quote:

Originally posted by Modern Day Savage:
Desert Camo. I'm not sure what the actual name or term for this is.

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Some sort of multi cam on a Rothco Combat Shirt

quote:

Originally posted by Modern Day Savage:

Do you know anything about the Desert Night Camo I posted above? I was told it was specifically for use to counter night vision use by the enemy but always questioned that.

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Ah... "Desert Night Camo". Seen briefly around Desert Storm, and then disappeared, never to be heard from again. (Good riddance.)




Best as I can tell, it was designed to obscure the wearer by roughly mimicking the heavily gridded/pixelated view provided by 1960s/1970s-era technology NV devices, plus adding in some bits of disruptive blobs for good measure.

The problem stems from the fact that this desert night vision pattern was designed as part of a development program that also came up with the 6 color desert camo uniform, in the late 1960s and early 1970s. This program was shelved in the early/mid 1970s when the US decided they didn't have much of a need for a desert camo at the time.

The program was then later pulled out of mothballs a decade or so later and rushed into production in the early/mid 1980s, when the US decided they did, in fact, have a need for a desert camo pattern.

But the issue was that, by the time it was fielded in the mid-1980s, the idea and design behind the night camo pattern was based on research about Soviet NV capabilities from 1960s... A full two decades old.

Thus, even when used against a foe using older NV tech at the time of its eventual field use in the late 1980s/early 1990s, its usefulness was debatable. And when used against more modern contemporary NVGs from the late 1980s and early 1990s, it was worse than useless. In fact, when used with the newer NV tech of the time, it made the wearer stand out more than standard camo patterns!

Likewise, the accompanying 6 color desert camo had issues, being designed around rocky, darker deserts like the Mojave in California instead of the lighter, sandier deserts of the Middle East where they would actually end up being used, and where the pattern wasn't as effective.

As a result, the 6 color desert camo was rather quickly replaced by the better-suited 3 color DCU pattern, and desert night camo faded into obscurity. So both patterns from this much-delayed development program turned out to be flops.


Below is a shot of the original Natick desert camo testing from the late 1960s/early 1970s, showing these original patterns, a full 10-20ish years before the designs were actually fielded.

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Originally posted by RogueJSK:

quote:

Originally posted by Modern Day Savage:

Do you know anything about the Desert Night Camo I posted above? I was told it was specifically for use to counter night vision use by the enemy but always questioned that.

In fact, I do. I just so happened to post the following in another thread last week, where a similar question came up ( https://sigforum.com/eve/forums...935/m/9010071854/p/3 ):

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Originally posted by Modern Day Savage:
now I've got to dig out the charcoal-filled BDU's I have somewhere and try to figure those out. I believe those are for use in gas attacks.

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Originally posted by RogueJSK:

quote:

Originally posted by Modern Day Savage:
now I've got to dig out the charcoal-filled BDU's I have somewhere and try to figure those out. I believe those are for use in gas attacks.

Yep. MOPP oversuit, for chemical/biological weapon protection.

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Originally posted by RogueJSK:
The Karmanator has chosen TheFrontRange as the winner.

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