SNAFU is an acronym that is widely used to stand for the sarcastic expression Situation normal: all fucked up. It is a well-known example of military acronym slang. It is sometimes censored to "all fouled up" or similar. It means that the situation is bad, but that this is a normal state of affairs. The acronym is believed to have originated in the United States Marine Corps during World War II.
A soldier is a person who is a member of an army. A soldier can be a conscripted or volunteer enlisted person, a non-commissioned officer, a warrant officer, or an officer.
The G.I. Bill, formally the Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, was a law that provided a range of benefits for some of the returning World War II veterans. The original G.I. Bill expired in 1956, but the term "G.I. Bill" is still used to refer to programs created to assist American military veterans.
Military slang is an array of colloquial terminology used commonly by military personnel, including slang which is unique to or originates with the armed forces. In English-speaking countries, it often takes the form of abbreviations/acronyms or derivations of the NATO Phonetic Alphabet, or otherwise incorporates aspects of formal military terms and concepts. Military slang is often used to reinforce or reflect interservice rivalries.
Gook is a derogatory term for people of East and Southeast Asian descent. Its origin is unclear, but it may have originated among U.S. Marines during the Philippine–American War (1899–1913). Historically, U.S. military personnel used the word “to refer to any dark-skinned foreigner, especially a non-European or non-American.” The earliest published example is dated 1920 and notes that U.S. Marines then in Haiti used the term to refer to Haitians. It was widely used in Asia in both the Korean and Vietnamese Wars.
Desertion is the abandonment of a military duty or post without permission and is done with the intention of not returning. This contrasts with unauthorized absence (UA) or absence without leave, which are temporary forms of absence.
This is a list of words, terms, concepts, and slogans that have been or are used by the German military. Ranks and translations of nicknames for vehicles are included. Also included are some general terms from the German language found frequently in military jargon. Some terms are from the general German cultural background, others are given to show a change that was made before or after the Nazi era. Some factories that were the primary producers of military equipment, especially tanks, are also given.
Irregular military is any non-standard military component that is distinct from a country's national armed forces. Being defined by exclusion, there is significant variance in what comes under the term. It can refer to the type of military organization, or to the type of tactics used. An irregular military organization is one which is not part of the regular army organization. Without standard military unit organization, various more general names are often used; such organizations may be called a troop, group, unit, column, band, or force. Irregulars are soldiers or warriors that are members of these organizations, or are members of special military units that employ irregular military tactics. This also applies to irregular infantry and irregular cavalry units.
Doughboy was a popular nickname for the American infantryman during World War I. Though the origins of the term are not certain, the nickname was still in use as of the early 1940s. Examples include the 1942 song "Johnny Doughboy Found a Rose in Ireland", recorded by Dennis Day, Kenny Baker, and Kay Kyser, among others, the 1942 musical film Johnny Doughboy, and the character "Johnny Doughboy" in Military Comics. It was gradually replaced during World War II by "G.I."
Military parlance is the vernacular used within the military and embraces all aspects of service life; it can be described as both a "code" and a "classification" of something. Like many close and closed communities, the language used can often be full of jargon and not readily intelligible to outsiders—sometimes this is for military operational or security reasons; other times it is because of the natural evolution of the day-to-day language used in the various units.
Ethnic minorities in the U.S. Armed Forces during World War II comprised about 13% of all military service members. All US citizens were equally subject to the draft, and all service members were subject to the same rate of pay. The 16 million men and women in the services included 1 million African Americans, along with 33,000+ Japanese-Americans, 20,000+ Chinese Americans, 24,674 American Indians, and some 16,000 Filipino-Americans. According to House concurrent resolution 253, 400,000 to 500,000 Hispanic Americans served. They were released from military service in 1945-46 on equal terms, and were eligible for the G.I. Bill and other veterans' benefits on a basis of equality. Many veterans, having learned organizational skills, and become more alert to the nationwide situation of their group, became active in civil rights activities after the war.
Pogue is American pejorative military slang for being Posted on Garrison, which at the time were the Infantry.
The abbreviation or acronym RITA stands for "Resistance Inside the Army", "Resister Inside the Army", or "Resist! Inside the Army".
The King's shilling, sometimes called the Queen's shilling when the Sovereign is female, is a historical slang term referring to the earnest payment of one shilling given to recruits to the armed forces of the United Kingdom in the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries, although the practice dates back to the end of the English Civil War. To "take the King's shilling" was to agree to serve as a sailor or soldier in the Royal Navy or the British Army. It is closely related to the act of impressment. The practice officially stopped in 1879, although the term is still used informally and there are some cases of it being used still in the early 20th century, albeit largely symbolically.
R&R, military slang for rest and recuperation, is an abbreviation used for the free time of a soldier or international UN staff serving in unaccompanied duty stations. The term is used by a number of militaries such as the United States Armed Forces and British Armed Forces. In the UK, the term applies to a type of leave granted to personnel during an overseas deployment which allows them to return home to the UK to visit their family.
Military humor is humor based on stereotypes of military life. Military humor portrays a wide range of characters and situations in the armed forces. It comes in a wide array of cultures and tastes, making use of burlesque, cartoons, comic strips, double entendre, exaggeration, jokes, parody, gallows humor, pranks, ridicule and sarcasm.
Digger slang, also known as ANZAC slang or Australian military slang, is Australian English slang as employed by the various Australian armed forces throughout the 20th and 21st centuries. There have been four major sources of the slang: the First World War, the Second World War, the Korean War and the Vietnam War. The name Digger slang derives from the cultural stereotype of the Digger in the First World War. Graham Seal AM, Professor of Folklore at Curtin University of Technology, calls the slang Diggerese. It is a combination of an occupational jargon and an in-group argot.
G.I. Joe is a line of military-themed action figures produced by Hasbro.
GI coffeehouses were coffeehouses set up as part of the anti-war movement during the Vietnam War era as a method of fostering antiwar and anti-military sentiment within the U.S. military. They were mainly organized by civilian antiwar activists, though many GIs participated in establishing them as well. They were created in numerous cities and towns near U.S. military bases throughout the U.S as well as Germany and Japan. Due to the normal high turnover rate of GIs at military bases plus the military's response which often involved transfer, discharge and demotion, not to mention the hostility of the pro-military towns where many coffeehouses were located, most of them were short-lived, but a few survived for several years and "contributed to some of the GI movement's most significant actions". The first GI coffeehouse of the Vietnam era was set up in January 1968 and the last closed in 1974.
