It's good to know I'm not the only one who thinks the military's camouflage fetish has gone crazy.

[Aristus]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/us-military-has-10-kinds-of-camouflage-uniforms-government-duplication-at-its-finest/2013/05/08/58f2fe4e-b67c-11e2-bd07-b6e0e6152528_story.html?hpid=z3

As far as I'm concerned, bring back the old four-color woodland BDU pattern, and the simplified three-color desert pattern for all four services. And to hell with embedding the service logo in service-specific patterns!

I can appreciate the difficulty in eliminating these redundant, wasteful programs, though. If anyone were to cut funding for these programs, someone else would start screeching "You're cutting defense spending! You're leaving us vulnerable to terrorists!!!"

[Marrah_G]

1. Different patterns, different uses

Of all the things to get upset about..... this would be way the fuck down on the list for me.

[Aristus]

2. It would be for me too, if it weren't wasting millions of dollars.

Don't get me wrong; we need to get rid of the billion-dollar boondoggles, like the F-35, too, as well as the million-dollar ones. We're never going to get a handle on spending in this country if we don't transition away from an "all-war-all-the-time" economy.

[uppityperson]

6. Did you read the article? It is quite interesting, talking about the larger issue with this as an ex

example. For instance....

Today, there is one camouflage pattern just for Marines in the desert. There is another just for Navy personnel in the desert. The Army has its own “universal” camouflage pattern, which is designed to work anywhere. It also has another one just for Afghanistan, where the first one doesn’t work.

Even the Air Force has its own unique camouflage, used in a new Airman Battle Uniform. But it has flaws. So in Afghanistan, airmen are told not to wear it in battle.

In just 11 years, two kinds of camouflage have turned into 10. And a simple aspect of the U.S. government has emerged as a complicated and expensive case study in federal duplication.

Duplication is one of Washington’s most expensive traditions: Multiple agencies do the same job at the same time, and taxpayers pay billions for the government to repeat itself....

[Marrah_G]

7. Duplicating expenses is a problem

What I was saying is that in the broader scheme of things, especially military expenses, this is not that huge. I'd like to see some of the bigger wastes of money addressed first (planes, boats, tanks that are not needed/wanted).

[Aristus]

8. I commented on that above. But these smaller contracts are a good place to start,

because there may only be one or two contractors involved. Unlike the contract to produce, maintain, and upgrade the M1 tank, for which there may be as many as 10-15 contractors.

[uppityperson]

28. There is that. I'd like to see the whole military budget looked at closely.

[Marrah_G]

30. Unfortunately as long as the congress critters work for these big corps it won't happen

[zipplewrath]

37. Probably not as much waste as one might believe

It sounds big, but when spread over all the uniforms that will be made, it turns into pennies per uniform. And trying to coordinate a design for several services around the world has certain costs buried in it as well. Our corporation is forever trying to "stream line" some purchase or another. All pens will be such and so from company XYZ. They forget all the jobs that require a certain kind of pen/ink/tip/color and so there is lost time and overhead while the exceptions are addressed. Ultimately, there are so many exceptions, the savings are never realized because the actual buy size was smaller than anticipated.

There are economies of scale, but the bigger the scale, the harder it is to achieve them.

[Aerows]

15. Did it cross your mind

that they change up the uniforms so that our military personnel won't be fooled by people wearing the same uniforms?

It has happened before. They change them up so that they aren't ambushed by enemy combatants impersonating military friendlies.

[former9thward]

23. When the military changes uniforms they are immediately available to the general public.

[jakeXT]

3. And you need a snow pattern

http://www.hyperstealth.com/USMC-Snow-Camouflage/

[Aristus]

4. What we used to do in these situations is have standard, uniform service dress,

and reserve specialty camouflage patterns, like the snow pattern, specifically for the troops who were actually going to need them.

The woodland pattern for general service dress back in the 80's & 90's made the most sense, because the military was geared toward a continental and European Cold War mission. If we are going to change our focus permanently to a desert setting, in order to steal as much oil as possible from the desert countries who possess it, let's settle on a single desert pattern to outfit the troops service-wide.

Time and again when I was in the Army, I saw that the most important aspect of disguising vehicles and personnel in the field was not the colors that they wore, but whether the outlines of men and machines were broken up from the POV of potential enemy troops.

[hobbit709]

9. Now we need an urban street camouflage pattern.

[sinkingfeeling]

5. What? Then they wouldn't have to spend $millions on designing all

those patterns!

[msanthrope]

10. It's because Obama is a Muslin. Blame him!

[Aristus]

11. Which means yet another expensive change to the uniform contract.

We have to change the fabric from cotton and rayon to muslin! Will he stop at NOTHING?!?

[msanthrope]

12. He's destroying the fabric of this country, I tell you! nt

[Aristus]

16. And trying to substitute the fabric of another country!

He's a madman!...

[msanthrope]

19. Everybody's gonna have to get gay married in a kanga. Watch out. nt

[pinboy3niner]

20. He's the worsted ever!

Twill be the end of us, for sure!1!!

[Aristus]

21. They'll be canvassing the neighborhoods for our fabrics next!

[msanthrope]

22. The right to bare arms will be enforced!!! Bolt while you have a chance! nt

[pinboy3niner]

25. We wool not run

Damask nazis!

[msanthrope]

27. You're colorfast, then? nt

[pinboy3niner]

29. Not exactly

I'm madras as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore!

[msanthrope]

31. You seem fustian in your pronouncements. nt

[Eleanors38]

35. I'm outta this thread!

[pinboy3niner]

36. Well...

[msanthrope]

38. We've certainly spun quite the yarn! nt

[LanternWaste]

13. I feel the same way about the camouflage fashions civilians often wear.

I feel the same way about the camouflage fashions civilians often wear.

I won't call the fashion a fetish, nor will I call civilians who wear camouflage idiots... aloud.

We all have our peeves.

[LongTomH]

32. When you get to things like camo prom dresses and camo wedding dresses....it's a fetish!!!

[nadinbrzezinski]

14. Well, it's not a fetish...it does keep

Troops alive when it works.

That said, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. It was supposed to be one woodland, one desert and very specialized for specialized troops service wide. It was supposed to be a money saving measure because everybody had their own working uniforms. That includes the Marines and Army...it was not just the cover that was different.

Then Uncle Sam's misguided children said, nope, we want our own, with globe and anchors, only service that does that...and it went from there.

But in 2002 it was supposed to be uniform for all services, and inter service rivalry came in.

That said, the problems go beyond design, the navy BDU make zero sense, cammy, at sea, in patterns that will make it hard to see my sorry ass if I go over the side? They don't last and are fire prone.

So of curse the Navy is looking into that.

[Aristus]

17. Well, call it an unhealthy obsession then. Although if 'unhealthy obsession' doesn't define 'fetish'

then I don't know what does.

Spending millions of tax-payer dollars just so Marines can have a globe and anchor pattern on their camos is ridiculous. Time was when having it stenciled inexpensively to their uniform pocket was enough.

I guess the Marines are getting soft. Be wanting combat manicures next...

[nadinbrzezinski]

34. Been following the story

Since the original goal actually made sense...three sets service wide...

[Recursion]

40. At the time the Corps was more interested in elbow and knee pads ...

... which the proposed BDUs didn't have. (No, we didn't end up getting them, but that was the starting point.)

I was at Quantico when we were wargaming some of the patterns -- I really liked the proposed urban BDUs (grey black and white digital pattern, elbow and knee pads, elastic ankle cuffs, pockets you could actually use), but they never got recommended.

[tjwash]

18. My favorite camo -

[backscatter712]

24. And the icing is that most of the pixelated designer camo doesn't work.

It's actually worse at helping troops not be seen than the old splotchy camo in many environments.

But hey, the designer camo sure makes the troops look cool! MURICA! FUCK YEAH!!!

[Aristus]

26. I saw an episode of 'Hawaii Five-Oh last night.

Awful, awful, AWFUL episode of a show I'm rapidly losing my enthusiasm for. And it was like camouflage porn. There were so many different camo patterns on display, it was ridiculous.

And all the usual hypermilitaristic bullshit in the teleplay, too: "Navy SEAL!" *fist-bump* "Tough-talk!"

[cornflake_31]

33. New navy camo still boggles my mind.

Blue digital camouflage. Why the hell would you need to be camouflaged at sea? Is the navy prepping for a war with mermaids from Atlantis?

[NightWatcher]

42. If you are wearing the Squid camo and fall overboard at sea....

We'll be sure to tell your family bye for ya.

I like to wear bright colors in the event I should fall.

[Recursion]

39. All of that "wasted" money is going to Americans with jobs making those uniforms

What you call inefficiency, I call a good job.

[Aristus]

41. A lot of people call it a good job.

And this is a prevalent sentiment throughout the country: "The congressmen of every other district are engaged in unconscionable waste of the tax-payers money! Me? I'm providing employment for my constituents!"

Or put another way: Everybody complains about the waste of tax-payer money, but nobody does anything about it.

What we need to do is transition away from a war economy, and back to a peacetime consumer economy. The reason our economy is in such a shambles is because the only things we build anymore are weapons, and the accoutrements of war. That's no way to sustain an economy.

It's been done before. There was a major naval base in South Carolina that was shut down in the 1990's. Just about everyone sounded the death knell for the community down there. But the community adapted and changed, and by the early 2000's, was thriving on a non-militarized economy.