{"id":20131,"date":"2013-04-02T08:01:14","date_gmt":"2013-04-02T15:01:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/?p=20131"},"modified":"2013-04-02T22:49:38","modified_gmt":"2013-04-03T05:49:38","slug":"why-the-viet-cong-were-called-charlie-during-the-vietnam-war","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2013\/04\/why-the-viet-cong-were-called-charlie-during-the-vietnam-war\/","title":{"rendered":"Why the Viet Cong Were Called “Charlie”"},"content":{"rendered":"
Mike T. asks: Why were the Viet Cong called “Charlie” during the Vietnam War?<\/div>\n
\"ho-chi-min-city\"<\/a>

Ho Chi Minh City Hall<\/p><\/div>\n

First, because I suspect there are at least a few people curious and it pertains to how the name “Charlie” ultimately came about, let’s discuss how the term “Viet Cong” came about at all.\u00a0\u00a0 It comes from “Vi\u1ec7t Nam C\u1ed9ng-s\u1ea3n”, which just means “Vietnamese Communists”.\u00a0 This, in turn, was shortened to just Vi\u1ec7t C\u1ed9ng, with the first documented instances of such appearing in various Saigon newspapers in 1956.<\/p>\n

From here, “Viet Cong” was commonly further shortened to “VC”, which in the NATO phonetic alphabet is pronounced “Victor-Charlie”, which gave rise to the further shortened, “Charlie” designation.<\/p>\n

It’s also interesting to note here that “Vietnamese Communists” is possibly something of misnomer, at least partially. Even though the Viet Cong, or “National Liberation Front for South Vietnam”, were in some ways an arm of the People’s Army of Vietnam in the North, fighting the same cause (against the U.S. and the Southern Vietnamese government the U.S. was supporting), in fact some members of the Viet Cong were not themselves necessarily communists.\u00a0 They were just people who joined the National Liberation Front because they weren’t happy with the foreign influence on their government and the presence of foreign soldiers.\u00a0 However, due to rampant war propaganda on both sides, it’s difficult to ascertain just what percentage (significant or not) of the National Liberation Front was actually South Vietnamese people who simply were fed up with their government and the U.S. interference, and what percentage was made up of Northern forces or otherwise supplied or directly under Northern control.<\/p>\n

Whatever the case, as the United States and the South Vietnamese government’s official stance during the war was more of the latter “Arm of the People’s Army”.\u00a0 Thus, amongst U.S. soldiers and South Vietnamese allies, “Viet Cong” (and “Charlie” for the U.S. soldiers) came to commonly refer not just to the South Vietnamese National Liberation Front, but also to the North Vietnamese army soldiers- basically, any enemy Vietnamese troops were slapped with the label.<\/p>\n

If you liked this article, you might also enjoy our new popular podcast, The BrainFood Show (iTunes<\/a>, Spotify<\/a>, Google Play Music<\/a>, Feed<\/a>), as well as:<\/p>\n