Nam to Iraq and back

Greetings,

"Welcome to hell," James Webb wrote in March 2003, the month of the U.S. invasion. "Many of us lived it in another era."

Webb, 60, a Democrat from Virginia, was wounded while commanding a Marine rifle company during some of Vietnam's bloodiest fighting, in the An Hoa Basin west of Danang. He had shrapnel lodged in his left knee, left arm, back of the head and right kidney. Webb said the experience changed him.

"I was probably older when I was 24 than I am right now," he said years after the war.

As early as 2002, Webb warned of a Vietnam-style quagmire in Iraq. He broke with the GOP and was elected to the Senate as a Democrat.

MK 31 is up. Finally.

Peace.