eli5, Why isn’t there a nautical kilometer?
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There is no need for one. A kilometer is defined as 1,000 meters.
There isn’t a true need for nautical miles versus land miles, either. It is just that the statue (land) mile comes from a traditional British definition of 5280 feet, the nautical mile comes from a traditional marine sailing definition of one minute of latitude, and despite having the same name these two different length units have different histories going back centuries in Europe. We *added* the word “nautical” to avoid confusion.
There are also Roman miles (1000 paces), Dutch miles, German miles, Russian miles, etc. These are essentially obsolete historical units now though, since those countries moved to metric.
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