F**king-A

[James A. Landau]

In a message dated 1/15/03 7:28:15 PM Eastern Standard Time,
sclements at NEO.RR.COM writes:

> It has been suggested to me that the "A" could have come from "affirmative"
>  in the sense that the military usage of "affirmative" to mean "yes" or "you
>  are correct" might have been been the inspiration.  "Fucking Affirmative,
>  Sir!" shortened to "Fuckin'-A."
>
>  Was "affirmative" a well-used military word in WWII and before?

I think the use of "affirmative" was mostly from aviation, both civilian and
military, and there was a legitimate reason for it.

Circa 1940 most air-to-ground radio was in the frequencies below 30
megahertz, and at these frequencies static is a problem.  (AM broadcast is
between .5 and 1.5 megahertz and suffers from static.)  Japan trained its
pilots in Morse code, but the US, Great Britain, and Germany depended on
voice radio for air-to-ground.  (Those are the only countries I happen to
know about.  In the US, if the crew were large enough to include a radio
operator, he used Morse.)  On a static-filled channel a single syllable like
"yes" or "no" can easily get swallowed up in static, so the custom arose of
using multi-syllable words such as "affirmative", "negative", and "negatory".

As to whether these were commonly used in World War II, you might check some
movies about air warfare in WWII.  These will probably have their jargon
correct, if not much else.

Nowadays air-to-ground radio is in the VHF band (30 to 300 megahertz, which
also includes FM broadcast) and has little problem with static.  However,
over the oceans radio in the "High Frequency" (also called "short wave")
band, 3 to 30 megahertz, is still used, because only short wave signals can
be counted on to reach across the ocean.  Over the oceans it is not uncommon
for a message to have to be repeated from plane to plane to get to its
destination.  (Eventually it will be replaced by reliable satellite channels
in the UHF band).

In both British and US Navies the affirmative is not "yes" but rather "aye"
or "aye aye".  I don't recall ever having encountered "F**king Aye", although
I have heard "Aye-firmative".  This may be an argument against a military
origin.

"Affirmative" when used by a pilot or controller simply means "yes".
However, "negative" means "no" or "permission not granted" or "that is not
correct".

What do you do if you don't have a radio?  There are visual signals.  For
"affirmative" on the ground wave a white cloth vertically, and from the air
dip the nose of the plane several times.  For "negative" wave a white cloth
horizontally and from the air fishtail the plane.

[Reference: Federal Aviation Regulations/Airman's Information Manual, 1993
edition]

        - James A. Landau
          systems engineer
          FAA Technical Center (ACB-510/BCI)
          Atlantic City Int'l Airport NJ 08405 USA

"You don't have to be a murderer to contribute to the OED" - Jesse Sheidlower