"Rod Speed" wrote in message
...
yep. The military standardised on kilometers because NATO did that.

And NATO includes a lot of countries that use the metric system. And goes
on foreign expeditions.

It hadn't gone on any at the time it went to kilometres.

So I was right.

Nope, wrong, as always.

OK. So what is the real reason that "the military" (in which country -
worldwide?) adopted the metric system?

Is it related to the fact that (UK) Ordnance Survey maps (originally linked
to the British army) adopted a National Grid that used kilometre (rather
than mile) squares measured from some datum off south-west England - even
for its imperial-scale 1-inch and 6-inch maps, long before OS changed to
1:50,000, 1:25,000 etc maps (2 cm = 1 km).

Is there some common factor that caused both military and OS (and NATO) to
use kilometres?