Hero
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perp: Slang for perpendicular. Never used, even by Military Police, as a contraction for "perpetrator."
phut gun: A small-caliber pistol, equipped with a noise suppressor, shooting a subsonic bullet. Primarily used for assassination and as a backup weapon on reconnaissance.
pour encourager les autres: An old French expression meaning, literally, "to encourage the others," but more colloquially, "to discourage the others from screwing up." Generally, the reason you give for hanging slackers and cowards.
pravda: The official truth, presumptively different from the actual truth.
range card: The list of possible targets and traverse angles made by an autogun crew when emplaced. Primary purpose is to allow the relief crew, coming in at night, to be able to cope with a night attack before they've actually seen the territory. A secondary purpose is to keep everybody aware of areas that the autogun can't get at.
red light: Direction not to shoot someone or something, at least for the time being. E.g., "You've got a red light on the guy in the green uniform." Opposite of green light.
S1, or adjutant: The personnel officer or department of a military unit smaller than a brigade.
S2: The intelligence officer or department of a military unit smaller than a brigade.
S3: The operations and training officer or department of a military unit smaller than a brigade. When the unit doesn't have an exec, the S3 officer is generally third in line of command; in the smaller units the S3 generally is the exec. The S3 is the guy who gets to figure out how the battle is going to be fought, and—generally, Shimon Bar-El has always preferred to do it himself—writes up the orders. In a Metzadan regiment, the S3 is third in the chain of command.
S4: The logistics and supply officer or department of a military unit smaller than a brigade. The logistics officer is the fellow who makes sure that when the soldiers pull the trigger, not only is there ammunition for them to shoot, but there's been food for them to eat, and that they've had as recent a bath and change of clothes as is feasible.
sniper: A rifleman whose business it is to kill or wound enemy troops, primarily expecting success through better than average to superb marksmanship skills. He'd also better be real good at concealment: snipers are very much sought after targets.
stabsunderoffizier: A senior Freiheimer NCO rank, roughly equivalent to a staff sergeant.
squash radio: A device that will record transmissions, compress, encode and then transmit them on an assigned frequency or "freak," all of which is designed to minimize the possibility of interception.
stag: A work shift.
Ten: Metzadan communications designator for the second in command of a unit. If a company's call sign is Safed, the company exec's call sign will be Safed Ten. (See call signs, Twenty.)
TTD (Troop Training Detachment): A loose organization of approximately 250 Metzadan officers and men, which can be expected to train a foreign infantry force ranging in size from a battalion to a brigade.
Twenty: Metzadan communications code for commander of a unit. If C Company's call sign is Safed, C Company commander's call sign will be Safed Twenty. (See Ten.) If the first platoon of C Company's call sign is Safed One, the platoon leader will have Safed One Twenty as his call sign. More colloquially, the commander of a unit. ("Since when are you the Twenty around here?")
tube: The barrel of an artillery piece. Colloquially, the artillery piece itself.
Virgin: Somebody who has not been involved in combat.
VCP: Vehicle check point. Also known as a roadblock.
warrant: l. Mild colloquialism for a warrant officer. 2. In Metzadan usage, a lateral promotion, particularly for combat specialists. This doesn't confer additional rank, but does nice things to one's pay voucher: a senior private with enough service time gets paid as much as his platoon leader. Warrants are also used to discourage people who are particularly competent at their jobs from seeking linear advancement for the sake of pay.
warrant officer: Not a Metzadan usage, but in other armies, a system of rank squeezed in between the highest level of noncommissioned officer rank, and the lowest level of commissioned officer ranks. Generally speaking, a man is promoted to warrant officer as a way of either giving him rank over senior NCOs without turning him into a goddamn butterbar, or so that an enlisted man can be required to perform functions usually restricted to the officer class, like flying helos.
weapons release: An authorization to fire at one's own discretion.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
PART ONE
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
PART TWO
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
PART THREE
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
PART FOUR
CHAPTER 19
Glossary