B-40: A shoulder-held rocket-propelled grenade launcher.
B-52: Boeing built, jet engine Bomber. Nicknamed the Stratofortress but often referred to as a BUFF (Big Ugly Fat Fucker). The B-52 is regarded by experts as the most successful military aircraft ever produced. It began entering service in the mid-1950s and by 1959 had replaced the awesome but obsolete B-36 as the backbone of Strategic Air Command's (SAC) heavy bomber force. Its primary mission was nuclear deterrence through retaliation. The B-52 was amazingly adaptable. Also, slang for can opener.
BA MOUI BA: Brand name of a Vietnamese beer. See Ba-Ma-Ba.
BA: Married woman; used as a title, like "Mrs."
BAC BAC: Bastardized Vietnamese for "to shoot".
BAC SI DE: Home-brewed rice whiskey
BAC SI: Vietnamese term for Medical Corpsman/Doctor; also used to refer to medic in the U.S. Army.
BAHT: Thai unit of currency.
BALLGAME: An operation or a contact.
BA-MA-BA: Term for "33" Vietnamese beer ("Tiger Piss"). More properly: BA-MOI-BA (Vietnamese for "33"). Ba Moi being 30 and Ba being three. Moi counts 10s. I.e., mot=1, hai=2, ba=3, bon=4, nam=5, sal=6, bai=7, tam=8, chin=9, moui=10, tram=100. E.g. hai moui tram dong = 2000 dong (piastres; money).
BANANA CLIP: Banana shaped magazine, standard on the AK-47 assault rifle.
BAND-AID: Radio call sign for a medic.
BANDOLIERS: Ammo belts for rifles and machine guns
BAR: Browning Automatic Rifle, .30 cal, heavy, shoulder fired weapon, used by U.S. troops during World War II and Korea. The M-14 sought to combine the firepower of the BAR with portablilty of the M-1. The M-60 machinegun replaced both the BAR and the Browning light machinegun.
BASE CAMP: A semi-permanent field headquarters and center for a given unit usually within that unit's tactical areas responsibility. A unit may operate in or away from its base camp. Base camps usually contain all or part of a given unit's support elements.
BASIC: Basic training.
BASKETBALL: An illumination-dropping aircraft mission, capable of lighting approximately a square mile of terrain.
BATTALION: A battalion is an organizational institution in the Army and Marine Corps. Commanded by a lieutenant colonel, an infantry battalion usually has around 900 people and an artillery battalion about 500 people. During the Vietnam War, American battalions were usually much smaller than that.
BATTERY: An artillery unit equivalent to a company. Six 105mm or 155mm howitzers or two 8-inch or 175mm self-propelled howitzers.
BATTLE SIGHT: Zeroing process of adjusting a weapon's sights and windage to an individual soldier so the weapon, when fired, will hit the object of aim.
BCD: Bad Conduct Discharge.
BDA: Bomb damage assessment.
BEANS AND DICKS: Nickname for C-rations of Beans and Hot Dogs.
BEANS AND MOTHERFUCKERS: Military C-ration of lima beans and ham.
BEATEN ZONE: Area where the majority of bullets will strike when a machine gun is laid-in to cover a part of a defensive perimeter or part of an ambush zone.
BEEHIVE ROUND: A direct-fire, explosive artillery shell which delivered thousands of small projectiles, "like nails with fins," instead of shrapnel. It incorporated steel darts (fleshettes), used as a primary base defense munition against ground attack.
BERM, BERM LINE: Hedgerow or foliated built-up area which divided rice paddies; also, a rise in the ground such as dikes or a dirt parapet around fortifications.
BIC (biet): Vietnamese term for "understand".
BIERE LaRUE: Tiger beer (1 liter).
BIG BOYS: Artillery; slang for tanks
BIG RED ONE: Nickname for the 1st Infantry Division, based on the red numeral "1" on the division shoulder patch. "If your gonna be one, be a Big Red One!!" Also known as the "Bloody One," "Bloody Red One," or "Big Dead One."
BIG SHOTGUN: A 106mm recoilless rifle using antipersonnel canister ammunition.
BINGO: Air Force term for the point in a flight in which there's only enough fuel remaining to return to base.
BINH XUYEN: The organized crime syndicate that controlled much of the Vietnamese underworld and Saigon police until deposed by Diem's forces in 1955.
BINJO MARU: Name given to the White River.
BIPOD: Two-legged, supportive stand on the front of many weapons.
BIRD DOG: Forward air controller, usually in a small, maneuverable single-engined prop O-1 Aircraft.
BIRD: Any aircraft, but usually refers to helicopters
BK AMPUTEE: Below-the-knee amputation of the leg.
BLADDER BAG: Collapsible canteen.
BLADDER: A heavy-duty, rubberized collapsible petroleum drum ranging from 2,000 to 50,000 gallons.
BLIVET: A heavy rubber bladder in which fuel was transported in an aircraft.
BLOOD TRAIL: A trail of blood left by a fleeing man who has been wounded
BLOOPER/BLOOKER: The M-79 grenade launcher. A 40-millimeter, shotgunlike weapon that shoots spin-armed "balls" or small grenades.
BLUE FEATURE: Any water feature. So called because of the color used to designate water on topographic maps.
BLUE LINE: A river on a map.
BLUELEG: Infantryman, aka "grunt".
BO DOI: A uniformed NVA soldier.
BOAT PEOPLE: Refugees fleeing Vietnam by boat after 1975.
BOATSWAIN: An enlisted rating, running from boatswain's striker (E-2) thru Master Chief and then into Warrant Officers. A Navy and Coast Guard rating for deck crew.
BOATSWAIN'S MATE 1st CLASS: Usually the "deck apes" and small box coxswains. The Aviation Boatswain's Mates were usually the guys who took care of towing the birds around the ramp area or flight decks and who made sure they were secured to the 'ground' when the weather went to pot.
BODY BAGS: Plastic bags used for retrieval of bodies on the battlefield.
BODY COUNT: The number of enemy killed, wounded, or captured during an operation. The term was used by Washington and Saigon as a means of measuring the progress of the war.
BOHICA: Short for "Bend Over, Here It Comes Again." Usually describing another undesirable assignment.
BOK-BOK: Fight/fighting.
BOO COO (Beaucoup): Vietnamese/French term for "many," or "lots of..."
BOOBY TRAP: An explosive charge hidden in a harmless object which explodes on contact.
BOOM BOOM: Vietnamese slang for sex with a prostitute.
BOONDOCKS, BOONIES, BRUSH, BUSH: Expressions for the jungle, or any remote area away from a base camp or city; sometimes used to refer to any area in Vietnam.
BOONDOGGLE: Any military operation that hasn't been completely thought out. An operation that is absurd or useless. See also Cluster Fuck.
BOONIE HAT: Soft hat worn by a boonierat in the boonies
BOONIERAT: A combat infantryman.
BOONIES: Infantry term for the field; jungles or swampy areas far from the comforts of civilization
BOOT: A military person just out of "boot camp", i.e. "Basic Training'.
BOQ: Bachelor officer's quarters; living quarters for officers.
BOU: Shortened nickname for the C-7A Caribou aircraft.
BOUNCING BETTY: Antipersonnel mine with two charges: the first propels the explosive charge upward, and the other is set to explode at about waist level.
BOW: Front of the ship or boat.
BOWL: Pipe used for smoking dope.
BRAVO: Military phonetic for the letter "B"
BREAK SQUELCH: To send a "click-hiss" signal on a radio by depressing the push-to-talk button without speaking, used by LLRPs and others when actually speaking into the microphone might reveal your position.
BRIGADE: The term "brigade" is a basic military organizational institution. During the Vietnam War, a division was organized into three brigades, with each brigade commanded by a colonel. A division consists of approximately 20,000 people. There were also separate infantry brigades functioning in the Vietnam War.
BRING SMOKE: To direct intense artillery fire or air force ordnance on an enemy position.
BRONCO: Twin-engine OV-10 Aircraft observation aircraft equipped with rockets and miniguns.
BRONZE STAR: U.S. military decoration awarded for heroic or meritorious service no involving aerial flights.
BROWN WATER NAVY: Term applied to the U.S. Navy units assigned to the inland boat patrols of the Mekong River delta.
BS: Bullshit, as in chewing the fat, telling tall tales, or telling lies.
BUCKLE: To fight. "Buckle for your dust" means to fight furiously.
BUFF: Slang for B-52 Bomber (esp. D model). Stands for "BIG UGLY FAT FUCKER".
BUMMER: Bad luck, a real drag.
BUNKER: Fortified place for protection during a mortar/rocket attack or to protect the command post, communications facility, etc., from this form of attack and from small arms fire. Usually consisted of PCP (Perforrated Steel Plate) and sandbags.
BUS TRANSFERS: Standard tongue-in-cheek expression. Use your metro bus transfers to change buses at a transfer point. Meant humorously, as troops did not have their "bus passes" with them at the time.
BUSH: Term for being in the jungle or out in the field.
BUSHMAASTERS: Any elite unit skilled in jungle operations.
BUSHMASTER: A breed of poisonous snake that could be encountered in the jungles of Vietnam.
BUST CAPS: Term for firing a rifle rapidly.
BUTTER BAR: 2nd Lieutenant, based on the insignia: a single gold bar.
BVR: Beyond Visual Range. (Air Force).
BX: Base Exchange. Used by the Air Force.
