When Nick first meets Gatsby (in Chapter 3), the first thing they talk about is that they were both in the War. Apparently they had even seen each other, briefly, in the War, for Gatsby finds Nick's face familiar. "We talked for a moment about some wet, gray little villages in France." This is before Nick even knows who Gatsby is.
In Chapter 4, Gatsby takes Nick for a ride in his car, and says that he is going to tell Nick "God's truth" about his life. He then launches into a history of his wealthy family, his education at Oxford, his high life in Europe, and his heroics in the War, that is so full of cliches that Nick can barely keep from laughing. At this point Nick is sure that Gatsby is lying. Gatsby finishes by telling Nick, "every Allied government gave me a decoration [a medal] -- even Montenegro."
At this point, Gatsby reaches into his pocket and produces the medal given to him by Montenegro, which to Nick's astonishment, looks real and has Gatsby's name on it. He then pulls out a picture, also apparently authentic, of himself at Oxford. So Nick decides, with disbelief, that Gatsby must have been telling the truth after all.
Finally, in Chapter 8, after Tom has exposed Gatsby as a fake, Gatsby tells Nick the true story of his life. He did not grow up wealthy, he attended Oxford only for a few months after the war, and he had no money when he and Daisy first met. But he did go to the War. In fact, that was what separated Gatsby and Daisy for the first time, five years ago. Now Nick does not doubt Gatsby's story, but, in his narrative, says simply, "He did extraordinarily well in the war."
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