Green’s Dictionary of Slang

f.u.b.a.r. adj.

[abbr. fucked up beyond all recognition]

1. (orig. US milit.) extremely unhappy.

[US](con. 1943) A. Myrer Big War 129: Hel-lo Chief, what’s to this beef? [...] What’s to this yarn about you being a fubar character from the word advance?

2. (orig. US milit.) totally beyond repair and/or control.

[US] ‘Words in -fu’ in AS XXI:3 Oct. 71/2: Yank mag. in the spring of 1944 told of a squadron that was part Army, part Navy, part Marine and was scattered all over the Pacific doing practically every conceivable job that planes could perform. It was called the FUBAR squadron, explained in Yank as ‘FU Beyond All Recognition.’.
[US]S.V. Baum ‘From ‘Awol’ to ‘Veep’’ in AS XXX:2 103–4: Derivative terms reported in popularity among government workers included [...] fubar (’fouled up beyond all recognition’).
[US]Current Sl. II:2 14: FUBAR, adj. Fouled up beyond all recognition.
[US]L. Dills CB Slanguage.
[US]R. Marcinko Rogue Warrior (1993) 224: Even the lowliest dogfaces of WWII knew that. ‘How’s it going, soldier?’ SNAFU, they’d say [...] Or FUBAR—Fucked Up Beyond Repair.
[US]S. King Dreamcatcher 219: The electronic gear was currently FUBAR in the Jefferson Tract: fucked up beyond all recognition. [Ibid.] 347: My wristwatch, on the other hand, is still FUBAR.
[US]E. Weiner Drop Dead, My Lovely (2005) 75: When the dogface grunts ignore the word from upstairs the system gets FUBAR.
[US]S.M. Jones August Snow [ebook] I’d seen enough of that FUBAR shit in Afghanistan.
[UK]J. Meades Empty Wigs (t/s) 654: ‘Your war just went fubar Mate.’ The Sergeant grinned.
[UK]L. Freedman Comment Is Freed 23 Jan. 🌐 The US infantry in the Second World War left us with [...] FUBAR, of which there are many versions of which the most polite is ‘Fouled Up Beyond all Recognition’ but the most heartfelt is ‘Fucked up by Assholes in the Rear’.

3. (US campus) very unattractive.

[US]Eble Campus Sl. Apr. 4: fubar – unattractive.

4. (US campus, also foob) very drunk; completely intoxicated by a given drug.

[US]Eble Campus Sl. Fall.
[US]Eble Sl. and Sociability 37: Acronyms in which the letters are pronounced together as a word are much less frequent: fubar (fucked up beyond all recognition) ‘unattractive, suffering the ill effects or alcohol or drugs’.
[US]Ebonics Primer at www.dolemite.com 🌐 FUBAR Definition: fucked up beyond all recognition. Drunk as hell Example: I drank so much last night, I could hardly stand up. I was straight fubar.
[US]Eble Campus Sl. Nov.

5. (US) exhausted.

[US]FadaGurl posting 26 Feb. 🌐 Shite, I feel completely fubared at the moment. I’m not *quote* tired... I’m not sick... actually, I’m mentally having the most wonderful time over the past couple of weeks.

6. (US campus) unfortunate, out of luck.

[US]Eble Campus Sl. Oct.
[US]B. Astore Bracing Views [substack] 13 Feb. 🌐 Pat had been killed by accident in the chaos of war, a casualty of FUBAR, because troops in combat, hyped on adrenaline, confused and under stress, make deadly mistakes far more often than we’d like to admit.