Tactical Tailor

The Camo That Almost Was

While Australian forces will soon be outfitted in a new Australian MutiCam Pattern developed in conjunction with Crye Precision, at one point the Royal Australian Air Force almost took a page from the Royal Australian Navy‘s playbook to adopt a unique color variant of the Disruptive Pattern Combat Uniform.

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6 Responses to “The Camo That Almost Was”

  1. Rob says:

    It would have cost a fortune out of the budget to issue something that from five feet away would have looked just like the bog standard pattern.

    Almost kind of like they are doing with the new ‘Australian’ variant of MTC which from five feet away looks almost exactly like MTC and will cost a small fortune.

    • CJ says:

      What, like the USAF ABU pattern looks quite like the US Army’s UCP from anything more than five feet away? At least for you all the definitive word here is “almost.” And you all are getting Crye patterns.

  2. 96C says:

    While we’re at it….

    Let’s buy the Sea Sprite helicopter – hang on, it doesnt work.
    Or the Eurocopter Tiger helicopter – that’s been barely combat proven, we don’t want to copy everyone that has a clue and go for the AH64 (USA, UK, Israel)… How about the F88 Steyr rifle instead of the M4/M16 variants for interoperability and modularity, that’s right – we bought the rights to manufacture this rubbish and are too stubborn / proud of our polished turd to make the switch.

    DMO has made countless misjudgements, this would’ve been just another one on the list. The three services should stick with the same uniform with their own insignia and patches – problem solved.

  3. Reverend says:

    Soooo, they wanted to run around in my Grandma’s 1960’s tablecloth? (shrugs) OOooooookay.

  4. Johnny B says:

    I like it. It’s WWII USMC “Urban”. I’m calling some paintballers right now and I’m gonna make this revisionist history happen.

  5. gusto says:

    Waste of money.
    96C -Colt would not give Australia permission to build the M16A2 in Australia.The reason SASR switched to M4 was because the water operators couldn’t swim with the F88s and were using old M16A1s.They got it so everyone else got it.The reason was not that the F88 was crap.
    The problem with the F88 is that we buggered up the metal for the barrel and its no good for SS109 hence F1 round.The Austrians went ballistic over this.
    Having a rifle that was built in Australia was a corner stone of the tender.The F88 was no SA80 debacle.