Saturday - November 26, 2005

Category Image It's not Real until it has an Acronym


The army loves acronyms. I've nothing against acronyms when necessary, but not when they replace perfectly acceptable, understandable, and common words. Marines use acronyms, but not with the same zealotry that the army does. Being the subordinate service we are obliged to use army acronyms, but I for one am not happy about it.

The army's new uniform? ACU. The old uniform? BDU. The Marine's new uniform? Utilities. Just like before. Sure, if necessary, we'll use the word "MARPAT" if it's necessary to distinguish it from the old tri-color uniform, but we normally use the English word instead. The army always says BDU, and now I'm sure they'll say ACU.

But there's one crazy family of acronyms that drives me nuts.

Any normal person would say "bomb." But the army has its maniacal, bureaucratic drive to make things sound more official. If we just said "bomb" then it wouldn't fit on their spread sheets properly and wouldn't look adequately scientific in their power point presentations, so they call bombs "improvised explosive devices." The IED.

What a stupid acronym.

But that's not the worst of it. Not satisfied with that acronym, they have to expand on it.

Got a car bomb? That a VBIED, or "vehicle borne improvised explosive device."

Got a car bomb driven by a suicidal maniac planning to blow himself up? That's an SVBIED.

Got a bomb mounted on an ass? That's a DBIED, or "donkey borne improvised explosive device." I kid you not. We had a couple of those.

And then there are "improvised explosive device countermeasures equipment." Here, IED is treated as a word in forming the new acronym, ICE. This caused no end of confusion when planning logistics. In Iraqi heat, bringing refrigerators and ice boxes, and ice makers is critical on operations. So the questions, "do you have an ICE machine?" or "do you have an ICE box?" was sure to elicit an incorrect response.

The variations are numerous. Too numerous. And all unnecessary.

This is what happens in an overly bureaucratic organization.

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