Some Soldiers Trying to Get Out of Army [View All]

Kevin Benderman spends his days sitting in a plastic chair in the stockade at Fort Lewis, Wash., completing a 15-month sentence for "missing movement" with his unit. Jeremy Hinzman is raising his baby boy in Toronto, awaiting a court date when he hopes the Canadian government will grant him political asylum. Aidan Delgado is back in school, studying religion at the New College of
Florida and practicing Buddhism.

All three are among a small but growing number of soldiers who have become disillusioned with the war in Iraq and are trying to get out of their required service. Increasing numbers of men and women in uniform are seeking honorable discharges as conscientious objectors. Others are suing the military, claiming their obligation has been wrongfully extended. Many have simply deserted, refusing to appear for duty. Some are more desperate: Last December, Army Spc. Marquise J. Roberts of Hinesville, Ga., persuaded a cousin to shoot him in the leg. The cousin was sent to jail, Roberts to the stockade. You sign a contract and you're required to serve for whatever time period you've agreed to," said a Pentagon spokeswoman, Lt. Col. Ellen Krenke.

"There are certain standards the enlistment contracts oblige soldiers to, and they are required to fulfill them." But Pentagon policies do have exceptions, and soldiers are increasingly challenging their mandatory service. Requests for conscientious objector status, which can qualify someone for an honorable discharge, have steadily increased since 2000 - about 110 soldiers filed the complex paperwork in 2004, about four times the number in 2000. Of those, about half were approved. Those who were rejected either went back to the war or refused to serve. Some are now on the lam. Others have been court-martialed and done time.

Former Staff Sgt. Camilo Mejia, 30, of Miami Beach, Fla., says he had change of heart while on a two-week leave last year after spending a year in Iraq. "Going home gave me the opportunity to put my thoughts in order and to listen to what my conscience had to say. People would ask me about my war experiences and answering them took me back to all the horrors, the firefights, the ambushes, the time I saw a young Iraqi dragged by his shoulders through a pool of his own blood or an innocent man was decapitated by our machine gun fire," he said.

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