As U.S. forces continue to advance toward Baghdad in the war against Iraq, veterans of the first Gulf War are often queasy about supporting the military action.

Tony Vargas, a Gulf War Vet who said he experienced illness due to his deployment in the first Gulf War, said he had mixed feelings and felt “about 50-50” in his support of the war. Vargas lives in President Bush’s home state of Texas and said that many people in his area were in favor of the war. But opinions from vets Vargas has talked with are grayer.

“I can’t speak for all the veterans, but a lot of them are not in favor of this war,” Vargas said. “Some disagree that we should be going ahead. The war we were in seemed to have a nobler cause of liberating the people of Kuwait. A lot of veterans did feel coming out of Kuwait sort of like, ‘Hey, what happened, I thought we were supposed to finish the job.'”

Vargas said the current war seems very different than the past war in that the 1991 conflict was designed to remove Iraqi forces from Kuwait, while present military action is designed to overthrow and replace Saddam Hussein’s regime.

Although some urban conflict did take place in Kuwait during the first Gulf War, it seems the most prominent feature of the war against Iraq. The second Gulf War has also already far surpassed the first in duration, and the length of how long U.S. forces will remain in Iraq to restore a sovereign government remains undefined.

“The current situation seems to be more difficult than the one in Kuwait,” Vargas said. “I just hope they don’t go through the bureaucracy of what we went through.”

Those involved in Gulf War Veterans associations say combatants in the first Gulf War became severely disappointed in the treatment they received from the government concerning illnesses developed in correlation with their deployment.

Kathleen Senn, press secretary for the Midwest Gulf War Veterans Association, said that she has been disgusted by the treatment of Gulf War Vets over the last decade.

“When I first found out about it, it just made me sick, because it sounded just like Vietnam and Agent Orange,” Senn said. “It’s very saddening that our country will continue to use the finest and the best as cannon fodder and then not take care of them when they return.”

Speculation of illness arising from U.S. troop exposure to chemical and biological weapons has arisen around many wars fought during the 20th century. Notorious examples of such weaponry include mustard gas used in World War I and Agent Orange in the Vietnam War.

Joyce Riley served as a Captain in the U.S. Air Force and flew on missions in support of Operation Desert Storm. As a flight nurse, Riley became sick about six months after the Gulf War ended, even though she had not flown into any war zones.

Riley, now spokeswoman for the American Gulf War Veterans Association, said she is left to believe her illness either came from vaccinations administered to her or from secondary exposure to unknown elements while treating U.S. soldiers for war wounds.

The causes for Gulf War illnesses have not been defined but are widely considered among those veterans who experience ailments to be a result of exposure to depleted uranium, vaccinations, chemical or biological warfare, and oil-well fires during deployment during the 1991 campaign. Veterans have attributed symptoms of Gulf War-related illnesses to include rashes, sores, Leukemia, cancers, and kidney and lung failure.

“Our organization supports our veterans but is dissenting on this war,” Riley said. “We support our vets and want to see them come home safely, but we are concerned about what is being done in terms of ensuring their safety from chemical and biological agents.”

Riley offers a number of 400,000 Gulf War Veterans who became sick out of 700,000 who were deployed. The Department of Defense already has compensation for 250,000 of those veterans, but the average compensation totals $96 per month.

Department of Defense report released in September 2002 said that there was no evidence Gulf War veterans were becoming ill with anything out of the ordinary.

“The DOD spent $300 million on researching this illness, and they couldn’t find anything. I say either they’re terribly inept or they intentionally tried not to find anything,” Riley said. “When three dead crows show up in New York City, the World Health Organization can figure out what went wrong in 24 hours.”