Capt. Doug White said he remembers the wait.

Twelve years ago, White, now commandant of cadets for MSU's Army ROTC, was waiting to be sent to Iraq from his station in Germany.

As an active duty soldier in the U.S. Army, his equipment had been sent ahead of him to the already-stationed soldiers in Iraq, while he intently awaited orders to follow.

"That is the time when people are the most nervous," White said. "That was a new situation for me - you don't know what you're walking into."

More than 250,000 soldiers are in the Persian Gulf region with orders to attack, not to mention reserve soldiers in the United States preparing for their orders to go.

On February 14, political theory and constitutional democracy sophomore Mark St. Louis got the alert that he would be deployed. He immediately withdrew from his classes, expecting to head out a few days after the alert.

St. Louis is still waiting.

"It makes me really anxious," he said. "I hope I do get notified soon.

"I am sick of all this waiting."

St. Louis has been occupying his time by lifting weights, reading and spending time with his family.

As anxious as he may be, St. Louis said he's handling the delay well.

"I am still good," he said.

Relief comes with the order to leave, White said.

"Once we got (to Iraq) we had to wait quite awhile before the war kicked off," White said. "When you're doing all your training and preparing, that is when the morale starts picking up."

Along with the daily training and exercise, soldiers abroad also perform guard duty. This heightens their sense of focus, White said.

"Soldiers aren't just sitting in the desert waiting for something to happen, he said. "They're doing their duty, too."

In the days leading up to Operation Desert Storm, White said troops' confidence and morale was up.

"A month before the war we were on a high," he said. "It is a good source of strength to know you have soldiers on your left, right, front and rear - everyone around you is seeing what you're seeing."

Army Sgt. David Quintela said he was not nervous when he was waiting for his orders to deploy to the Middle East after Operation Desert Storm had ended.

Quintela, who is an MSU Army ROTC instructor, was part of a rapid deployment unit that followed the war to assist with refugees and reconstruction.

He said when his unit was asked to go they had to be assembled and ready within in two hours of their phone call.

"It was a point of honor," Quintela said. "You're asked to go first."

When Quintela was on alert he could not travel farther than one hour from his home, he said.

He also was required to keep the Army updated every twenty minutes to his whereabouts if he was at the mall or the movies.

But getting the call to go did not always mean they would be deployed, he said.

"They call you up in the middle of the night and you go through the whole build up to find out it was only a drill to make sure you can make the two hour drill line," Quintela said.

Quintela was part of Operation Provide Comfort, a mission in Northern Iraq to provide a safe haven for the Kurds after Operation Desert Storm.

The Kurdish people, who live in southern Turkey and northern Iraq, were target of attacks from Saddam's forces in 1988. About 5,000 people died in a yearlong campaign of chemical attacks.

After waiting to receive this mission, Quintela said he was ready.

"Once you're actually there you don't think about what you are doing," he said. "All you're thinking about is, 'Don't let your buddies down, don't let your team down.'"