ProTact by Haartz

AUSA 18 – US Army Pinks and Greens Update

Throughout the AUSA Annual Meeting there have been a handful of Soldiers wearing the “Pinks and Greens” service dress, a uniform combination inspired by the World War Two-era private purchase Officer’s uniform of the same name. Except that, if this uniform is adopted, it will be for wear by enlisted and officer alike.

Although the uniform has changed since we saw it last year, the most significant have been to the female uniform. You’ll notice four pockets and belts for both male and female versions. Even then, additional alterations may come with full type classification.

Although the decision to adopt the uniform could come at any time, most of those I have polled expected to be later, rather than sooner.

There are prototypes of an “Ike” short jacket but none were seen at AUSA. Likewise with the Leather Flight Jacket but wear testers said the USAF A-2 which is also a WWII Design has been evaluated for that role. Garrison caps now feature a slit down the top like the USAF version and the jury is still out on whether the Service Cap will feature a stiffener like the current ASU model or will be worn WWII “crusher” style.

48 Responses to “AUSA 18 – US Army Pinks and Greens Update”

  1. Maroon Beret says:

    The Army needs to switch over to this classic uniform once and for all and stop trying to emulate a cross between the Marines and the Village People. Black beret is the universally most disliked uniform change since the Cavalry got off horses. Why the black beret is still around is a testament to stupidity while at the same time the Army has created a participation badge for everything under the sun. That’s just designed so that no one feels inferior because they didn’t earn a CIB because they are sitting in the rear with the gear. It’s just like every kid getting a trophy because they showed up when all they wanted was orange slices and Gatorade. Enough with looking like Ru Paul. Get back to basics when men were men and girls were girls. We don’t need more stinkin’ dress up clothes.

    • Mick says:

      Yeah, you tell those kids to get off your lawn!

      • lcpl1066 says:

        Are you suggesting that the trophies were the parents idea and the children aren’t to blame? The kids that got those trophies? They grew up to volunteer to fight in the longest war in the nation’s history. I am happy to see a uniform that will prominently display skill tabs, rather than hide them among the rest of the chest candy.

    • Dognamedjack says:

      Is the red beret not a literally what you just described as a every one gets one medall I mean airborne school was not hard in the slightest bit. And

      • SSD says:

        The Maroon beret is worn by members of airborne units. The school isn’t hard, packing three days of information into three weeks, but life in an airborne unit is.

  2. Cimg says:

    Looks good but please no “bomber” jacket.

    • Admin says:

      It’s optional. You don’t have to get one.

    • Liam Babington says:

      I personally like the Leather Bomber jacket! As it will be an option My hope is that it will be available to only paratroopers as it was during WWII!

  3. pbr549 says:

    Crusher style please!

  4. Dave says:

    So which SGM didn’t like the crushed service cap?

  5. Hubb says:

    A few thoughts:
    – The pinks a greens look good and historical, now pick a uniform a stick with it.
    – Crusher style is good because it has a historical look and some of us have big, misshapen heads who have a hard time wearing the garrison hat.
    – No, you may not wear the leather jacket, it’s ours and we will not share. Feel free to adopt the Navy version with the 1970’s shag carpet lining.
    – If I was the CinC, SecDef or Congress, I would tell the services to pick their service, PT and combat uniforms and then impose a 10 year moratorium on uniform changes. Stop wasting money on uniforms and invest that money and effort into operations, maintenance and personnel.

  6. D308 says:

    If A-2 jackets are going to be a thing, then they should emulate the cut ofthe WW2 A-2 s; the cut of current issued A-2s are a travesty.

  7. Tony says:

    A2 jackets and crusher caps for flight crew only. Everyone else can have the Ike jacket. Just saying those two things were staples of being Army air crew. 19 series have there stetsons and spurs, tankers have their boots and 11 series get their cords and discs.

    • JK says:

      Think if you check, while the leather jacket was an issue item for the USAAF, it was an optional item for personal procurement…usually by officers. Example you can find include: airborne organizations, armored organizations, …

      No personal ‘beef’ with unique items, but they should/could be personal items, not for wear in formation.

  8. Dev says:

    Is the carpet the new Navy aquaflage?

  9. Joe says:

    OCP > UCP
    Pinks & Greens > ASU

  10. Adun says:

    Does anyone else thing that having the “Army” patch on the upper left shoulder is a bit redundant? Is that going to be on the finalized version of the uniform, or is it there right now to keep internet commandos from confusing which branch these uniforms are for?

    • b_rawrd says:

      No he is just a poor sap assigned to HQDA and that is there patch. Everyone else will wear their respective unit patches on the left shoulder.

      • Adun says:

        Oh, thank god. That would have been so damn cringe worthy. I thought it was a general branding initiative.

  11. b_rawrd says:

    1. Please for the love of God stick with this uniform. Its great. No more changes.

    2. Don’t add more bling. Less is more on service uniforms. As a 1LT I had more ribbons than MAJ Winters after V-E Day. That’s not right. And no I didn’t do anything heroic. The only medals & ribbons should be campaign and combat related (Change my mind!)

  12. J says:

    I was in the US Army and I don’t like these prototype dress uniforms. They are too retro for a by gone era of the US Army of WWII. The Army does not need a WWII replica dress uniform. They probably look better in black and white photos of the WWII era. I would hate to wear this dress uniform. There has to be a better way to instill pride in the Army these days then to drum up some way to spend money on a bad looking Pinks and Greens dress uniform for the Army.

    • 30yearsin says:

      I think they should reserve the Pinks and Greens for officer wear (as it was) and brown for the rest of the uniform for enlisted. I do not think this is a gone era because as a former Marine, they still have the same uniform from WWII except with rank design changes and unit patches removed.

      • Austin Garber says:

        I agree fully, keep the Pinks and Greens for the officers and bring back the browns for the enlisted men and women. I’m in the process of joining myself, i cannot stand the uniform now the ASU’s I dont think they scream army at all. I really love the ww2 era, not only military but the time period. I feel like the great sense and nationalism and pride will come back to the people when they see the Army wearing the historical and yet very iconic uniform! God Bless and take care 30years in and thank you for your service!

  13. paul says:

    I think we should get Indiana Jones jackets. I mean, his entire outfit is loosely based on US Army attire pre-WW2.

  14. Lawrence says:

    We had a visit at our booth at AUSA this morning from SMA Daley, that uniform looks very smart and soldierly – MUCH better than the ASU!

    Make the Army Look Great Again – just do it!

  15. 32sbct says:

    I’ll take a counter view to most here. I think these look awful. Pinks and greens were worn by officers only in WW II, not every Soldier. “Crusher caps” were crushed because aviators wore headsets not because it looked cool. If we go back to the retro WW II look is everyone willing to ditch the beret? WW II paratroopers wore the standard overseas cap with the para/glider patch.

    The wear out date for the Army Green uniform was just three years ago. It took over seven years to complete the transition. Now we need another? They keep saying it won’t cost the taxpayer any money. That can’t possibly be true. Except for new recruits, somebody is paying to provide a new uniform to everyone else to replace a uniform they already own. Not to mention the fact that the service uniform is only worn a few times per year by the average Soldier.

    • Kirk says:

      While the taxpayer is taking it in the shorts with this deal, the real victims are the mid-career types who likely got issued Army Greens during their initial contract, had to buy the latest ASR version out of pocket, and are now faced with buying a new set of these throwback abominations before retirement.

      This obsession with dress uniforms is both unseemly and an indicator of an essential lack of serious purpose in our higher ranks. Same-same with the black beret, which has thankfully been essentially abandoned as a daily wear item, and should go the rest of the way to starring in someone’s YouTube channel on “Forgotten Uniform Items”.

      I guarantee you one thing: This idiocy will not end the way a lot of people envision it ending, with pretty-pretty garrison soldiers rocking really cool-looking retro uniforms as they… Say, what the hell do we actually do in dress uniforms, these days? Seriously? Who the hell wears these things enough for this issue to actually matter, and why do they have them on? Oh, yeah; staff bureaucrats who don’t actually, y’know… Soldier. Most of whom we could probably replace with civilian contractors for a hell of a lot less money.

      Get back to me when they start taking the mission seriously, again, and they’ve quit playing Barbies with the troops. I can’t believe Mattis is not reaming the responsible parties for this idiocy out, behind closed doors. I’d kinda hoped he had, being as I hadn’t heard much on this travesty in awhile, but since it’s apparently moving forward like the SPIW/OICW/LSAT/NGSAR/NGSW/Acronym Superiority Program, well… I guess we’re doomed to get this crap shat upon the enlisted force, and likely long before they ever figure out what to replace the M16/M249/M240 with.

    • 30yearsin says:

      I agree with this call and getting rid of that awful ASU (well putting it back to a formal wear uniform). I was never a fan of the greens and wish they reverted to the Khakis at least, but I take this any day of the week and then some. Seems like an announcement may happen on Veterans Day.

    • Ton E says:

      Glad someone said it I could understand this move if the Army replaced the Green Class A uniforms with this retro uniform. But I was under the impression the reason the Army nixed the Green Class As was to streamline the overall number of uniforms the Army has which I understood. That move was one step forward this one seems like two steps back.

      • Kirk says:

        None of the fixation on a dress uniform makes a lick of damn sense. At all.

        We only have the damn things because the old-timers wanted to “enhance morale” by letting the troops out of the barracks occasionally, versus keeping them imprisoned therein, and also wanted them to “look good” when seen by the civilians. Not to mention, since they forbade the troops to have civilian clothes in order to discourage desertion from 19th Century armies, well… Those of you with a discerning mind might note that the whole paradigm is now well past its freshness date.

        Dress uniforms are, historically, the combat uniforms of the previous generation, gussied up and affixed with fake pockets and dewdads galore. Why? Because there’s a certain immature mentality that tends to be attracted to military service, that sees the soldier as so many live-action Barbie dolls to be played with. Which is why you see fucking idiots like my old chain of command who eschewed the opportunity to get our brand-new M68 CCO sights properly zeroed and conduct New Equipment Training, and conducted a massive waste of time called a “Casing the Colors” ceremony right before deployment. About the only assholes who attended that thing were a bunch of bored staff officers from Corps headquarters who had nothing better to do with their time than watch a bunch of troops march around a field–They scheduled that idiocy in the middle of the day, and not even the families of those who were at that post could make it, aside from a few select wives who were able to schedule days off, or who didn’t work. Net contribution to morale? About ‘effing zero. Net contribution to combat readiness, before deploying…? Actually a major detractor; I was still running into troops who’d never been trained on the M68, or had an opportunity to zero the damn thing a year after we returned from that deployment, and who had been there in the unit for the entire cluster-fuck that was pre-deployment preparation.

        The Army, as a whole, suffers from a woeful lack of ability to prioritize on what is really important to a combat soldier; this bullshit is just more proof. There’s not a Goddamn thing that this “uniform initiative” is going to contribute to readiness for war, and in fact, it’s actually going to detract. How many mid-career guys are going to put off buying good winter boots, because they have to spend money buying this crap, instead?

        If you really must have a fucking dress uniform, make it something that can be rented like a fucking tuxedo. Quit wasting money putting the damn things in the clothing bag for soldiers that may wear the damn things once or twice a fucking career for any real purpose.

  16. C. Myngs says:

    I was in for dress greens, and towards the end, the blues. I always liked the greens, because that’s what the Army wore during Vietnam. Coming up, I always idolized the Vietnam guys; some were still around as senior NCOs when I first came in. Still, these new retro uniforms are infinitely better than the blues.

  17. Connor says:

    Rumor has it that if we get the “Pinks and Greens” we will use them in Garrison rather than wearing OCP, and as a result OCP will be worn mainly in the field. All while keeping ASUs for more formal events. In other words simply adding them into the mix of uniforms.

    • SSD says:

      The Army hasn’t put Soldiers in a dress uniform, including Khakis, in garrison since the 40s.

    • Kirk says:

      Oh, I can see that working out ever so well. It’s hard enough trying to persuade the troops to get their expensive BDU/ACU/Whatever Uniforms dirty in the motor pools as it is, and you think it’s a good idea to put them in dress uniforms for daily garrison wear? Dear God, the stupid… It burns, it burns…

      Prediction: Go to any version of a dress uniform for daily garrison wear, and watch the readiness rate for equipment and garrison upkeep go through the floor. Send the troops out on police call…? Oh, yeah, let’s just add an hour or two onto the mission so they can go change in and out of their pretty-pretties.

      Y’all can keep your costume changes for the theater, in between acts. Implement that particular idea in the real military, and you’re going to see some severe impacts on routine operations, and a severe fall-off in readiness.

  18. JWL says:

    The Army should have gone with this design years ago when planning the change. I agree this style belongs to the officers and the enlisted uniform should be the brown pants and jacket, with no belt on the jacket. As for the A-2 flight jacket, only aircrews and the airborne should be authorized to wear them because that was who wore them during the 1940s. Of course, if the Army really wants to look like the Marines, really go retro and go back to the dress coat worn in WWI with the choker collar (not).

  19. Grady Burrell says:

    I had the pleasure to attend this show and I think these two NCOs look absolutely noble and are dressed impeccably. I strongly suggest pencils down, make the call.

  20. Rusten Currie says:

    Please make a decision… THEN LEAVE UNIFORMS ALONE for 10 years. If readiness if the number one priority for our Army, pick a priority that actually impacts COMBAT readiness. I love the pinks and greens, truly I do. If it is approved I’ll be one of the first to buy it, but I’d really rather have a better pistol 10mm or .45. I’d love a rifle with a round that has greater muzzle velocity and stopping power. Oh, and as a Parthian shot… Can we stop putting enterprise and excellence in everything? Excellence should be the default setting, and enterprise doesn’t make AKO suck any less…

  21. Stefan S. says:

    I vote for M-1942 Paratrooper Jumpsuits for all Airborne units stateside.

  22. 32sbct says:

    I just don’t get this whole “lets go back to WW II” sentiment. What’s next a return to the M1 Garand.? The Army has made a whole lot of history in the 73 years since WW II, Korea, Vietnam, Persian Gulf, Iraq, Afghanistan, etc.

    I enlisted in 1985 and went through three service uniforms in thirty years. The first was the Army Green service uniform. Then in 1993 they changed the color to a slightly darker shade of green and put pleats on the shirt pockets which necessitated buying a whole new uniform for a change you couldn’t even tell unless the two uniforms were side by side. Then the change to the ASU in 2008.

    How about taking the money that will be spent on yet another change and use it to accelerate the transition from UCP gear to OCP gear. Most Soldiers still don’t even have an OCP helmet cover. Also, many Guard/Reserve units still have not issued OCP uniforms yet to their enlisted Soldiers and the wear out date is less than a year away.

    The WW II service uniform was only worn for a brief period in time in the Army’s history compared to the Army Green uniform which lasted from 1957 to 2015. Anyone interested in going back to that?

  23. Greg says:

    To this day, I still don’t get the “pink” part of the name, it’s like the least pink that has ever pinked. I’ve seen real WWII uniforms, pictures of Patton’s jodhpurs from that era. Was there some colorblind person naming things?

    • Kirk says:

      The “pink” was from how the pants faded from the original color to a pinkish shade, in the right light. This may be an issue that no longer applies, with modern fabric and dyes, but who knows? The lighter the color, the less stable it is in terms of getting the shades to match, and they’ll fade differently based on fabric and use.

      My guess is that once the uniform goes into mass production, gets issued, and has been around for a few years, you’re going to see a bunch of people having conniption fits because of all the variations in shading that will likely show up–Followed, of course, by the inevitable “Oh, well… We need to have all the color guard uniforms match, so you guys go down and buy new pants at Clothing Sales…”, plus First Sergeants and Sergeants Major having to start worrying about the color shade matching in the front ranks, as well as having the tall guys up there.

      I’m going to go out on a limb and suggest that nobody has really taken a look at this uniform in terms of “What will it look like in formations that march across grass…”, either. Those cute tan slacks are gonna show grass stains galore from guys tripping over each other doing those mass turns during a pass in review, and then there’s gonna be that shade thing, again.

      There’s a reason this uniform got replaced by the Army Green one, and we’re apparently about to re-discover why all the officers who had to maintain it sighed in relief and bought their Army Greens as soon as they could.

      I ran into an old dude awhile back, who’d been a field promotion to 2LT in WWII, and then got dragged back to active duty for Korea. I told him they were bringing back the pinks-and-greens, and he just laughed his ass off at the whole idea. In his experience, the pinks-and-greens were probably the worst thing about moving from Staff Sergeant to Second Lieutenant, and the expense of having to buy and have them tailored about to broke his young ass, financially.

      I really don’t think they’ve done all their homework on this, and I kinda expect we’re going to be suffering some severe buyers remorse, as soon as this gets fielded completely.

  24. DOL Guy says:

    This uniform has great history and I am excited to wear it. Recently CANSOF adopted a similar WWII style uniform based on legacy of the 1st SSF. I saw in in person and the uniform looks sharp! So will the pinks and greens, especially with brown jump boots and a maroon/tan/green beret. Also I am glad to see unit shoulder patches and full size tabs back. Frankly I miss the old Class A and this uniform knocks it out of the park.

  25. OPS NCO says:

    Finally approved today. This is a good change. There are definitely going to be days (like Motor Pool Monday, Drill for Reserve and Guard, etc.) that the uniform of the day will likely be OCP. It just makes sense. There are some Soldiers whose MOS will require them not to wear it a majority of the time (Medical, Food Service, Maintenance, etc.). That said, the fact of the matter is that there are a great many of us who work in offices more often than not (Recruiters, Instructors, Training NCOs, Operations NCOs, Staff Sections, Command Teams, etc.). It just makes sense for us to have a daily uniform that is more professional than a field uniform. New Soldiers will have it issued when they reach their Duty Station by 2020. The rest of us have an ADDITIONAL 8 years after 2020 to purchase it (There’s 8 clothing allowances there). Anyone retiring before 2028 won’t be required to have it. Regardless, it’s already done. Everyone needs to stop complaining and accept it. It’s above our pay grade.

    • caleb says:

      have you ever worked in the medical field, dress uniforms take away the natural range of motion OCP’s have and hinder personnel from accomplishing the task at hand. On top of that wearing Class A’s on a daily basis would be silly and make getting patient care done, even more difficult than it already is.

      • Paul says:

        I don’t think you would be working with patients while wearing new uniform. Food service personnel will most likely go to the cook whites and maintenance personnel have coveralls to wear for work. Medical personnel will probably wear scrubs when dealing with patients

  26. Bill Burns says:

    I think these retro WW2 Pinks and Green uniforms look great! I hope they bring back the Ike Jacket too. I wish they would allow soldiers to choose how many ribbons and insignia that they wear. I think in the last 50 years the Class A and Blues uniforms got far too junked up with decorations. I realize they are important and there are companies that make them and want to stay in business, but I think “less is more.” General Grant never wore any ribbons and looked great, General Eisenhower only wore his 3 best and General MacArthur wore none when addressing Congress. I realize this notion may cause an uproar from some egomaniacs but these vintage unis will look better with less insignia.