Gung ho (/ˈɡʌŋˈhoʊ/) is an English term, with the current meaning of 'enthusiastic or energetic', especially overly so.
It originated during the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945) from a Chinese term, 工合 (pinyin: gōnghé; lit.
In Chinese, concludes Moe, "this is neither a slogan nor a battle cry; it is only a name for an organization".
[3] The term was picked up by United States Marine Corps Major Evans Carlson from his New Zealand friend, Rewi Alley, one of the founders of the Chinese Industrial Cooperatives.
From there, it spread throughout the U.S. Marine Corps, where it was used as an expression of spirit, and then into American society as a whole when the term was the title of a 1943 war film, Gung Ho!, about the 2nd Raider Battalion's raid on Makin Island in 1942.