Glossary of Korean War Terms #1: Military Alphabet

From Leatherneck: Magazine of the Marines

< WWII WWII/Korea Vietnam Present
AFFIRM - ABLE - ALPHA
BAKER - BAKER - BRAVO
CAST - CHARLIE - CHARLIE
DOG - DOG - DELTA
EASY - EASY - ECHO
FOX - FOX - FOXTROT
GEORGE - GEORGE - GOLF
HYPO - HOW - HOTEL
INT - ITEM - INDIA
JIG - JIG - JULIET
KING - KING - KILO
LOVE - LOVE - LIMA
MIKE - MIKE - MIKE
NEGAT - NAN - NOVEMBER
OPTION - OBOE - OSCAR
PREP - PETER - PAPA
QUEEN - QUEEN - QUEBEC
ROGER - ROGER - ROMEO
SAD - SUGAR - SIERRA
TARE - TARE - TANGO
UNIT - UNCLE - UNIFORM
VICTOR - VICTOR - VICTOR
WILLIAM - WILLIAM - WHISKEY
X-RAY - X-RAY - X-RAY
YOKE - YOKE - YANKEE
ZEBRA - ZEBRA - ZULU

Why the changes?

From Wikipedia
The U.S. adopted the Joint Army/Navy Phonetic Alphabet from 1941 to standardize systems amongst all branches of its armed forces. The U.S. alphabet became known as Able Baker after the words for A and B. The United Kingdom adapted its RAF alphabet in 1943 to be almost identical to the American Joint-Army-Navy (JAN) one.

After World War II, with many aircraft and ground personnel drawn from the allied armed forces, "Able Baker" continued to be used in civil aviation. But many sounds were unique to English, so an alternative "Ana Brazil" alphabet was used in Latin America. But the International Air Transport Association (IATA), recognizing the need for a single universal alphabet, presented a draft alphabet to the ICAO in 1947 that had sounds common to English, French, and Spanish. After further study and modification by each approving body, the revised alphabet was implemented on 1 November 1951 in civil aviation (but it may not have been adopted by any military):

Alfa Bravo Coca Delta Echo Foxtrot Golf Hotel India Juliett Kilo Lima Metro Nectar Oscar Papa Quebec Romeo Sierra Tango Union Victor Whisky Extra Yankee Zulu

Immediately, problems were found with this list. Some users felt that they were so severe that they reverted to the old "Able Baker" alphabet. To identify the deficiencies of the new alphabet, testing was conducted among speakers from 31 nations, principally by the governments of the United Kingdom and the United States.

Confusion among words like Delta, Nectar, Victor, and Extra, or the unintelligibility of other words under poor receiving conditions were the main problems. After much study, only the five words representing the letters C, M, N, U, and X were replaced. The final version given in the table above was implemented by the ICAO on 1 March 1956, and was adopted before 1959 by the ITU, because it appears in the 1959 Radio Regulations as an established phonetic alphabet. Because the ITU governs all international radio communications, it was also adopted by all radio operators, whether military, civilian, or amateur (ARRL). It was finally adopted by the IMO in 1965. In 1947 the ITU adopted the compound number words (Nadazero Unaone, etc.), later adopted by the IMO in 1965