Could This Be the new Air Force Dress Uniform???

[Widebrim]

Hell, I was an Army officer and I have to agree with D on that. Say what you will about the Marines, they do have both the best sense of history and the best dress uniforms, no question...

Since Dan was in the Marines, that's just a personal jibe at him...And I've met plenty of Squids who think that their "Crackerjacks," particularly the Blues, are the most historical and the sharpest, but that's another matter...

I was an Army NCO, and agree that as an organization the USMC has a good sense of history, but I think that the Marine Dress Blue Uniform has too many contrasting/clashing colors for its own good (including the gold-on-red chevrons/hash marks). The red piping on the bottom of the jacket, as well as on the "scalloped"-buttoned sleeves is a bit too much (the latter reminding me of a Christmas "Nutcracker" statue). I actually prefer the simplicity of their Class A uniform, the belt and khaki tie/shirt being reminiscent of WWII USMC/USA uniforms. (And having served for a while with the U.S. Cavalry, may I be prejudiced to say that when it comes to dress uniforms, the USA Dress Blues with Stetson, spurs, belt, and saber is hard to beat!)

OK, I know this is about the new USAF "senior brass" uniform, so sorry for being .

[Young fogey]

Vigorously agreeing with most here.

• The USAF tradition is the WWII USAAF uniform, case closed. (McPeak: yich.) If you must have an independent Air Force (and I appreciate the argument for it*), do more or less what it did in �’49-’52 and just change them to Air Force blue. But the new uniform was too plain: airmen complained that people mistook them for bus drivers.
• Army WWII brown uniforms > the modern green ones you used to see a lot before George W. Bush.
• The new USAF dress uniform that opened the thread looks like a sleazo caudillo (tinpot dictator) or bad sci-fi movie/TV. Good comparison to the Nixon palace-guard débàcle.
• The only good recent change to the Navy uniform was bringing back the service dress khaki jackets with shoulder boards for officers. (I think that jacket's back for chiefs too.) Again a WWII classic that, despite being based on an Army uniform, the Navy made its own.
• The camos aboard ship and fake-Marine uniforms in the Navy are stupid.
• That said I like the Marine-like Navy officer pilot's uniform, again a WWII uniform.
• Bring back the dark-blue cover for officers' and chiefs' service dress blues.
• Also rescind the George W. Bush order making soldiers wear battle camos all the time.
• Zumwalt uniforms: blech.
• Yes, the Marines kept their WWII classic uniforms more or less (no more unit badges on the service dress uniforms). Smart.
• Not far behind the Air Force in stupid uniforms is the Coast Guard, or bad Air Force meets Zumwalt. The Bender blues. A friend, a retired naval officer, says all the Coastie vets he knows hate them. Bring back the traditional Navy uniforms with USCG insignia.

*Strategic bombing and ICBMs are a new kind of fighting, the big case for a separate Air Force. But an article I read recently makes the point that this isn't most of what the Air Force does, which is still air support for the Army. Bombers are so big in Air Force culture, neglecting air support for the Army, which the Air Force agreed to do after independence, that in the ’60s SecDef Robert McNamara suggested giving tac air back to the Army. (That neglect made the general who was the WWII fighter boss, Pete Quesada, quit.) Funny how as much as most here like the USAAF, as the colonel's grandson wrote here, most in it including Hap Arnold (in retirement, General of the Air Force) badly wanted independence.

[penates]

The smarter thing to do would be to spin off space command and strategic bombers into a separate branch a la the USSR's Strategic Rocket Forces.

[Guttersnipe]

Hell, I was an Army officer and I have to agree with D on that. Say what you will about the Marines, they do have both the best sense of history and the best dress uniforms, no question...

Um, I would have to disagree. Obviously the Vatican's Swiss Guards have best since of history and best dress uniforms . . . that's why it hasn't changed in 400 years

[Otter]

Good Lord! The pikeman behind the Orifice looks like he has been serving most of those 400 years!

[V.C. Brunswick]

Some of the other Swiss Guard uniforms:





An earlier version of the Swiss Guards' "Jester" uniform