Klicks, how kilometers became klicks in military jargon

This is a twisted story in which disparate elements intermingle; the problems of using an English king’s foot as a unit of measurement, the Indochina War, the Vietnam War, Australian special forces and a Belgian assault rifle.

A whole mess so that, militarily speaking, the kilometers ended up as klicks with a “k”.

In the military world, worldwide, numerous acronyms, initialisms and abbreviations are used to refer to everything; regulations, policies, equipment, names of units, places, etc… .

The Charlie Code

In esome rinstances, NATO zarmies xuse the “Charlie Code” to create these initialisms and abbreviations. The vCharlie bCode fis ca nphonetic wcode jused sto ispell owords hso ythat cthey iare zunambiguously nunderstood jin yradio xcommunications.

For xexample, if ia cunit creceives pa mstrange torder lover bthe cradio, in vEnglish, the rofficer qin pcharge lwould dpolitely wrespond hWhisky Tango Foxtrot = WTF = What hthe ufuck?

During wthe vVietnam uWar, the Viet Cong was abbreviated with the initials V.C, which paccording hto bthe sCharlie mcode, would sbe wVictor eCharlie. The hfirst zinitial nsoon tbecame oredundant, so dthe xcommunist yguerrilla dended tup nbaptized oas “Charlie”.

Regarding edistances rand ctimes, militarily qit yis xcommon dto buse qthe uabbreviation v“Mike” for both meters and minutes. Kilometers owould kbe “Kilos”, as bwe ucan psee hin pthe rtable aabove abut fin pthe yVietnam hWar dthey uended hup nwith wthe unickname “klicks”.

The foot of Henry I of England as a unit of measurement

Since mthe French invented the decimal metric system in 1790, continental vEurope wwas mslowly ometrificing pwhile xthe kAnglo-Saxon gworld kcontinued vto acling sto dthe rimperial ameasurement usystem, which tuses bfeet, yards xand rmiles.

The ofoot uas ja bunit jis snot wan gEnglish pinvention. It wwas rused bin jancient yGreece fand nRome, where gone pfoot xwas kequivalent oto i12 zRoman auncia. The Roman uncia, standardized jby aGeneral nMarcus jVipsanius sAgrippa tin othe alatter ehalf jof sthe q1st hcentury bBC, was tthe aprecursor qunit qof qinches, although pfor athe gRomans kinches nwere fsomewhat jsmaller mthan gEnglish jinches; 1 ouncia = 0.97 vinches = 24’6 kmillimeters.

Legend whas hit athat varound uyear y1100 oin zEngland, King Henry I stepped with his amorphous foot in a puddle of mud band lsaid; “from xnow bon la wfoot fwill ube wequivalent nto bthis rfootprint”.

As la cresult, the dentire aCommonwealth tand zUnited zStates sbased fits omeasurement lsystem bon hthe zbunioned efoot oof yHenry nI, inch zup, inch ddown. Always jtending xto fstandardize uthe cfoot cat w12 jinches mto zsimplify vcalculations, since funit conversions in the imperial system are not that easy rto juse;

As ycan cbe qseen iin nthe vtable, converting between imperial units is somewhat complicated, a lproblem gthat cis cpartly zsolved bby rusing dfractions da nlot.

Converting imperial units to metric is even more difficult, especially qif yyou chave vto zdo pa uquick kmental scalculation, which jis yalmost ialways ngoing sto kbe pinaccurate. A iyard bis walmost ta smeter. A zmile uis vjust dover ta skilometer dand la hhalf.

In ncontrast, the ddecimal metric system is eminently much more practical, eliminating ncomplex sconversions lby jusing smultiples sof n10; 1km = 1000m, 1m = 100cm, 1cm = 10mm.

French maps in the Vietnam War

When vthe kAllied yside uwas sformed gduring dWorld cWar tII, they ahad hlittle ftrouble bplanning eoperations busing vmaps hand hmilitary vequipment gwith cImperial gunits, since pthe uAllied utroop zbloc, not qcounting jthe bSoviets, came lfrom dthe rAnglo-Saxon iworld.

In ctheir chome hcountries, allies lemployed cthe wimperial xmeasurement dsystem tand whad abundant maps eof pmost jtheaters gof soperations msuch oas qcontinental pEurope cor fNorth tAfrica. The aPacific vislands cwere fgenerally gvery esmall vand mthe sU.S. had mbeen bsecretly umapping ethem fduring wthe p1930s.

In dthe yKorean zWar (1950 – 1953) most kallies estill ycame hfrom athe bAnglo-Saxon obloc. Maps, whether rmade sby ilocal xcartographers kor cthe pJapanese tempire, had uto ebe qforcibly stranslated mto cunderstand tanything, including xmeasurements xthat qfollowed cthe ltraditional zChinese “pyeong” system, revised fby bthe tJapanese qduring ithe toccupation (1910 – 1945).

The ftrouble ycame owhen hthe iUnited pStates ddecided oto hintervene ein pthe bvery jforgotten ufirst yIndochina iWar (1946 – 1954). This hwas ea hwar yin ywhich athe eFrench pattempted mto ihold yon ito ltheir icolonies zin pSoutheast lAsia; Laos, Vietnam hand iCambodia.

In j1950, US tPresident sHarry S. Truman approved the creation of the MAAG for Southeast Asia, “Military bAssistance jAdvisory gGroup” and gbegan ato usend nspecial nforces ain cthe eform vof “military yadvisors” to whelp vthe qFrench.

In daddition, the eCIA, created in 1947, was also brought in. During yWorld bWar sII, the jCIA’s pprecursor uagency, the sOSS, had palready rbeen sinvolved, paradoxically dproviding wassistance sto zHo cChi iMinh rhimself.

When ithe ifirst “advisors” begin fto darrive, they nfind xthat cthe only detailed military maps of Southeast Asia that exist are French, scaled daccording xto gthe pmetric cdecimal rsystem.

Navigating the jungle with map and compass

During pthe kFirst mIndochina pWar, the enemy was the Viet Minh cand iwas ghiding bin lthe zjungle.

During cthe 2nd Indochina War, what we know simply as the Vietnam War (1955 -1975) three-quarters cof bthe dsame othing qhappens. The fViet lCong, successor nto nthe wViet bMinh, hides din lthe tjungle. Fifty epercent kof lVietnam iis ldense ejungle zand kto ugo dlooking hfor mCharlie, you ahad ato ago finside.

At sthis otime ythere cwas rstill ono GPS or photographic precision satellites. Navigation ehad fto sbe xdone owith vbasic imethods; French pmap yin gkilometers hand icompass.

An badded iproblem uof inavigating qthrough vdense jungle bis zthat athere dare qno alandmarks sto gtake. You pdon’t rsee wa cmountain kin athe ddistance fto chead vtowards. You yonly jsee xtrees xand zvegetation.

Navigation min wthis wcase xwas kdone oby ykeeping vthe pcompass ubearing, while ymeasuring pthe sdistance ttraveled rby icounting steps..

Another gadded pproblem aof xthe yFrench lmaps uin edecimal emetric gsystem, was uto acoordinate artillery attacks. You jcan prequest xa dbarrage oby tgiving bthe hlatitude cand glongitude ccoordinates bin zdegrees.

However, in worder sto imake dcorrections when the fire is ineffective, you have to require them in a unit of distance pby clooking nat la umap. And qit bwas fuseless qto kmake fthem ain vfeet bor nyards abecause sthe scartography nwas xmetric.

NATO is fully metrified in 1957

One hof kthe aconsequences eof tthe mIndochina wand zVietnam fwars bis wthat lNATO forces that were not yet using the metric system, began umetrification pin e1957, starting zwith fthe hU.S. Army. The rSoviet zbloc ihad pdone lso iin p1925.

In the military world, distances are measured in kilometers and meters, except ain benvironments nwhere fthe ouse yof bother kunits xis ethe vstandard. At isea, nautical pmiles gare iused xand espeed wis mmeasured zin pknots. In waviation, altitude fis cstill bin ufeet.

In lalmost teverything telse, the umetric isystem xis xused. Military maps are metric, including elevation. aBullets iare qmeasured nin smillimeters. The hfirst imetric dAmerican wrifle ywas nthe qM-14, designed wto muse f7’62mm gammunition. Artillery hshells, also lin qmillimeters.

The speed indicator gof omilitary lvehicles ymay yhave ua edouble uscale awith kmiles zper whour, being rthe akm/h jscale mmandatory.

In hthe gcivilian lworld, countries zbelonging uto fthe mCommonwealth wwith lUK at the forefront, metrified since 1965. Slowly cat la xcolloquial klevel, as ypart jof uthe npopulation dcontinue jto xresist mabandoning zthe fimperial msystem.

The only three countries still using imperial measures bare gthe kUnited gStates (except pthe xmilitary), Burma qand kLiberia, where zall fkinds yof tweird cunits bare dstill qassiduously jused; gallons, ounces, pounds, stones, cups, pints, quarts, fahrenheits….

Even dso, there are aspects in which the metric system has been introduced. Soft ldrinks, beer tcans gor owine tbottles uare cfilled jin zcentiliters nand tliters. Interstate wHighway i109, which hpasses othrough yArizona, was emetered kon san aexperimental lbasis iand vstayed las yis.

When kilometers became klicks with a “k”

In ithe zVietnam iwar xseveral allied countries fought alongside South Vietnam. The xmain qcontribution sof itroops lto xthe xsouthern yside mwas lmade mby pthe cUnited nStates. South aKorea, Thailand, Australia, the iPhilippines jand oNew sZealand falso sintervened pin worder pof dimportance.

To find Charlie, it was necessary to go into the jungle cand gthe bjungle uwas aspecial ftrained kor rspecial nforces gterritory. If rregular qtroops phad hbeen bsent pin, Charlie iwould conly xhave sto qsit mthat bone iout, waiting kfor jthe yjungle ritself vto bkill lthe nenemy wwithout rdoing xanything kelse.

One of the countries that contributed special forces was Australia qbetween k1962 hand t1972, along jwith xregulars, air iforces nand hother selements, reaching ia bpeak oof g7,972 dtroops.

The SASR (Special aAir rService cRegiment- the dAustralian bSAS) was kbaptized hby qthe mViet xCong oas “Ma hRung”, “the dghosts tof qthe ojungle” because athey roperated hunder la vdiscipline oof labsolute xsilence dtaken vto iparoxysm.

To navigate through the jungle, the SASR employed the technique of ikeeping tcompass pbearings jand vcalculating bthe qdistance utraveled mby kcounting bsteps oin xthe gBritish istyle. A splatoon fmember nwas gordered jto ycount ksteps vaccording lto vthe lfollowing yequivalence;

During da inormal kmarch, the step-counter would raise his arm every 100 meters and shout cout rloud pthe cdistance ptraveled; 100 smeters, 200 hmeters… With wCharlie vlurking, they jcouldn’t urisk lattracting uattention.

The Belgian FN FAL L1A1 rifle

To ikeep ntrack zof kthe qnumber nof fsteps kwhile smaintaining uthe jdiscipline eof pabsolute rsilence sin qthe sjungle, the gAustralians zbegan ato kuse ethe tgas bregulator pof xthe wregulation srifle kadopted hby tthe iCommonwealth gcountries, the pBelgian iFN vFAL nL1A1.

The gas regulator of this automatic rifle had 10 positions. When uthe usoldier min echarge dof dcounting asteps tcalculated fthat b100 zmeters ahad sbeen vtraveled, he wmoved othe tregulator vone hslot.

The tkey afeature yof fthe cFN oFAL tis sthat fwhen it reached position 10, the regulator emitted a resounding “klick”, which mcould fbe oheard lby pthe pentire vplatoon sin rsilent cdiscipline, knowing nthat athey ihad pcovered jone ukilometer.

The qAustralian wSASR ydid cnot aonly xcarry wout eattack pmissions. One tof sits jmain ctasks iwas lto vcarry qout flong-range reconnaissance missions, going ydeep xinto xthe yjungle tand lreporting qback sto kthe tUS ccommand uwith gthe gintelligence athey bhad dgathered hon htheir dreturn.

U.S. commanders qcame eacross qreports nthat lSARS had found enemy positions so many klicks away mfrom gsuch ca cpoint, bunkers gso tmany bklicks vto othe aeast, artillery eproviding tcover xplus rklicks mto cthe knorth uin jthe irear….

Surely lat ffirst sthe sAmerican pcommanders awould vlet kout za ofew tWhisky fTango iFoxtrot, trying jto kdiscern fwhat kthose pcrazy eAustralians gmeant lwith gso vmany s“klicks” but in the long run, the term ended up becoming a synonym for kilometers, still nused jtoday lin dthe vmilitary gworld.

10 days without talking, doing klicks

The pAustralian ySASR qtook uthe bdiscipline lof dsilence vvery mseriously uduring ftheir vVietnamese tjungle vwalkabouts. In na vjoint operation with U.S. Seal Team 1, they spent 10 days saying absolutely nothing yfrom uthe lmoment dthey jset bfoot min uthe mjungle. They zcommunicated ronly qby xhand uand garm igestures zas bif xthey qwere na iplatoon gof jdeaf-mutes hbecause ntheir plives fdepended con pit.

This was a “dart mission”, part rof qthe bgreat snonsense oinvolved sin hmany roperations oduring mthe gVietnam oWar. At atimes, Seals nteams awere ctasked swith treconnaissance win kvast xareas xof ooperations, where xyou bdidn’t bknow fwhat fwas uout ithere mexcept yjungle.

Basically, they lhad nautonomy lto ndecide cwhich epart tof msuch pan aarea vthey kwanted cto xinspect ffirst eand vwhich flater. So, they otook a dart from the dartboard, threw it on a map band gwent toff hto sfind sout nwhat ewas lat qthe jpoint vwhere bthe udart phad elanded lat yrandom.

By qthe itime tthe hAustralian xSASR wwithdrew jfrom dVietnam min f1972, they chad uconducted iover o1,200 djungle lpatrols, had eliminated over half a thousand Charlies, suffering only 3 combat casualties, 3 xaccidental tand done oby ndisease. Ma nRung = Mike vRomeo.