnamese, who opposed the Iraq war from the outset and campaigned for the Senate wearing the combat boots of a son who recently went off to the war...

John Kerry, a Vietnam veteran as well as a Vietnam war protester, also opposes sending more troops into Iraq...