When communicating, usually by phone or radio – but sometimes now when wearing a face mask, it can be difficult to get yourself across – especially when spelling things out. S and F are often confused, as are M and N. Nowhere is this more important than in the military, when a grid square MM2454 is very different to NN2454 – there’s no point in landing your troops in a school playground in Croatia, when they need to be on a Battlefield in Somalia. So NATO came up with a method of delivering letters without confusion using a standard alphabet (psst, Cubs, we’ll be using this next term, so time to learn!)

LetterPhoneticPronounciation
AAlphaAl-fah
BBravoBrah-voh
CCharlieChar-lee
DDeltaDell-tah
EEchoEck-oh
FFoxtrotFocks-trot
GGolfGolf
HHotelHoh-tel
IIndiaIn-dee-ah
JJulietJew-lee-ett
KKiloKey-low
LLimaLee-mah
MMikeMike
NNovemberNo-vem-ber
OOscarOss-cah
PPapaPah-pah
QQuebeqKeh-beck
RRomeoRow-me-oh
SSierraSee-air-rah
TTangoTang-go
UUniformYou-knee-form
VVictorVik-tah
WWhiskeyWiss-key
XX-RayEcks-Ray
YYankieYang-key
ZZuluZoo-Loo

Practice – imagine you’re on the phone to someone and you have a bad line, you’ve said your name twice, but they still can’t understand you – practice spelling your name out loud using the Phonetic Alphabet.

Keep watching this page for more ‘Let’s learn….’ articles.