\n<\/p>\n
WASHINGTON — <\/span>As Congress responds to President Donald Trump’s<\/a> attack on Iran<\/a>, lawmakers who served on the front lines of Iraq and Afghanistan are making their voices heard in a war debate that has taken on intensely personal meaning.<\/p>\n Many admit mixed feelings, taking satisfaction in seeing vengeance taken on the leadership of an Iranian regime<\/a> that has targeted U.S. service members for decades, yet fearful that another generation of soldiers could soon face the same combat experiences that they did.<\/p>\n \u201cDo I take gratification? You know there\u2019s the Marine side of me: Yeah, of course,\u201d said Arizona Democratic Sen. Ruben Gallego, whose company suffered some of the heaviest losses on the U.S. side during the Iraq War. \u201cI know they killed a lot of American soldiers, American Marines. But do I also understand that I have a responsibility not to let my lust for revenge drive my country into another war?\u201d<\/p>\n Experiences in the post 9\/11 wars are also coloring the decisions of the Trump administration, given that top officials, including Vice President JD Vance and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, were once deployed to Iraq. <\/p>\n Gallego, like others on Capitol Hill, leaned heavily on his firsthand experience of fighting in the wars after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks<\/a> as he assessed the Iran conflict. Lawmakers wore bracelets etched with the names of friends killed in battle, told stories of coming under attack from Iran-backed militant groups and reflected on their own life-changing injuries suffered during combat.<\/p>\n While the initial votes on Iran saw Congress divide mostly along party lines<\/a>, with Republicans backing Trump’s actions and Democrats warning of an extended conflict, veterans in both parties share deep reservations about entering the conflict.<\/p>\n \u201cAs somebody who knows a lot of friends that didn\u2019t come home and a lot of Gold Star families, that\u2019s why the week before the attack, I was actually one of the ones that was talking about caution and why we needed to avoid at all costs getting into another long, drawn-out Middle Eastern war,\u201d said Republican Rep. Eli Crane of Arizona, a former Navy SEAL who left college to enlist the week after the Sept. 11 attacks.<\/p>\n Crane said his concerns were partially assuaged by briefings from the Trump administration<\/a> that indicated to him the president is not planning a drawn-out war. He voted against a war powers resolution<\/a> that would have halted attacks on Iran unless Trump got congressional approval.<\/p>\n But Crane said wars are never straightforward. \u201cI\u2019ve been on military operations that did not go to plan many times, and so I understand the nature,\u201d he said, adding that he was calling for the Trump administration to approach the conflict with \u201chumility and caution.\u201d<\/p>\n Gallego and other Democrats worried that it was too late for that approach. They paid tribute to the six U.S. military members who were killed in a drone strike in Kuwait and worried that there could soon be more American casualties. <\/p>\n \u201cWar is dirty, and mistakes happen,\u201d Gallego said. The longer the conflict drags on, he added, the more chance there will be for U.S. military members to be killed. He said he saw that in Iraq when friends would be killed by seemingly random shots from enemy combatants.<\/p>\n Still, many Republicans argued that it was necessary to attack Iran to stop a regime that for decades has helped train and arm militant groups throughout the Middle East. Republican Rep. Brian Mast, who chairs the House Foreign Affairs Committee, led the debate on the House floor against the war powers resolution.<\/p>\n Mast, who served as an Army bomb disposal expert, now uses prosthetic legs after receiving catastrophic injuries from an improvised explosive device in Afghanistan. \u201cMe especially, many of my other colleagues, no one wants to see our military go into combat or war,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Then he added, \u201cBut Iran\u2019s terror, which has caused the deaths of thousands of Americans, it has to stop.\u201d<\/p>\n