[2dogs]

http://www.usadaily.com/Commentary/Choate/030325_wrong_camouflage_on_us_troops_in_iraq.htm

The Wrong Camouflage on U.S. Troops in Iraq

By Pat Choate 03-25-03 -World Exclusive-

I have a very close friend who fought bravely in Viet Nam in the Marine Corps. He opposes the war in Iraq, but now that combat has begun, he strongly supports the troops. My friend e-mailed me some pictures of U.S. Marines fighting in Iraq and then called to ask what was wrong with all these pictures. I had no answer.

"Look closer", he said, "the uniforms on our soldiers are for fighting in the jungle. The green camouflage highlights them against the pale desert for the Iraqi marksmen."

His is the voice of combat experience. The right camouflage can help save our soldiers lives. The irony, of course, is that for months the advocates of this war have touted all the high-tech equipment being deployed to help speed victory. Tens of thousands of sophisticated night vision gadgets, for instance, were distributed so our troops could fight at night while the Iraqis would be blinded by the dark.

Yet, American troops were put into battle with the wrong camouflage on their uniforms, boots and flak jackets. It is a deep green used for fighting in the jungle. In the pictures, desert colored helmet covers are being used -which highlights the larger mistake even more.

As I studied the pictures, I also quickly noticed that the generals and defense department civilians being shown on television or in the newspapers are wearing desert colored uniforms.

The question, of course, is this: How did it come to be that our war fighters are being sent into desert battle with jungle colored uniforms, flak jackets, and boots?

One source claims that some time ago the Services chose to make body armor vests in green only. And perhaps the Defense Department has no chemical or biological proof uniforms other than those in jungle colors. Yet some war fighters seem properly equipped. I doubt these official explanations.

Our leaders have known that war with Iraq was coming for almost a year. They also know that Iraq does not have jungles. It has sand.

A major reason for this mistake is that our civilian and military leaders have focused on high-tech weapons and ignored the basics, such as getting enough of the right uniforms and boots to the right people at the right time.

Another reason is that this mistake cannot be corrected quickly because a succession of Presidents and Congress's have allowed the U.S. manufacturing base to deteriorate so far that the nation lacks enough manufacturing capacity to quickly supply what is now required without totally disrupting the domestic economy.

A quarter century ago, for instance, the United States had a large and prosperous shoe industry. It employed literally hundreds of thousands of people in New England and the Southern United States. When foreign manufacturers and U.S. retailers began to flood the American market with goods from penny-wage foreign factories, the U.S. Government passively stood by as the U.S. shoe industry was destroyed.

Now, when our troops need several hundred thousand boots immediately, a domestic shoe industry and the skilled shoemakers it requires are not here for us. The Department of Defense must rely on foreign producers for such emergency surge production.

The same dilemma exists for getting the right uniforms on our soldiers. As recently as 15 years ago, the United States had a large and prosperous apparel industry, which was fully capable of shifting from domestic to emergency military production. Then, American factories and American workers could have quickly produced the uniforms our troops need. Today, those factories that remain cannot.

There is a lesson here. Fighting wars successfully requires more than high technology suppliers. Our troops may be able to see the Iraqis better at night because they have high-tech vision enhancers. But the Iraqis can see our troops better during the day because we have them inthe wrong uniforms.

In sum, superpowers cannot depend upon others to produce the materials of war they require, including shoes and uniforms. That capacity must exist within the borders of the nation. Otherwise, superpower soldiers will be forced to fight a desert war in jungle uniforms- as ours are now.

When this war is over, this life-threatening mistake requires a full investigation.

For now, however, I offer one simple suggestion. As long as our troops in Iraq are forced to wear jungle camouflage, the generals and Defense Department civilians serving there should wear the same. While this may not solve the problem, it will highlight it in a way that will help ensure it never happens again.

[gun-fucious]

the Marines chem war suits are jungle camo

[Blackhawk]

I have a very close friend who fought bravely in Viet Nam in the Marine Corps.But not close enough so that you learned how to spell the name of that country, Pat.... :rolleyes:

[Betty]

But not close enough so that you learned how to spell the name of that country, Pat....

Actually, he has it spelled correctly. Viet Nam is spelled as two words in Viet Nam, but either is acceptable.

I asked mom.

[Sodbuster]

the nation lacks enough manufacturing capacity to quickly supply what is now required
No problem. The procurement office, quartermaster and S4 are now located in China. Whatcha need?

[Kaylee]

Now I'll admit I ain't been watching every second of coverage, but from what I've seen it looked to me like everyone's BDU's were the new improved desert pattern, and the heavy stuff (some LBVs, chem suits, lotsa whatnot I never learned to recognize) were in woodland.

Which I guess makes sense.. those things look more expensive to manufacture than regular old BDU's, and if it comes down to any given unit being able to buy either duplicates of every single piece of (expensive) equipment in every color scheme, or being able to buy sufficient food, weapons, fuel, and ammunition to keep the guys alive.. ya pays your money and ya takes your chances.

I also don't get the "elitist officer" thing this guy is trying to convey -- it looked to me like the guys actually doing the fighting that needed the extra protection were the ones wearing the heavy stuff (that happened to be in woodland) and the guys farther back, not expecting direct contact, were in their (oddly enough) desert pattern BDUs.. yes?

Maybe I'm just slow, but I don't think I understand this thing.. seems like too much armchair logistics to me.

-K

as a sidenote.. is this the kinda thing that could be field-remedied with a can of krylon?

[Greg L]

is this the kinda thing that could be field-remedied with a can of krylon?

Sort of, you could make it a different color to blend in better. However you would probably also destroy the protective quality the suit gives you from a chem attack. I think that I would rather stick out like a green thumb.

Greg

[meathammer]

I was wondering the same thing. The woodland camo really sticks out in the sandy terrain.

I also heard them talking about "night desert" camo being issued. Does anyone know what this pattern looks like?

[Poodleshooter]

as a sidenote.. is this the kinda thing that could be field-remedied with a can of krylon?
Nature handles it-dust covers everything.
The simple fact is that while our soldiers have desert BDU's, we don't have the money to make desert MOPP suits for them. I'm pretty sure that everyone over there has desert BDU's, but our guys are running around in MOPP1 or 2 with their chemical suits over them, so they only have to put on the mask and gloves to be fully protected.

[GinSlinger]

My life-long friend who is in the 4th ID reports that they only have woodland (everything, including helmet covers). He doubts that they will be issued any desert cammo upon arrival. Their equipment however, ist still tan from last time....

GinSlinger

[Selfdfenz]

The captured enemy troops I have seen have all be dressed in solid green. The dead ones too.

If the US woodland pattern casues more enemy troops to move in our direction we can........."react" to the all the quicker.

Seems like all of our special ops peps are wearing desert pattern.

The big deal with woodland is that with hot weather on the way it could get uncomfortable in about a month. Let's all hope our men and women are sitting in the AC having a cool one and the war is over before the really hot weather hits.

S-

[D.W. Drang]

:banghead: Good lord. Could we POSSIBLY find anything STUPIDER to whine about?

[UnknownSailor]

^^^ I'm with this guy.

[longeyes]

It looks as if we're going to need counterfeit-proof uniforms as much as we need counterfeit-proof currency.

Let's try making those in the US of A.

[Ian]

meathammer - The night camo is basically a grid of ~1/4 inch medium olive drab squares separated by ~1/4 inch dark olive drab grid lines. There's a bit more to it than that, but not much. It looks like it should work pretty well (I have a set, but haven't ever tried it out in a desert).

[ahadams]

As far as I've been able to determine everybody except 4ID and some portions of one other US Army division (haven't seen shoulder patches so can't tell which one) had at least one or two sets of desert pattern BDUs at the start of festivities. The problem here folks is that some of these guys and gals are going on three weeks in the field without a shower (remember some of them were deployed along the border at least 10 days before the shooting started), and in case you haven't noticed, there also seem to be somewhat less than an overwhelming number of coin operated laundries on the road to Baghdad.

Now granted by this time everybody smells so bad that it's hard to pay attention to such things, but a change of clothes every once in a while is a real morale booster. Thus out come the stateside bdu's from the bottom of the ruck and there you are. Should they have had more sets of desert bdu's? yep. is it too late to change this? yep. I guess this one falls into the category of 'shinola happens'... I just hope the previous administration gets a letter from every parent who loses a kid because of these shortfalls writes a nice personal letter to all the members of the previous administration and any senators and congressmen who voted for all those military budget cuts.

[Leatherneck]

FYI, I MEF is outfitted in stylish desert tan.

Runt, you crack me up! I asked mom. :D :D :D

TC
TFL Survivor

[rebbryan]

i was talkin with a friend at school about this and how their camo was desert but packs were green and it pretty much defeats the purpose of camo.

maybe the gov thinks the iraqi army is REALLY stupid. "hey look at all those green bushes out in the middle of the desert surrounding our capital saddam, ain't they purty?"

[Boats]

C'mon! Camo in the desert is way over-rated for mechanized infantry. Is some Iraqi gonna mistake a Marine for his LAV? Out in the open, as much desert warfare is, motion is going to give you away much more than what colors one is sporting, especially with a week's worth of grime covering everything.

Last I checked, the Israelis wore solid tans or ODs. Are they onto something?

[Navy joe]

Original author is a bona-fide two brain cell mo-ron.

First, yes it is the CBR suits.

2. There are desert NBC suits, just not many.

3. The top brass he whines about are in Kuwait or Qatar.
Far from a chemical threat.

4. Pictures from Basra and south seem to show Marines and Royal Marines fighting and working in normal desert wear, most likely MOPP 2.

5. All the guys up north are wearing their suits, hence the camo.

6. Don't like it, wait ten minutes and another sandstorm will be along, then everything will be brown.

7. Had this fella not slept through Geography he would note that we were mainly in the desert for the big endrun up towards Baghdad. Once the 3rd closed in on the Euphrates they entered an area you may remember as the "Fertile Crescent" There is most certainly vegetation there.

8. Like someone else said, you prolly won't notice a green shirt when it's riding one of 30 M-1A1s bearing down on your position. Better luck next time.

[voilsb]

another comment on this camo ... it's not supposed to hide you. it's supposed to sufficiently break up your sillhouette to make you a harder target.

believe it or not, desert BDUs with woodland TA-50 does a good job at this. b/c you see a rifle, and the LBE/LBV which breaks up your nearly-solid light-color DCUs when seen at a distance. granted, this is lost when you're wearing woodland MOPP gear, but when you've got that stuff on you have more to worry about than just bullets.

also, woodland camo in the woods doesn't hide you all that well, either, because you tend to look for motion a lot more than you look for bodies.

cover and concealment will hide a body much better than any camo clothing (though the camo clothing helps some). all they have to do is dust up their woodland gear, throw some old dry shrubbery on it, and they start to disappear. especially if in a foxhole or behind a rock or a bradley.

and finally, none of those generals has more than the troops at the front have. they have DCU BDUs. they probably don't have *any* TA-50 or MOPP gear, and if they do it's probably woodland.

[CWL]

US Marines have NEVER been known to be the first to get new equiptment but they always make do. They ARE administered by the US Navy.

Marines pride themselves on not having to live with the comforts that the Army demands.

What the Marines are good at is fighting.

[MeekandMild]

All cats are grey at night.

You could equip a patrol with clown costumes, orange hair, striped shirts, pink tutus et cetera, have them attack at night with Starlight scopes and all the enemy would see is shadows.

[Rangerover]

Marines pride themselves on not having to live with the comforts that the Army demands.

What the Marines are good at is fighting.

Jarheads have also apparently always prided themselves on being outrageous blowhards who persist in verbally slagging the United States Army.

How does one lay a Marine to rest? Give him an enema and bury him in a shoebox.

[swampgator]

What I find funny is that the author is so condescending of the military leadership for the troops not being in the "right" uniform, but only after it was pointed out by a second party.

[Boats]

Now is hardly the time for inter-service rivalry to be coming to a boil. Knock it off!:fire:

[Navy joe]

Is INTRA-service rivalry still ok? Blackshoe! :neener:

(brought to you by an airedale, AM1 type)

-good shooting.

[ahadams]

now I realize this is slightly OT, but Navy Joe, would you or Boats explain that last remark for us doggy (yes we know that's *one* of the things you call us) Army soldier types?

[twoblink]

SKUNK should have been their tactical adviser...:p

[Navy joe]

Actually, we in the Navy usually like our Marines, so we just call you guys Ain't Real Marines Yet. Betcha didn't know it was an acronym.

Airedale is Aviation.

Blackshoe is Surface warfare deck type. Then you got your hole snipes, reactor trolls, bubbleheads on the submersible craft, etc.

[D.W. Drang]

Grrr, after writing The Great American Post, I discovered that I somehow got Logged Out so all that great philosphy is lost to the ages. :fire:

:D

Navy joe: you forgot about Deck Apes. (I'm retired Army, but LSW was a Navy Brat.)

[KMKeller]

Navy Joe, You forgot us "Twidgets". CTs, ETs, EWs, OSs and the like...

ET2SW Keller

[Boats]

Oohh subject to a twofer, a blackshoe and a deck ape (as I was a Boatswain's Mate Second Class)! Ouch! All that was left out was "skimmer."

True stories. My company commander in boot was a MMC, a snipe. My boot was at RTC San Diego in the mid-80s. His last sea duty before becoming a boot driller was aboard the Kitty Hawk. RTC Sandog is continually overflown by commercial airliners as it in the path of Lindbergh Field.

Anyways, first week formed up as a company, the Chief asks our formation who is going to become a brownshoe. Predictably everyone stares in confusion. Then he says. "I don't know if anyone has informed you, but in the fleet the aircraft types are known as brownshoes or airedales. So how many of you are here?"

About 2/5ths of the company shoots up hands.

"Good! On my last ship, you were visitors for deployment or exercises, most of your types anyways. You come and you turn our ship into the loudest GD airport in the world! I'll tell y'all what's what! Everytime we are marching and we are overflown by a jet to the point that I cannot make myself heard you are all gonna drop (do push-ups) until I can hear myself again!"

And he did it too. Mashed 'em all about seven times a day. At least he did for the first four weeks before we went to the drill company barracks and then ran the grinder everytime we screwed up a marching tune or someone dropped a rifle tossing them about practicing for parades, graduation and such crap.

My CC had also made friends with a Marine DI across the fence next door where the jarheads were made. Our running tracks abutted each other, seperated by a fence. He and his Marine friend connived one day to have us running on the track at the same time. As we were running we could see the Marine recruits jogging in formation as they are given to do just as we squids were all strung out along the track haphazardly as befits our lack of strict regimentation. Our CC suddenly barks out an order. "Height line along the perimeter fence facing the Corps! DOUBLE TIME!" He then makes us start pulling out weeds by the roots along the fence line. The Marines came closer. "Ready? FIRE AT WILL!" We started chucking the weeds with their dirty root balls over the fence at the Marine formation. The DI on the other side starts screaming "INCOMING INCOMING!!!" At first, his company looks confused and then the DI starts screaming in a voice I had never even heard our CC come close to emulating. "GET IN THE (expletive deleted) FIGHT RIGHT NOW!" Evidently he was screaming at his squad leaders to shoot back. It was a pretty comical tribal war that got everyone dirty, cleared the fenceline of weeds, and got nobody hurt.

Our respective drill instructors then gave a joint speech about hoping to have gotten all of the rivalry out of us as we were only being separated by the fence during boot and that in the fleet, (a term used by both services) we are on the same team. The Marines fight, provide security aboard larger vessels and bases, we squids patch them up, and support them with transportation, naval gunfire and air support, and resupply.

I have never forgotten that speech though I cannot do it any justice.

Semper Fi to all of the Marines in Iraq right now, my heart is out there with you.

[SodaPop]

The green camouflage highlights them against the pale desert for the Iraqi marksmen."

I'm perfectly willing to stand buck naked in the Iraqi desert in front of Iraqi marksmen.:D

I'm scared....real scared.....:D

[SodaPop]

On second thought, maybe that would scare them away.

I think I'd rather fight in a tuxedo.

[Prodigalshooter]

Sodapop, that was priceless...:D

[AZTOY]

I have a idea:D










Lets put all are troops in Micky Mouse costumes and DROP 20 tons of LSD on the Iraqi troops.

:neener: :neener: