Repaying the debt. (Scan).

The war in Iraq brought countless stories of courage and compassion: Two young American soldiers, left behind in the desert due to the fog of war, are found days later thirsty and hungry because they gave much of their food and water to Iraqi civilians. A severely wounded foreign-born U.S. Marine insists on standing as he takes his oath of citizenship at a Naval hospital and starts sobbing midway as he is overcome by pain and emotion. A soldier loses his leg in battle but bears no ill will and tells the visiting President Bush that it does "not bother me a bit."

Such examples of honor and sacrifice have made many Americans, including me, beam with pride. But at the same time, I have never felt so ashamed--ashamed that I myself have failed to serve my country. Speaking to friends and peers, I've discovered that I'm not alone in feeling this sense of guilt.

Call it the Gen-X lament. I am almost 28 years old, have two Ivy League degrees and work at a large New York law firm. By the standards of the upwardly mobile set in Manhattan, I should be content. But something keeps gnawing at my conscience, and I am left wondering whether I made a mistake by not sharing in my country's military service.

My generation's parents lived in the age of Vietnam, when respect for the military reached its nadir. Viewing American foreign policy as incorrigibly corrupt, they mainly had disdain toward those in the armed forces. In contrast, we grew up watching medical students rescued by soldiers kissing the ground upon reaching American soil, and seeing jubilant Kuwaitis thanking American fighters for liberating them. And despite the politically correct prattling of our professors, most of us saw America as a force for good in the world. (Radical chic loses its cachet when you see Chinese tanks crushing students.)

So while most of us grew up with respect for men and women in uniform, many of us Gen-Xers at the same time arrogantly treated military service as something almost beneath us. It was perfectly fine for a poor or working-class kid who lacked opportunities to enlist in the military, but it wasn't meant for us. We were more interested about going to a good school, getting a well-paying job, and aspiring to be the next Master of the Universe. Too many of us chose dot-com over CentCom.

It wasn't always like this. Only a couple of generations ago, it was not uncommon for someone from a privileged background to have served in the military for a few years, if not ...