AAA—antiaircraft artillery
AB—air base
ABCCC—airborne battlefield command and control center (EC-130E)
AC—alternating current (electrical power with alternating polarity)
ACC—Air Combat Command
ADI—attitude direction indicator
ADVON—advanced echelon
AEF—Air Expeditionary Force
AEW—Air Expeditionary Wing
AFAC—airborne forward air controller, aka FAC(A)
AFSOUTH—Allied Forces Southern Europe; NATO’s regional headquarters at Naples, Italy
AGL—above ground level
AGM—air-to-ground missile
AIM—air intercept missile
AI—air interdiction
AIRCENT—Allied Air Forces Central Europe (NATO)
AIRSOUTH—Allied Air Forces Southern Europe (NATO)
AMRAAM—advanced medium range air-to-air missile
AO—area of operations
AOR—area of responsibility
APC—armored personnel carrier
APU—auxiliary power unit arty artillery pieces
ASC—air strike control
ATACMS—air tactical missile systems
ATO—air tasking order
AWACS—airborne warning and control system (E-3)
BAI—battlefield air interdiction
bandit—an enemy aircraft
BDA—battle damage assessment
BE—basic encyclopedia number used to catalog targets
bingo—(1) brevity term used by tactical air forces to indicate a fuel level that requires termination of the mission and recovery to a tanker or home station; (2) brevity term used by special operations SAR helicopter forces to indicate that the door gunner is abeam the survivor
bino—gyro-stabilized binoculars; 12 power and 15 power
bomblet—a CBU submunition
bootleg—unscheduled (e.g., a bootlegged tanker is an unscheduled air-to-air refueling)
BRAA—tactical control format providing target bearing, range, altitude, and aspect, relative to a friendly aircraft
break—an aggressive, abrupt maneuver to defeat SAM, AAA, or air-to-air threats
BSD—battle staff directives
C3CM—command, control, and communications countermeasures
CAIFF—combined air interdiction of fielded forces
CANN—temporarily removing parts from an aircraft (cannibalization) so others can fly
CAP—combat air patrol
CAS—close air support
CAVOK—ceiling and visibility OK
CBU—cluster bomb unit
CEM—combined effects munition (CBU-87)
CFACC—combined forces air component commander
COAC—combined air operations center
Compass Call—an aircraft configured to perform tactical C3CM (EC-130H)
CP—control point
CSAR—combat search and rescue
DC—direct current (electrical power with constant polarity)
DCA—defensive counterair
DEAD—destruction of enemy air defenses
dirtball—dirt road
doolie—first year cadet at the AF Academy
EABS—expeditionary air base squadron
ECM—electronic countermeasures
EFS—expeditionary fighter squadron
ELS—expeditionary logistic squadron
EO—electro-optical
EOG—expeditionary operations group
ESS—expeditionary support squadron
EUCOM—US European Command
EW—electronic warfare
FAC—forward air controller
fence—the demarcation line between friendly and enemy territory
FG—fighter group
FL—flight level; thousands of feet when using a standard altimeter setting of 29.92 (FL 300 is 30,000 MSL with 29.92 set)
FLEX—force level execution targeting cell (located within the CAOC)
FM—type of radio that uses frequency modulation; used by A-10 pilots primarily for interformation communication
FOV—field of view
fox mike—military phonetic alphabet expression for FM and commonly used to refer to the FM radio
frag—(1) the “fragmented order” which tasked unit aircraft, weapons, targets, and TOTs; (2) a lethal piece of warhead case that is explosively projected from the point of detonation to its impact point
FS—fighter squadron
FW—fighter wing
GAU-8—A-10’s internal 30 mm cannon (Avenger)
GPS—Global Positioning System
Guard—a common emergency frequency that all pilots monitor
hard deck—the lowest altitude for operations allowed by the ROE
hardball—paved road
HARM—high-speed antiradiation missile (AGM-88)
heads-down—when the pilot concentrates on things inside the aircraft or looking outside through the binoculars, and is unable to clear the airspace for threats or other aircraft
hitting the tanker—aircrew jargon for rejoining on, connecting to, and taking fuel from a tanker
Hog—one of several A-10 nicknames; also Warthog and Hawg
HUD—head-up-display
IADS—integrated air defense system
ICAOC—interim combined air operations center (ICAOC-5 was located at Vicenza, Italy, and often referred to as the CAOC)
ID—to identify
IFF—identification, friend or foe; a system that uses a transponder response to an interrogating radar that indicates the host aircraft to be a friend (if code is set correctly) or foe (if not set correctly)
IIR—imaging infrared
INS—inertial navigation system
IP—initial point
IR—infrared
ISOPREP—isolated personnel report, which documents unique information on an aircrew to allow for positive ID during a SAR
ISR—intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance
JAOC—joint air operations center
JSTARS—joint surveillance, target attack radar system (E-8)
KEZ—Kosovo engagement zone, which included Kosovo and southeast Serbia
KLA—Kosovo Liberation Army (English) or Ushtria Clirimtare e Kosoves ([UCK] Albanian)
LANTRIN—low-altitude navigation and targeting infrared for night
LASTE—low altitude safety and target enhancement system used in the A-10
lead—the term for leader, as in two-ship flight lead
LGB—laser-guided bomb
LOC—lines of communication
MANPADS—man portable air defense systems, which include heat-seeking, shoulder-fired missiles
Maverick—AGM-65D is a large antiarmor imaginginfrared (IIR) guided missile with a 125 lb shaped charge warhead
MC—mission commander
MET—mission essential task list, which is a commander’s list of priority tasks, which help define their war-fighting requirements
MPC—mission planning cell
MR—mission ready, capable of flying assigned combat missions
MRE—meals ready to eat
MSL—altitude above mean sea level
MUP—Serb Interior Ministry police
NAEW—NATO airborne early warning aircraft, which used the call sign “Magic”
NATO—North Atlantic Treaty Organization
NBA—brevity term for the half of Kosovo east of 22 degrees east longitude
NCA—national command authorities, generally the president or secretary of defense
NFL—brevity term for the half of Kosovo west of 22 degrees east longitude
NM—nautical miles
NVG—night vision goggles
OAF—Operation Allied Force
OPCON—operational control
ORI—operational readiness inspection
OSC—on-scene commander for SAR operations outlaw brevity term for an aircraft that meets the enemy point of origin criteria
Pave Penny—a laser-spot recognition system that displays in the A-10 cockpit where a laser, from an external source, is designating
PERSCO—Personnel Accountability Team
pipper—center point of a gun/bomb sight
PLS—Personnel Locator System is the standard combat search-and-rescue system for the US military and NATO
POL—petroleum, oil, and lubricants
POW—prisoner of war
RAF—Royal Air Force
revets—brevity term for revetments
ROE—rule(s) of engagement
RTB—return to base
RTU—replacement training unit
RWR—radar warning receiver
SACEUR—supreme allied commander Europe
SAM—surface-to-air missile
SAN—naval SAM system
Sandy—call sign for fighters that control and support SAR operations
SAR—search and rescue
SEAD—suppression of enemy air defenses
secondary—additional explosion(s) caused by an initial explosion
shack—direct hit on a target
SHAPE—Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe
sky hooked—conserve fuel by optimizing speed and altitude for maximum range
SOS—Special Operations Squadron
spades—brevity term indicates an aircraft is not squawking the right IFF transponder code
SPINS—special instructions
splash—weapons impact and explosion
Stan/Eval—standardization and evaluation
steer-point—preplanned geographical reference points (e.g., steer-point alpha)
stepped—to depart the squadron for the aircraft at the prebriefed “step time,” a critical milestone in the sequence of getting a flight airborne on time
stepped-on—a simultaneous transmissions between two people, with neither hearing the other’s transmission strikers attack aircraft who employ weapons under the control of an AFAC
talk-on—a FAC’s description of the target and target area to assist an attacking aircraft to positively identify the target
taskings—missions fragged on the ATO
top three—designated senior squadron leadership, which includes the commander, ops officer, and another experienced person
triple-A—antiaircraft artillery
UAV—unmanned aerial vehicle (e.g., Predator, Laser Predator, and Hunter)
UCK—Ushtria Clirimtare E Kosoves (Albanian) and Kosovo Liberation Army ([KLA] English)
UHF—radio transmitting on ultra high frequencies and commonly referred to as “uniform”
UK—United Kingdom
UN—United Nations
undercast—a deck of clouds whose tops are below an aircraft’s altitude
unsecure—nonencrypted radio
USAFE—United States Air Forces in Europe
UTM—Universal Transverse Mercator, a map grid system
VHF-AM—radio transmitting over very high frequencies using amplitude modulation and commonly referred to as “victor”
VID—visual identification
vis—brevity term for visibility
VJ—Serb army
VMEZ—Serb army (VJ) and Serb Interior Ministry police (MUP) engagement zone
vul—scheduled periods of time when the KEZ was vulnerable to AFACs looking for and striking targets
VVI—vertical velocity indicator
Willy Pete—slang phonetic expression for 2.75-inch white-phosphorous rockets
WP—white phosphorous
Zulu—the time at the prime meridian that is used for military planning and is also known as Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) and Greenwich mean time (GMT)