Forum: Author Hangout

Acronym gobbledygook

PotomacBob 🚫

This paragraph, from a dead-tree book, verbatim, I think was supposed to be about the military response during the Cold War in the event of a thermonuclear attack:
Under the MAD theory, if, for instance, BMEWS and NORAD confirmed a USSR BOOB attack on CONUS, the NCA —either POTUS, SECDEF, or the AEAO aboard the ABNCP — would see a PINNACLE/OP-REP3/NUCFLASH alert and turn to the NMCC, FEMA's HPSF, the ANMCC, or NEACP to issue EAMs activating SIOP, move the nation to DEFCON 1, mobilize COG and COOP plans, and notify DOD and SAC to attack and launch ICBMs, ALCMs, and SLBMs, raining MIRVs down upon USSR DGZs preselected by NSTAP and JSTPS.

Replies: Freyrs_stories Dominions Son REP Michael Loucks Freyrs_stories JoeBobMack Grey Wolf BlacKnight Argon

Freyrs_stories 🚫

@PotomacBob

Well I easily recognise maybe 3/4 of those, but and it's a big but. I'm not American and am in the wrong age group for most of that to make sense. I would be very interested in the interpretations of others, both younger and older, and non-seppo ;)

Dominions Son 🚫

@PotomacBob

Several of those are neither acronyms nor initialisms, they are contractions.

DEFCON = DEFense CONdition
SECDEF = SECretary of DEFense
CONUS = CONtinental US or CONtiguous US (The 48 contiguous states which excludes Alaska and Hawaii).

REP 🚫
Updated:

@PotomacBob

Your post makes no sense.

It sounds like a post about plagiarism. The quoted (?) text appears to be nothing more than a series of acronyms defining what should happen if certain events take place. I have no idea of what the majority of those acronyms mean or what they are about.

Based on the replies to your post, it sounds as if no one else understands why you made the post.

Why did you make the post?

Replies: Pixy

Pixy 🚫

@REP

It makes perfect sense in it's posting. PB is alluding to the AS, and demonstrating that without a working knowledge of that employment area, it's going to be a headache for everyone else.

I have come across that way of writing many times, however it has only been in internal communication between military and scientific communities where there is a tendency to get as much information across as possible in the shortest amount of time possible. The eyes they are writing for, know what they are saying and if they don't, then they shouldn't be in the rank/research position they are. Seriously, read some research papers and they are full of things like 'loading V7's from the HTD34 into the GT15 to be spun in the KL500' etc etc..

When those researchers/military personnel retire and decide to write fiction using their knowledge, then old habits tend to come back. Unless there is an editor on hand to keep saying "Write so the Plebs can understand it...."

AS- Alphabet spaghetti

Replies: REP

REP 🚫

@Pixy

PB is alluding to the AS

I would disagree. All PB provided was a statement that he was quoting text from a book. He also said that he thought the paragraph was about a Cold War military response.

The rest of the post's text was the quoted text.

Replies: Pixy awnlee jawking

Pixy 🚫

@REP

I would disagree. All PB provided was a statement that he was quoting text from a book

REP, the point of the post is in the very title of the thread, "Acronym gobbledygook". PB was commenting about the absurdity of the passage they had read.

Replies: REP

REP 🚫

@Pixy

This paragraph, from a dead-tree book, verbatim, I think was supposed to be about the military response during the Cold War in the event of a thermonuclear attack:

I know PB stated the above. Nothing in those words indicates why he initiated the post. He may have had a reason other than your assumption of why he made the post. Your assumption is probably correct, but I try to avoid assumptions.

He may have been solicitating responses as if the quote was correct.

Replies: Dominions Son

Dominions Son 🚫

@REP

He may have been solicitating responses as if the quote was correct.

He may also be looking for a translation/explanation of what it means.

Replies: REP

REP 🚫

@Dominions Son

True. That would help to understand the quote, at least I certainly need most of the acronyms explained.

awnlee jawking 🚫

@REP

All PB provided was a statement that he was quoting text from a book.

He didn't even specify whether the book was fiction or non-fiction. Since there was no stated purpose to the post, perhaps he was goldfishing - "Oh look, there's a castle!"

AJ

Michael Loucks 🚫

@PotomacBob

I know most of those, but it appears to me to simply be someone trying to show off and failing miserably. If that was for consumption by people in the Department of Defense, I could see it, but if meant for broader consumption, it seems like 'look how smart I am' thus proving the adage that it's better to keep your mouth shut and allow people to think you're an fool rather than open it and prove it to them.

Freyrs_stories 🚫

@PotomacBob

Here's the ones I *know* without resorting to Google, Though punching all of them in, in quick succession may not be the best of ideas;)

MAD - Mutually Assured Destruction
BMEWS
NORAD North American Aerospace Defense Command; I know it doesn't match but it's been renamed once if not twice. The mountain it's under is also the location of the fictional Star Gate Command.
USSR BOOB - United Soviet Socialist Republics, Russia and a number of smaller countires, sometimes called the Eastern Bloc or Warsaw Pact after Warsaw Poland. no idea on the BOOB though
CONUS Contiguous/continental united states all the states bar Hawaii and Alaska
NCA National Command Authority; the 'order' in which people are in charge of Gov/Military operations should people be 'incapacitated'.
POTUS President of The United States
SECDEF Secretary of defence, typically ex-military confers between POTUS and DoD
AEAO
ABNCP
PINNACLE/OP-REP3/NUCFLASH
ANMCC - Airborne Nuclear Military Command Centre; Not airforce one, These are sometimes called 'doomsday' planes there are at least 3 of them and one is always in the air.
FEMA Federal Emergency Management Agency. sort of a catch all for natural and non-natural disasters. Technically Civilian.
HPSF
ANMCC
NEACP
EAMs
SIOP
DEFCON 1 Defence Condition 1; The highest it can go, 5 is the lowest but it's ever as far as I'm aware been below 3
COG
COOP
DOD Department of Defense
SAC Strategic Ait Command
ICBMs Inter-continental Ballistic Missiles; Solid fuel for the most part Missiles that follow a ballistic trajectory, leaving the earths atmosphere and in theory landing anywhere else on the globe

ALCMs Air Lauched Cruise Missiles. E.G. Tomahawk. Conventional or Thermonuclear warhead, air breathing, terrain following jet powered kamikaze plane without the pilot. Launched from just about anything the size of a semi or larger. Air Sub and surface ship launches are also possible.

SLBMs Sub(marine) launched ballistic missile; Launched from vertical tubes from a sub, normally close to the surface but not breaching it. Similar to ICBM but not launched from a *known* location

These three launch methods combine into what is referred to as the Nuclear Triad. You will likely stop or reduce the ability of one perhaps two of these but you can never stop all three. The Nukes will get through.
MIRVs Multiple Independent Re-entry Vehicles; Multiple independently taragetable weapons that split of from the primary lifting body to strike somewhat close targets, can also contain fakes to absorb the enemies countermeasures.
USSR DGZs
NSTAP
JSTPS.

Replies: Michael Loucks

Michael Loucks 🚫

@Freyrs_stories

MAD - Mutually Assured Destruction

Mutual Assured Destruction [Encyclopedia Britannica]

JoeBobMack 🚫
Updated:

@PotomacBob

Fiction book?

ChatGPT defined 22 terms, then ended with this:

In summary, the sentence describes a nuclear attack by the Soviet Union on the U.S., triggering a series of alert and response mechanisms involving various command and control systems, leading to a full-scale nuclear retaliation as per pre-planned strategies.

Grey Wolf 🚫

@PotomacBob

Circling this back to writing, it's a common stumbling block for me to define 'terms of art' that would be extremely familiar to the main characters but opaque to the reader. Even if I carefully define a term somewhere, 100,000 words might go by before that term comes up again. The protagonists know what it means - they use it every day. The first-person narrator may be aware that 'a reader' exists, and thus be motivated to re-explain, but the first-person narrator may also be blind to the issue.

For someone deeply versed in Cold War terminology, that likely makes a lot of sense. Explaining everything would be redundant, and even expanding terms might be more confusing than simply using the term of art (e.g. if someone said 'Defense Condition' to a Cold Warrior, it would be much more confusing than 'DEFCON').

Replies: redthumb

redthumb 🚫

@Grey Wolf

Perhaps try to include a preface to include the 'terms of art' for those who are unfamiliar with them. Just something to think about.

BlacKnight 🚫

@PotomacBob

The ABBR tag is your friend. Sadly most mobile devices don't support it properly.

Replies: madnige

madnige 🚫

@BlacKnight

The ABBR tag is your friend. Sadly most mobile devices don't support it properly.

-- and dead-tree (as specifically noted in the OP) supports it even less.

Argon 🚫

@PotomacBob

I believe the MAD theory can be traced to Alfred E. Neuman. The tapeworm sentence following it seems to confirm that.

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Forum: Author Hangout

Acronym gobbledygook

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