Space Force Is Worried About Being Called Silly Names
What will we call the men and women of the Space Force?, The Hill
“In the shorter term, Space Force personnel may conduct operations beyond Earth orbits in the near- to mid-term, so the nickname “orbiter” may unduly limit their potential. Defining Space Force personnel by motive power seems both limiting and premature. But “rocketeer” and “orbiter” have the obvious negatives of sounding a bit silly and not commanding respect. … The main drawbacks of “trooper” might also sound silly because of pop culture references, and there is no clear understanding of what a space “trooper” does. Since the Space Force will probably not field anything resembling “Starship Troopers'” Mobile Infantry anytime soon (or for that matter, “Star Wars'” storm troopers), trooper may also be considered false advertising by the American public. In addition, it would not be a good idea to mirror image the Russians and copy their model when we are trying to create a separate and unique force of our own.”
What? No “Space Cowboy”?
Per the op-ed, the Army Space Professionals Association suggests Trooper, Guardian, or Sentinel.
Given the DoD interest in SpaceX’s Starship for military airlift (10,000 km in ~25 minutes) and other operations, its very possible the US could field
Starship Troopers
What did they call those on Space Patrol? I couldn’t find anything specific, their mission was interplanetary justice and series was also called the Satellite Police. If or when there are crews flying around the solar system, it seems they would be more like the Coast Guard (policing, rescue, military action).
Still no idea what to call them but who cares (except for comedians). This is on order of determining issues if a moon or mars colony wants independence from earth but that is so far off into the future.
Space Rangers, of course.
Oh, the 75th Ranger Regiment would lose its s—t over that.
The rangers of Middle Earth, Texas, the tab on the shoulders of army officers and NCOs, who went to Ranger school, and Ranger ROTC units say hi. 😉
So do these boys:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wi…
Of course there was also https://en.wikipedia.org/wi… who defected to the Ist American.
Hate to break to you, the vast majority of the members of this force will doing their “fighting” from behind computer consoles. Very few if any will make it into space, at least not until space settlements become common throughout Cislunar space. As such Controller or Operator are more accurate terms. And more descriptive of their jobs.
I agree. No one can watch a SpaceX booster touch down, falling like a rock, engines blazing, and coming to a stop at the very instant it touches the ground, and think for a minute that the best pilot in the world could fly that trajectory. Robotics have so many advantages for military action in space that humans are better off doing their high level planning on the ground.
As long as there is no opponent, sure. That will not last long. PLASSF and the “Space Troops” will see to that.
Just when we are having a bit of fun, someone brings in a wet blanket 🙂
In light of that, are the Department of Defense staff involved in cyber warfare ever called “cyber warriors”?
What about “Space Cube Monkeys?”
I admit that this one has stumped me. If it ends of being the Space Corps, then space corpsmen is okay. Trooper, guardian and sentinel all fall flat with me. I don’t think spaceman or spacer would get traction. Operator seems a bit bland.
If they aren’t, certainly they should. There are many examples from the private world of how to go about names. A simple search on ‘naming mistakes’ yields hilarious and painful examples:
https://www.inc.com/geoffre…
BTW, I see Nissan is re-launching ‘Datsun’ in certain markets.
Most of those are translation errors. I do note that the IAU allows asteroids to be named more or less anything the discoverer requests. But within limits, and one of the limits is checking to make sure the suggestion isn’t something obscene in a foreign language.
Other seriously bad names, purely in English, come from acronyms put together by someone who didn’t expect them to be pronounced. One classic example was the Commander and Chief of the United States Fleet. Shortly after Pear Harbor, Admiral King realized his title, “CinCUS” could be pronounced “sink us”, and that just wouldn’t do. He changed to acronym to “COMINCH” very quickly. There are also many acronyms which are very descriptive and pronounceable by design, but which have negative connotations. The SuperThermal And Thermal Ion Composition instrument on MAVEN is an example. Talking about the STATIC measurements just sound wrong.
I sure hope the Space Force can withstand being made fun of by their enemies. To quote Frost from “Aliens”:
“What the hell are we supposed to use, man? Harsh language?”
If the present service branches can survive names like “squid”, “grunt”, “jarhead”, etc, I really don’t think SF personnel will worry too much about whatever derogatory nicknames that may appear for their branch of the military.
The Muppets nailed it:
‘Pigs in Spaaaaaaace!’
https://www.youtube.com/wat…
Hey, Junior! You must be about as old as I am. Besides which, the Space Force (if and when) won’t be cadets, and who ever heard of or saw rockets landing vertically, on their own exhaust plumes? Oops, wait a minute..!
Ad Astra, Junior,
Your shipmate,
Roger Manning
P.S. How about Star Fleet? That song and march would be great if the words were changed a bit.
Spacers?