Army Service Uniform tomorrow?
I saw this today as I was buying a new bus driver hat on Marlow White's website...Just when I had enough BDUs we went to the ACUs...Well it will be interesting to see what the final take is tomorrow!
19 August 2008: The Sergeant Major of the Army sent a major-release e-mail stating that the Army Service Uniform will be announced tomorrow. Major aspects of the "pre-announcement" in his e-mail are:
The current dress blue coat and the current dress blue trousers with belt loops will be the base components for the male uniform
The current dress blue coat, the current skirt, and a ASU slack will be the base components for females
The mandatory wear date for the new ASU is 4th Qtr FY14
The wear-out date for the Class A Greens was not mentioned today, but is likely the same 4th Qtr FY14
All of the accessories, accoutrements, wear of jump boots, etc, were referenced in general today.
NOTE: Any new items that will be announced tomorrow will likely take months to develop and certify. We expect many of these items to be new to the industry as the final details about the accoutrements and the wear policy have been close held. Please be patient with us as we transition.
I'll await the rebellion over this:
I suspect there will be other annoyances..."...Officers and non-commissioned officers (corporal and above) will wear the service cap with the ASU. Enlisted Soldiers (specialist and below) will wear the beret with the ASU."
Rebellion -- or is that a mutiny???
Once again, the Army has missed an opportunity to bring back the pinks and greens.
He cloaked himself in a veil of impenetrable terminology.
The AF is coming out with a new dress uniform too. One would think the services would have other things more frickin' important to worry about than dress uniforms! Save non-combat uniform changes for peacetime please.
Better yet, just stop screwing with them
entirely; no way to ever make everyone happy...
If we are consolidating uniforms and finding a way to make berets required less often, then I am all for it. It's dumb to have an abundance of uniforms and berets were a bad idea.
Now I only hope that the Army can come to a consensus opinion that wearing helmets, pistol belts, and canteens during parades and ceremonies is absolutely stupid. Ditto interceptors. It still amazes me that some senior officer wore a stripped-down interceptor with no SAPIs to the ceremony when two of his Soldiers had the DSC pinned on by the President. Who thought that looked squared away?
I know that some people were upset over losing the color SSI. That wouldn't upset me half as much as not having the regimental backing behind my jump wings.
"Pick up a rifle and you change instantly from a subject to a citizen." - Jeff Cooper
Going to be interesting to see what they
do about other than Black Beanies -- and boots...
The memo from CSA/CSMA said that they're making arrangements for the following:
98% surveyed wanted recognition of combat service on their ASU.
78% Wanted their combat patch reflected
70% wanted regimental affliation reflected.
They also said it looks like jump boots will be authorized.
Example is better than precept.
What Minor Crap Army Leaders Worry About
Screw it
Use Patton's tanker uniform and add a light coat of oil....
Ken has seen decades more of this than I have and I am in my third. Seems like everytime a new SMA gets tapped, we have to start changing the damn uniform. It is absolutely silly, it wastes money, and is a complete distraction from what is important.
I see troops worrying as to whether their ammo pouches match their ACUs.
Anyone for chamber music on the fantail? We will have to rearrange the deck chairs....
1st Steward, RMS Titanic
Tom
As much as I deplore the "better to look good than be good" mentality that dominates the world inside the D.C. Beltway (and spills over all too often), this 'change' is the elimination of the Greens, and adding a grey shirt to go under the existing Blues.
It could be worse, they've actually decreased the number of uniforms for officers and careerists. The only folks that really get screwed are the folks who were close to retirement and didn't have blues. If they were really introducing a new, additional uniform, I'd be frothing at the mouth.
Look at it this way; the folks who make a promotion based on ideas like this are folks you don't really want watching your back. This way, they are kept away from things that really matter.
Photos of new uniform
Army Times has two photos of the new uniform on their webpage.
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/0...iform_082008w/
Boy I feel bad laughing at the navy people in their white uniform. Guess I'll need to invest in some good stain removers!
Male Class 'B' Photo
Photo from the Army Times
I rest my case
This looks like a mall security guard
Originally Posted by 699guy
Looks like a Nicaraguan Field Marshal
Totally tacky. My wife's reaction: "Oh my god, what have they done?"
I give it four, five years, max, if it ever gets to implementation. They shoulda stuck with the gray shirt, the white one will show dirt like a champ.
I can see the Troops now, running around looking for cardboard to keep all those badges from dragging the shirt material down to the belt loops. Not that big a problem on the coat but I'm unsure why the 3d ID patch is down about belt level. Blousing those trousers with that gold stripe in a pair of Corcorans is gonna be fun -- and ruin you some britches...
Sheesh.
All of you serving have long had my thanks but you got no sympathy. Now you have my sympathy...
I guess I really don't understand the resistance.
Most people I know hated the Class A's. I know I rarely wore them except for DA Photos over the past 11 years. Excepting that was "Payday activities", wich ended around 2001 as a concept. On the other hand, until I purchased Mess Dress I was wearing my Blue uniform about once a month to different functions.
Most people like the Dress Blue Uniform, as demostrated by repeated surveys.
For soldiers, one less uniform to maintain, and the Blue uniform looks much better. Everyone has an opinion, but as RTK indicated, over 90% of the soldiers indicated they would prefer the Blue to the Green uniform.
The key problem was how to reconcile the "flair" on the Class A with the more restrained look on the blue uniform. I think they struck a fair compromise.
I seem to be rare on this board, but this is a good change, IMO.
EDIT: Not sold on the placement of the combat patch. If the female pictured above is accurate, the 1st CAV patch is going to look silly and take up half the front! :O
Last edited by Cavguy; 08-20-2008 at 04:42 PM.
Van,
The wear out is 2014! That mean's you're only "Screwed" if you're at the 14 year mark and are too cheap to have invested in Blues by that point in your career. Most SFC's and above I have ever met wear blues, and officers are required to have them. Maybe a higher impact on the RC, but enlisted soldiers do get a clothing allowance and CSA Preston indicated the "wear out" timeline was deigned to allow all soliders to afford the new uniform within that period.
And most soldiers' aren't paying for ACU's as they did the BDU, they're issued prior to deployment. And not sewing on tons of patches and no pressing makes it much cheaper than the BDU was to won.
It still looks better than what the AF picked out.....
"On the plains and mountains of the American West, the United States Army had once learned everything there was to learn about hit-and-run tactics and guerrilla warfare."
T.R. Fehrenbach This Kind of War
Got no problem with the concept, I'm quibbling over details
I agree with that and I never liked the Greens; I just thought the grey shirt looked better than the white one does -- and hanging all that junk on the shirts is just tacky. Just because you earned it doesn't mean you have to wear it...
I've also never been a beret fan even though I've worn 'em in green and maroon -- but then, nor am I a fan of the service cap. Like I've said, no way to make evetybody happy...Don't disagree with any of that; they really need to work on the patch and badge bit; those two factors foul up, to me, an otherwise good idea.The key problem was how to reconcile the "flair" on the Class A with the more restrained look on the blue uniform. I think they struck a fair compromise.
I seem to be rare on this board, but this is a good change, IMO.
EDIT: Not sold on the placement of the combat patch. If the female pictured above is accurate, the 1st CAV patch is going to look silly and take up half the front! :O
That and the short sleeve white shirt -- who wants to be mistaken for the Mess Sergeant / Dining Facility Manager??? That's what my sympathy was directed toward...
Text of the Announcement
As usual, Marlow White is on top of it and has the actual message:
http://www.marlowwhite.com/army/unif...ar-policy.html
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