Digger slang Digger slang , also known as ANZAC slang or Australian military slang , is Australian English slang as employed by the various Australian armed forces throughout the 20th and 21st centuries . There have been four major sources of the slang : the First World War , the Second World War , the Korean War and the Vietnam War . The name Digger slang derives from the cultural stereotype of the Digger in the First World War . Graham Seal AM , Professor of Folklore at Curtin University of Technology , calls the slang Diggerese . It is a combination of an occupational jargon and an in - group argot . First World War . The first influence on Digger slang was Australia ' s involvement in the First World War . The soldiers themselves were not called Diggers until well into the war , the name first entering common use around 1917 , with the first recorded use in something other than the traditional goldmining sense occurring in 1916 . Originally , they were known as " Anzacs " after the abbreviation ANZAC for the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps , a name that quickly entered the mainstream lexicon and was even the subject of federal legislation within a year of its coinage . The War Precautions Act forbade the use of " ANZAC " in the name of any private residence , boat , vehicle , or charitable institution , on penalty of a £100 fine or six months in prison . The Australian government even petitioned the British government to enact similar restrictions . The men of the Australian Imperial Force , and the women who nursed them , coined many words of Digger slang , including " Blighty " for Great Britain ( it being the name for a wound severe enough to get one returned to Britain for hospitalization ) , " chocolate soldiers " ( and thence " chocs " ) for soldiers who were believed to be unwilling to fight , and " six - bob - a - day tourists " for the soldiers themselves ( a reference to their daily wages of six shillings ) . As well as gaining slang versions of many French words from the areas in which the soldiers fought , such as " naipoo " for " no way " ( taken from the French " il n ' y a plus " ) , " tray bon " ( from " très bon " , and from which other Digger slang words such as " bonsterina " and " bontosher " were in turn derived ) , " plonk " ( from " vin blanc " ) for cheap wine , and " cushy " for " easy " ; the soldiers also incorporated Arabic words learned at their training grounds in Egypt , such as " saieeda " for " goodbye " and " imshi " for " go " , and , most notably " bint " for a woman ( who were also called " tabbies " ) . One slang phrase , going " to the top of the Wazir " derives its meaning , of doing something to excess , from a troop riot in the red light district Cairo on Good Friday 1915 , over the prices being charged by prostitutes and the rumour that they were intentionally infecting the men with sexually transmitted diseases . Many military - related words and phrases were also coined . The slang name " daisy - cutter " , for an anti - personnel bomb , originated with Anzac slang , for example . Soldiers lived in " dugouts " , fired from " possies " ( positions ) , and fought against " Johnny Turk " or " Jacko " . And they suffered from the " Gallipoli Gallop " , dysentery . Like the U . S . Navy ' s " scuttlebutt " , rumours shared amongst soldiers around the water - wagons , manufactured by Furphy & Sons , were known as " Furphy s " . Some of the slang originated in the street slang of the larrikin pushes , such as " stoush " for " fight " , which led to such words as " reinstoushments " for reinforcements . One of the essential components of the slang was the prolific ( for the time ) use of swearwords . Much of this slang was collected by W . H . Downing in his book " Digger Dialects " , which was published in 1919 ( and reprinted in 1990 ) . Second World War . The second influence on Digger slang was Australia ' s involvement in the Second World War . Some of the soldiers who had fought in the First World War perpetuated Digger slang into the second . These " retreads " were fit enough to return to action and continued the use of terms such as " bint " , " backsheesh " for money , " shoofti " for a look around ( borrowed via British slang from Arabic ) , and " guts " for news and information . Several slang words and phrases evolved . What in the First World War had been a " base bludger " , someone who hangs around headquarters avoiding the fighting ( from " bludger " , a British slang name for a pimp , and generally adopted as the name for any form of layabout ) , became a " base walloper " ( also known as " fountain pen fusilier " ) , for example . Similarly , several new slang words and phrases appeared . A " shiny arse " was someone with a desk job at headquarters , and a " blue pencil warrior " was a propagandist . Many slang phrases were expressions of malcontent , such as " wouldn ' t it root ya ? ! " , an expression of disgust , which came in many Bowdlerize d variations , from " wouldn ' t it rotate yer ? ! " to " wouldn ' t it rot your socks ? ! " . The shortened version of this , " wouldn ' t it ? ! " is still in use today . Anything thought to be nonsense was " a lot of cock " ( sometimes " a lot of hot cock " ) . Something that was useless was " as much use as a cuntful of cold piss " ( or " not worth a cuntful of cold water " ) , and a malfunctioning piece of equipment was " cactus " ( originally 1940s RAAF slang , and briefly revived in the 1980s ) . Other Digger slang expressions involving complaint and error were " whinge " , " balls - up " , and " upter " ( a contraction of " up to shit " ) . Food was called " afterbirth " , a cook was a " bait layer " , a quartermaster a " q bastard " , and a sergeant ' s mess a " snake pit " . Someone who wanted to " give the game to the blacks " was expressing unhappiness with the army or the war . One significant source of slang were the prisoner of war camps run by the Japanese , where Diggers sometimes ended up . These were the sources of many particularly strong expressions , such as " white nip " for a prisoner who collaborated with the Japanese , and " jap s " , " nip s " , " jeeps " , " little yellow men " , and " little yellow bastards " for the Japanese themselves . In the camps , " kippers " were the British POWs , and " cheese - eaters " the Dutch . The urinal s were " pissaphones " and the stew served to prisoners was " Danube " , a contraction of the rhyming slang " Blue Danube " . There were many other Digger slang words and phrases coined during the Second World War . Two of the most notable are " wheelbarrow " for a conscript ( because he had to be pushed ) and " doover " , a general name for just about anything at all . Others include " snarlers " , who were soldiers from the Middle East who were " SNLR " ( " Services No Longer Required " ) and sent home on " three P boats " ( troopships that contained " pox , prisoners , and provosts " ) . Korean and Vietnam Wars . The third influence on Digger slang were Australia ' s involvement in the Korean War and its involvement in the Vietnam War . As with the Second World War , much of the slang was carried over , and some of it evolved . In the Second World War , a subaltern was " baggie - arsed " , but was simply a " baggie " by the time of the Korean War . Similarly , the Second World War " mongaree " and " monga " for food , taken from Arabic as " mongy " was taken from the French " manger " in the First World War , and from which " hard monga " for iron rations and " soft monga " for ordinary food were derived , became " mongar " , this time adopted from Italian . World War II " cock orange " for a commanding officer became a " cock oboe " in the Korean War . The Korean War introduced further words to Digger slang , which were re - used in the Vietnam War . One such was " hutchie " , the equivalent to World War I " dugout " , taken from the Japanese word for a house . The Vietnam War introduced " noggies " for Vietnamese in general ( " gooks " being the North Vietnamese in particular ) , " frag " ( shared with U . S . military slang ) for a foolhardy officer killed by his own men , " bush - bash " ( a reference to four - wheel driving practices in the Australian Outback ) for a jungle patrol , " mammasan " for a madam of a brothel , and " Saigon rose " ( or " Vietnamese rose " ) for a particular sexually transmitted disease . Other Digger slang words coined during the peacetime after the Second World War and that were then used in the wars were " nasho " for a national service man . Modern Operations . Australia ' s involvement in numerous United Nations peacekeeping operations , regional stabilisation operations such as Bougainville and Solomon Islands , as well as East Timor , Iraq and Afghanistan , have created new opportunities for Diggers to work and interact closely with soldiers and civilians from other nations . In Iraq , a local man was known as a " smufti " . Getting sick from eating local food was known as " intestinal jihad " . The American combat rations allocated to Diggers on combat patrols , Meals Ready to Eat ( " MRE " ) were known as " Meals Ready to Excrete " . A Digger who did not patrol outside of the wire was a " Fobbit " , derived from the NATO acronym FOB ( Forward Operating Base ) . Rifles were known as " bang - sticks " , " tools " or a " woody " . A task which went wrong was known as a " cluster - fuck " and if no - one was to blame then it was due to the " Inshallah factor " . The slang term for the Middle Eastern areas of operations was referred to as the “ Sand pit ” . A lazy Digger was known as a " jackman " , " jack " , or " oxygen - thief " . " Jack " is most commonly used as an adjective for a person or behaviour that places the individual performing the action ' s interests ahead of those of the team . The term “ Quoinker ” is used to describe someone who would suck up , befriend or attempt to please persons of higher rank . This expression would also be used by mates of a soldier as they received an award , accolade or just general praise for a job well done . This is done by the soldiers mates to remind the praised soldier that they are not getting the award for hard work but for “ Quoinking ” Due to the institutionalised nature of military weapons training in Australia , a number of metaphors associated with rifle ranges were applied to operations . Combat was known as the " two way rifle range " , returning fire to the enemy was known as " putting a few rounds down range " , and coordinating Diggers for a large , long , boring or mundane job was known to be as exciting as a " brass party at Gallipoli " ( brass parties painstakingly collect all of the expended ammunition cartridges off the ground at the completion of a rifle range practice ) . The boredom or repetitive mundane aspects of operations were described by the term " living the dream " or the American term " Groundhog Day " . An item of equipment that is either of high quality or particularly useful may be described as " gucci . " These items are almost invariably not standard issue . Some slang has retained significant longevity and while finding its origins in previous conflicts are nevertheless still used by Diggers today . For example , medals were known as " gongs " or " tin " . Common sense was known as " CDF " or " common dog fuck " and the morning of the last day in theatre of operations or exercise was known as a " wakey " . The small metal spoon found in the Australian Defence Force ' s 24 hour combat ration pack , called a Field Ration Eating Device , was abbreviated to " FRED " ( said to stand for Fucking Ridiculous Eating Device ) . Some Digger slang entered mainstream Australian English vocabulary . Some examples of this were " zap " , " waste " or " turn into pink mist " , all originally taken from U . S . military slang , meaning " to kill " . Similar influence of Digger stereotyping on mainstream vocabulary has been the retention of " returned - servicemen " or " vets " for what in many other countries are called veteran s . The latter name became more common in the 1980s with the creation of the Department of Veterans Affairs by the federal government , but " returned - servicemen " still remains in popular usage through the Returned Servicemen League clubs .