The military will continue to use the 24-hour clock for many years to come mainly because it eliminates confusion. This also makes it easier when traveling to other countries on a deployment. military time (gray800.com) will always be used for assigning tasks and planning missions. Military time is part of the first line of security and will always be part of the military’s heritage and tradition. The main thing to know about military time is that it never changes. This makes it easier for everyone, especially new soldiers, to understand when they need to be somewhere. The new boot camp recruit will learn military time before even entering boot camp. Their recruiter should teach them this, because when they arrive, they’re not going to be told 5 am, they’re going to be told 0500. Chow starts at 0600, not 6 am, and ends at 0800, not 8 am. First of all, remember that the military clock runs from 0000 (zero-zero-zero-zero hours) to 2359 (twenty-three hundred fifty-nine hours). To tell the hour, you need to read in hundreds rather than thousands. For instance, zero nine hundred is how you read 9 AM, and twenty-one hundred is how you read 9 PM. For more examples, check the military time converter. While most people in the military use a 24-hour clock, civilians usually have to know whether a specific time is AM or PM. The 24-hour clock makes knowing the exact time efficient. If someone told you to meet at “five-o-clock” you might ask if that is in the morning or evening. With military time, they would have told you “Zero Five Hundred Hours” or “Seventeen Hundred Hours” which would clear up the confusion. If you look at our list of military time zones, you will notice that the letter J is missing.