In 1967, his plane was shot down over North Vietnam and he was held as a prisoner of war from 1967 to 1973. He retired from the Navy in 1981.

“I think it’s because it’s where (McCain) comes from,” said Jay Diller, an MSU criminal justice senior.

Diller, deployed in Iraq for 18 months, said although he doesn’t affiliate himself with a specific political orientation, he agrees more with McCain in general.

“A candidate who has a military background tends to attract people from the military,” said Ben Kleinerman, assistant professor at James Madison College.

Kleinerman added the armed forces also tend to come from Republican backgrounds, although of course there are exceptions.

Another reason most MSU military veterans may lean toward McCain is the perception that he is stronger on foreign policy matters, something people in the military are concerned about, he said.

“I think (Barack) Obama tried to change that perception with his trip to Iraq and Afghanistan, but he’s fighting an uphill battle,” he said.

Presumptive Democratic nominee Sen. Obama, D-Ill., advocates withdrawing troops from Iraq by mid-2010, while McCain has traditionally criticized such a timetable.

Bringing troops back to the United States as quickly as possible sounds like a good way to cut casualties, but seven months as a marine in Fallujah, Iraq made MSU geography sophomore Andrew Wisniewski, 21, see things differently.

“Pulling out quickly is not the right move,” he said. “What you got to think about is it’s important for this country, in every situation, to leave that place better than when we came in. Right now it’s not any better.”

Matt Patton, 29, once stationed in the Persian and Arabian gulfs during Operation Enduring Freedom, is now an MSU political science junior.

Patton, who served from 1998-2002, said he would sleep better knowing a veteran is in the White House.

“If you haven’t built a home before, only drawn one, chances are you’ll make more mistakes than a professional builder,” he said.

“The only difference is in war, mistakes translate into lives lost, not merely fallen walls.”

Military experience should be a prerequisite for any serving wartime president, Patton said.

Experience working with foreign policy is also a crucial asset for a president, said Troy Walters, an MSU criminal justice sophomore and U.S. Army veteran. Walters spent one year in Iraq, returning to the U.S. in January 2006.

“John McCain has said some things that I don’t quite agree with, and the same thing with Obama,” Walters said. “For me, a big issue is (electing) someone that’s president that will take care of the military and the veterans.”