A deployment is a helluva test to see if a marriage has legs. I saw that when I served at Naval Air Station Brunswick from ‘76 to ‘78 (since decommissioned). A guy would ship in for a two-year tour with a patrol squadron. He and a local gal would meet, fall in love, get married. Then he accompanies the squadron on a six-month deployment to Lajes, Rota or Sigonella. As for her, one moment she’s swept up with being newly-married. Suddenly he’s gone, and it almost feels like he was never there. NAS Keflavik was even tougher on young marriages. That was a 12-to-18 month unaccompanied tour (I was there for 18), with maybe one opportunity to take leave and go home to visit the missus.