VISUAL ACTIVITYCounting the Days in Vietnam Unlike soldiers in previous wars, most soliders in Vietnam served tours of duty lasting just one year. The soldier who carried this calendar expressed a common obsession with time “in country.” Soldiers considered themselves “short” when they had fewer than 100 days left. Bobby McMaster was thinking either of his wife or of the woman he would marry when, and if, he returned home.READING THE IMAGE: What does the condition of this calendar suggest about how McMaster spent his time in Vietnam? What concerns about the woman he left behind are expressed in the quotation from the Bible?CONNECTIONS: Besides the length of tours of duty, what other differences existed in the experiences of the soldiers of World War II and those of the Vietnam War?
Nathan Benn/Corbis.