The Nordic Combat Uniform system (NCU) is a cooperation among Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden with the goal of procuring a combat uniform system with accessories.  It is intended as an all service (army, navy, air force, home guard and special forces) combat uniform system for male and female soldiers. It is an inner to outer combat uniform system (from head to toe), which is functional in worldwide operations.

The concept is to come up with a multi-layer combat uniform system which is functional in arctic, tropical and arid environments.  While a common Nordic camouflage pattern has been looked at, it is not a component of NCU at this time.  Consequently, any NCU components will be procured by the various countries in their national patterns.  

NCU should provide:
– Improved combat endurance for the Soldier
– Improved protection from environmental and other indirect threats
– Improved modularity and flexibility
– Reduced overall weight and volume over legacy systems

NCU will replace:
– Light and heavy field uniform in Woodland/MultiCam patterns
– Light arod and tropical uniforms
– Shell garments in Woodland/MultiCam and Arid patterns
– Insulation jacket/trousers
– Under Armor (Combat) Shirt in Woodland and Arid patterns
– Winter Camouflage uniform (overwhites)
– Base and Mid layer clothing

NCU will also determine whether hand and footwear should be rolled into the program.

Although the initial concept goes back to 2011, the program is currently underway with selection of candidiate items coming soon along with Developmental and Operational Testing. The program hopes to begin fielding by 2019.

To keep tabs on the program, visit www.nordefco.org/ncu.

This entry was posted on Friday, November 4th, 2016 at 18:00 and is filed under Clothing, Contracts, International. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.