Word.ws English Dictionary

short-timer

short-timer noun: a soldier during the Vietnam War who had less than two months to serve.

Noun

short-timer (plural short-timers)

  1. (US, historical, slang) A soldier during the Vietnam War who had less than two months to serve.
    • Almost every Marine in Viet Nam carries a short-timer’s calendar of his tour of duty—the usual 365 days—plus a bonus of 20 days for being a Marine.1979, Gustav Hasford, The Short-Timers, New York: Bantam Books, published 1980, →ISBN, page 45
  2. A person who would not be required to do a difficult or dangerous task.
  3. (colloquial) An employee who has given notice of their intent to leave.
  4. (colloquial) The customer of a prostitute.

Forms of short-timer

pluralshort-timers

Questions about short-timer

What does short-timer mean?
Short-timer means a soldier during the Vietnam War who had less than two months to serve.
What part of speech is short-timer?
Short-timer is a noun.
What is the plural of short-timer?
The plural of short-timer is short-timers.

Words near short-timer in the dictionary

  1. short-termist
  2. short-termists
  3. short-termness
  4. short-time
  5. short-timed
  6. short-timer
  7. short-timers
  8. short-times
  9. short-timing
  10. short-toed eagle
  11. short-toed eagles

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: short-timer (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Cite this entry: “short-timer.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/short-timer. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.