When President Bush said he has the support of the generals on the war in Iraq, he wasn't talking about retired Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton.

Eaton was endorsing Sen. Hillary Clinton, D.-N.Y., Tuesday during an appearance at the Bob Ruud Community Center. Retired Air Force Gen. Tony McPeak stumped for Sen. Barack Obama, D.-Ill., during a stop in Pahrump Nov. 13.

Eaton was in charge of training the Iraqi military from 2003-2004. He called for the resignation of former U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfield for failing to heed the advice of military officers serving in Iraq.

Eaton said he just retired from a 33-year career in the Army. His father died in Vietnam, he was raised by his father-in-law, a career Marine. His two sons are both currently serving in Afghanistan.

"So all this is pretty personal to me, it's about as personal as you can get," Eaton said.

He related how the 160,000 families of American servicemen want to get past 7:30 a.m. every day without a government car pulling up, delivering bad news about the death of a child in combat.

"Some people think I'm anti-war. I'm not anti-war; that's like a doctor being 'anti-cancer.' I'm anti-incompetent waging war. If you're going to go to war, do it well, do it competently, do it right and get home. That, this administration has not done for this country," Eaton said.

"My colleagues, now in the retired community and on active duty who cannot speak, are so incensed at what this Republican administration has done to our Army, to our Marine Corps ," he said. "I've got a problem with the Republican administration that sends my son to war for 15 months and then sends him back for 15 months. For a lot of families that is not the volunteer army model that we went into."

Eaton struck a nerve with Pahrump resident Susan Jones-Davis, who said she had a son in Iraq while another son formerly fought in Iraq and is now stationed in South Korea. Jones-Davis angrily said President Bush's family should be required to fight in Iraq.

Pahrump resident Susan Woodall said her grandson is in Iraq on a 15-month deployment and can't even come home for Christmas.

Eaton was incensed some Republican candidates, except U.S. Sen. John McCain, R.-Ariz., sidestepped the question about torture techniques like "water boarding." People will say anything when they're tortured, he said, adding torture discredits our image abroad.

"When you serve 33 years in the Army your nose gets pretty good for leadership," Eaton said. Speaking of Clinton, he said, "In her presence, I am absolutely comfortable with this senator as our commander in chief."

Eaton called Clinton "the victim of 17 years of attacks from the Karl Rove type machine. Eight years as the first lady she could not fight back. Now she can, but she is a lady and you have not seen anything vindictive."

The Iraqi soldiers lack the belief in constitution and country that American soldiers have, Eaton said.

"The biggest component in Iraq is the moral component, because they do not believe in their government. They do not believe in their constitution. This is all new stuff to them," he said.

"That's going to be a slow, painstaking process with the Iraqis, and right now the al-Maliki government is not performing to standard. They're trying to live a Jeffersonian style Democracy. You don't just dump that on an Arab society and expect that to take root overnight," Eaton said.

The Bush administration didn't prepare for the number of wounded veterans coming back from war in Iraq and Afghanistan, which is why there are horror stories coming out of Walter Reed Hospital, he said.

"In the beginning a lot of very senior military, active and retired, told the president not to do it, and the president chose to go in there," Eaton said. "Right now the American Army and American Marines are trying to keep Iraqis from killing each other. We are in the middle of a civil war."

He advocated a diplomatic approach to ending the war. America needs to talk to enemies like Iran and Syria or those countries will continue to be part of the problem, he said.

"President Bush says he listens to the generals. What garbage," Eaton said.

Instead of large deployments in permanent locations, Eaton pointed to Colombia, where a few dozen special forces soldiers involved in working with the Colombian government has made that South American country much safer today.