You don’t have to look very far these days to realize that the inter-service “Camo Wars” has been a disaster and ultimately produced some terrible looking (and more importantly, poor performing) camouflage uniforms.

A few guys at Crye Precision kicked the shit out of Natick Labs with their Multicam pattern. It took Natick and the DOD years and billions spent to finally see the light and let Multicam in the door and now it’s pervasive on the battlefield for a reason. Why? Because it fucking works, and it’s the best camouflage in the field and inventory.

The US Marines developed a kick ass “Digi” pattern, the SEALs have AOR (Area of Responsibility) and the rest are left with no chair and the camo music turned off.

A uniform should be functional first, and just as important, it should look sharp, and make people feel good about wearing it. Making people look sharp in uniform matters at so many levels and is one thing the USMC continues to do right.  They have the sharpest uniforms out of any branch of service in my opinion.

A look at some of the worst and best camouflage patterns developed by the broken DOD acquisition system (another topic coming soon) and Crye:

1. The Navy’s “Aquaflage” pattern. I don’t know of one person I’ve asked who likes this silly uniform.  Apparently it makes you vanish if you fall overboard, not a good quality if you ask me.

Navy-aquaflage-sofrep

2. The US Army’s failed attempt to hurry up and copy the USMC’s MARPAT pattern.  This one apparently cost U.S. tax payers $5 Billion and is being re-called in favor of a better solution.

Army_Combat_Uniform_sofrep