ORT BENNING, Ga. - Down Custer Road, past cinder-block buildings with peeling yellow paint, past signs shouting the infantry credo ''Follow Me!'' sits a young Army major with questions of war and peace for his next commander in chief.
Two miles away, in their tidy, Army-issue, young-married-officer's house, is his pregnant wife, a former Army nurse, and their two young children. She, too, has questions. And worries.
Major Kevin S. Petit is just one of 1.4 million Americans in uniform, and Anita Petit is just one military spouse. But as they await tonight's debate between Vice President Al Gore and Governor George W. Bush of Texas, they embody many of the hopes and aspirations, as well as the frustrations and suppressed fears, of the men and women who salute the president, the nation's 24 million veterans, and the people who love them.
Like other viewers, the Petits will watch through the prism of their own experiences and the magnifying glass of their own interests. They will be looking for a leader, a man who can convince them he will keep the military strong and America safe.
''We need a man of character. That would include high moral standards and compassion,'' said Kevin Petit, 34. ''He has to understand there is a downstream effect when he takes an action. He's got to be stocked full of the sense of the greater good, the greater good of the nation, the greater good of the military, and not just the greater good of politics.''
His wife, 36, wants to hear support for the military, financially and philosophically.
''I have to know they have the money and the resources to train well, so I can sleep well at night as a spouse. Once you have that confidence, you never worry about them being deployed,'' she said.
Kevin Petit is a California native, a West Point graduate (''bottom 10 percent of the class''), a Bronze Star winner for leading a platoon during Desert Storm, an 11-year Army man with an easy smile who is planning a long military career.
He shaves his head on the sides and back, leaving an island of short brown hair on top - a ''high and tight.'' He thinks he earns about $35,000 a year, plus benefits, but he is not certain because his wife handles the finances. His high school wrestler's build has expanded to pro wrestling size by military training and Ironman triathalons. He is a proud Airborne Ranger, Special Operations trained, and the words gung ho barely begin to describe his demeanor.
Anita Petit was born in Germany to American parents working as civilian teachers on a US military base. An ROTC scholarship paid her way through nursing school at Creighton University in Nebraska. A Gulf War veteran, she and her husband spent Christmas 1990 a few tent rows apart in the desert, but they did not meet for another three years, at an Army hospital in Italy.
She rose to captain and did humanitarian work in the Honduras, but she left the service after they married in 1994; she says the best medal she received was her husband. She laughs and shakes her long blond braid when she says it, but she means it. She is home raising 4-year-old Erin and 17-month-old Ryan, and preparing for the one on the way.
The Uniform Code of Military Conduct prohibits soldiers from commenting publicly on civilian commanders, and Kevin Petit would not say how he might vote or even what party he registers with. Anita Petit said she is undecided. Still, their comments reveal some of the raw nerves of a military in transition.
Bush, who served in the Texas National Guard, has spoken of ''a military in decline.'' Gore, who spent a brief tour as an Army journalist in Vietnam, talks of armed forces that are ''the strongest and the best in the entire world.''
The Petits say both are right.
''The next president will inherit the best military in the world, but a military that is on the down side,'' Petit said. He explained by praising US military leaders as ''visionary'' and noncommissioned officers as ''the core strength of our Army.'' As for the decline, he said simply, ''It's money.''
''We want a happy soldier, a motivated soldier,'' Petit said. ''We can get him motivated despite a room that floods or with paint chipping off the wall. We can do it, but it's a tremendous investment of energy, and it's just that much harder to do it.''
The concern crosses over to his own life, as well.
''I am a selfless guy, but I cannot be selfless if I feel like I can't take care of my family,'' he added, lamenting cuts that have affected child care and recreation programs. ''It's getting hard to be selfless when I think the quality of life infrastructure isn't being funded like it should be.''
Bush and Gore have both promised increases in military funding, but Petit takes a see-it, believe-it approach.
To most Americans, the scheduling of the first debate on Oct. 3 has little historical significance. But when Petit hears the date, his blue eyes go wide with alarm. It is the anniversary of a traumatic 1993 battle in Mogadishu, Somalia, that cost the lives of 18 Army Rangers. Petit proudly wears the Rangers' maroon beret, and three years after the raid he became a company commander in the battalion that sent those men to Africa.
''Since then, the military has done its homework in terms of the lessons learned and finding the way ahead. The question is whether that way ahead is properly funded,'' Petit said. ''Will there be there enough so a single soldier isn't living in squalor? Is there enough money to keep him shooting his weapon five times a month, which is what it takes to keep him ready?''
As an operations officer responsible for making paratroopers out of 15,500 soldiers each year at this sprawling Army base, Petit has seen flat budgets cut the number of available parachutes from 5,000 to about half that. He worries that the need to reuse and repack parachutes that much more often is a canary in the coal mine of dangerous practices.
''We're having to rewrite our rules about how many parachutes you can repack in a day, and you just don't know what the risks are going to be from doing that,'' Petit said. ''Those kinds of decisions are being made in all kinds of areas...and we don't know what the results will be.''
For Anita Petit, concerns about her husband's possible death or injury in battle are real, but they are outweighed by her faith in his abilities and her belief that American military power should right global wrongs. Her childhood in Germany and awareness of its Nazi past sensitized her to the need to combat cruelties. She scoffs at the idea of deploying military might only when there is a clear US interest.
''We have a moral and ethical responsibility to see that children, women, people in general have the opportunity that we have in the States. That's the reason people still swim here from Cuba,'' she said. ''A good president knows that.''
''You choose your battles wisely, you choose battles when negotiations have failed and you've listened to your advisers. And I say if there's casualties, there's casualties. If you didn't join the fight there would still be casualties, the casualties of persecution,'' she added.
''I think in this country we accept that people die in robberies of ATMs, but we're not accepting of people dying for worldly causes, and that's a shame,'' she said. ''Let's not do another Vietnam, but let's also not be afraid to jump in at an opportunity to do good.''
The motivation to ''do good'' seems to be a powerful force in both their lives. Kevin Petit speaks with conviction about duty, honor, and love of the military. ''When you finally subordinate yourself to something greater than yourself, I think that's a huge step for the individual and a huge gain for society and the nation,'' he said without a hint of self-consciousness.
Asked to name the past president who embodies his ideals, Kevin Petit picks Franklin D. Roosevelt. First, though, he amends the question to include any historical figure. He names General George C. Marshall, the soldier-statesman who was the only professional warrior ever awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
When Anita Petit watches the debate, she will try to look beyond immediate answers to take the measure of each man.
''I want a man of honesty, integrity and clarity of vision. That way you'll know when to deploy, when not to deploy. That can be seen in the moment of heat of a debate, like if someone goes to name-calling, well, my 4-year-old can do that,'' she said. ''I do not like indecisiveness. I would rather have an answer I disagree with than to have someone waffle back and forth without his mind made up.''
No matter who is elected, though, or what happens to the armed forces in the coming years, both Petits can envision military lives for their children.
''It's an altrustic career, a calling. If the military was still in decline and my children were of age,'' Kevin Petit said, ''I would say to them, `They need you even more now.'''
