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During the chaotic 2000 election, thousands of troops overseas voted for president, only to have their ballots rejected. Others did not receive ballots at all. And some found the entire process confusing.
Four years later - with more than 160,000 troops fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan - Democrats and Republicans alike worry that the same thing will happen. They say reforms enacted by Congress after 2000 have not fixed the problems.
"I just pray for our country. We have to allow the military vote to be counted," said Joan Hills, director of Republicans Abroad, which helps U.S. citizens vote from overseas. Her organization's Web site has received 1,700 hits a day in the past two weeks from worried military personnel who did not receive their ballots.
Hills and other election watchers say that failing to count military ballots in this election is even more unforgivable than in 2000 because the votes now represent Americans risking their lives in battle.
"Not allowing military members to vote during wartime would be devastating," said Duke University political science professor Peter Feaver. "They're not sitting in comfortable offices in Germany anymore. Now they're under mortar attack in Iraq."
In 2000, Florida officials disqualified 1,527 military votes because they lacked postmarks. George W. Bush won Florida - and the presidency - by 537 votes.
The military traditionally votes Republican. In one recent informal survey of the armed forces and their family members, 72 percent of respondents said they favored Bush over Democrat John Kerry.
Many of the problems that marred the military vote in 2000 are cropping up again.
More than a dozen states - including those too close to call - missed the recommended deadline to mail ballots overseas. One reason: arguments over whether independent candidate Ralph Nader should be listed on ballots.
More confusing are conflicting state rules governing how to count an overseas vote.
Basically, military ballots must get to the service member's local election official in the United States before a certain deadline. The cutoff dates vary. Some states also require a notary or witness to sign the ballot.
"There will be thousands of military votes that don't get counted this time," said Samuel Wright, director of the Military Voting Rights Project of the National Defense Committee.
Gen. Richard Cody, the Army's vice chief of staff, said Friday that military officials had tried to fix voting problems from 2000, and he downplayed the idea of a repeat this year.
"We worked extremely hard on the absentee ballot program and my hope is every soldier who wanted the opportunity to vote in the election was afforded that opportunity," Cody said at 101st Airborne Division headquarters in Fort Campbell, Ky.
Nearly 30 percent of registered military voters did not get a ballot in 2000, or got it too late. This year, Wright estimates between 20 percent and 40 percent of service members will not have their vote counted because of slow mail and differing state rules.
Because of GOP complaints about service members not receiving their ballots, Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell agreed Friday to extend the state's deadline for counting overseas ballots by eight days, to Nov. 10.
Since the Florida debacle, the Pentagon has announced steps designed to make every military vote count. Several have failed.
After spending $22-million, the Defense Department abandoned an Internet-based voting system after citing security concerns - leaving regular mail as the main way to vote from abroad.
In addition, a Defense Department program that helps Americans vote from overseas blocked access to its Web site for fear of hackers, locking out would-be voters. The site did not reopen until late September, although the department recommends allowing at least 45 days for requesting, receiving and mailing ballots.