Biden's son
prepares for deployment to Iraq next year

The son of Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden is preparing for deployment to Iraq. The candidate is a U.S. senator and critic of U.S. policy in Iraq.

Capt. Beau Biden, a judge advocate general in the Delaware National Guard and the state's attorney general, is part of the 261st Signal Brigade that has been told to prepare for duty in Iraq in 2008. They have not been given a date of deployment.

''I don't want him going,'' Joe Biden said during his campaigning Wednesday, according to a report on Radio Iowa. ''But I tell you what, I don't want my grandson or my granddaughters going back in 15 years, and so how we leave makes a big difference.''

Biden criticized Democratic rivals such as senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama, who have voted against Iraq funding bills to try to pressure President George W. Bush to end the war.

''There's no political point worth my son's life,'' Biden said, according to Radio Iowa. ''There's no political point worth anybody's life out there. None.''

Lt. Col. Len Gratteri, spokesman for the Delaware National Guard, said Beau Biden is not being treated differently because of his office or because his father is running to be president, which would make him the military's commander in chief.

''He's a deployable asset just like any other soldier in that unit,'' Gratteri said.

Two other presidential candidates, Republicans John McCain and Duncan Hunter, have sons who have been in military units deployed to Iraq. (AP)