I can't post a picture, so the link (below) will have to do. I found my old gillie suit the other day, which would, I'm sure, still pass muster. As I said, I was quite pleased I had 't seen it for years!

In the right hands. It's not just the gear - it's guile, cunning, expertise and having the training and confidence to know you can succeed. Counter-surveillance, as I recall (and I will dig out my STANOC notes - well, actually, I won't) is the art not of becoming invisible, but remaining unrecognisable and undetectable.

A trip to SCRDE is the late 80s resulted in me being given a pair of goggles which reduced the heat signature from my face - at the time the threat then, envisaged that in 10 years everyone would have their own set of TI. It didn't happen, certainly not by the time I bowed out. But they meant well so I showed willing but I felt so detached and dislocated from the stalk they went straight in the bin.

https://twitter.com/raf_ifa/status/591883062029451265

...not forgetting the days of TACEVAL when the NBC Suits had to have your name and details written on the white sticky tape that sat in the middle of your chest. Looked just like the aiming point on the standard range target.

'All that said, many people don't like the newest MTP uniforms as they don't like the pocket arrangement etc, but then many naysayers of the new uniform don't wear it on patrol/front line either. Once you are wearing body armour and have several pouches around you the lack of a decent chest picket for fags or choccy becomes a non event.'

Correct - opinion garnered during the countless trips to Costas, Timmy Horton's or to collect the mail whilst telling people they should have tried harder at school.

MTP is good stuff and if you think CS95 helped you disappear into a treeline then it is only yourself that you are kidding - see Al R's comment about STANOC above.

:ok:

ExAscoteer.
I think you are being too harsh on MTP, well that or seeing temperate DPM through rose tinted glasses.
It has to be worth remembering that MTP is a jack of all trades pattern and as such is better than DPM in urban environments, better at longer range, better in mild to heavy snow, better against rock or sandy backgrounds.
I too think the '68 colour mix on temperate DPM was better than the last colour mix, but DPM was a compromise too, and would have needed at least three colour pattern options to work well in all seasons in a temperate environment.

I think Brit forces may well go back to a more barrack orientated uniform before too long, as things like untucked shirts aren't ideal in the Brecons in winter :)

Reverting to aircraft camouflage, the green/brown of our Vultee Vengeance dive bombers was near perfect over the Burma jungles in WWII.

D.

The picture speaks for itself..


https://encrypted-tbn2.gstatic.com/i...Jdip28aCUulcYg

US Army CARC,
 

In the 80s, the US Army repainted all its helos from Vietnam green to CARC Chemical Resistant Coating which is not green green nor is it black black. Dependent on whether the sun hits or not, or grey overcast clouds, it can look black.

Though there are a couple of examples where US Army helos have gone grey, like their fixed wing counterparts. One was during Op Praying Mantis / Prime Chance during the 1980s when the Nightstalkers MH-60A were sea grey when deployed on the MSBs in the Persian Gulf. First time I had seen a grey MH-60 was in 1990 book called Screaming Eagles, 101st AD when the author took a photo over Sabre AAF flightline can see all the A/MH-6 Little Birds and MH-60 with one grey sticking out.

The second example was the South Carolina ARNG AH-64A during Iraqi Freedom in light grey. I am not sure if that was a one-off and said airframe(s) have gone back to CARC

I have not seen any US Army rotary or fixed wing in mottled grey green camou but the USMC had went from green in 60s/70s to 80s green grey then desert sand brown and desert brown/ mottled grey during Desert Storm and thereafter and then all grey now.

I am mildly surprised that since Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom, no one went back to painting all mud movers desert brown like they did a decade earlier as with the Tonkas, Harriers, C-130, Lynx, Junglies, Wokkas, Trimotors,

The French have always had some form of desert style camou on some of their ALAT SA330C fleet and Gazelles probably due to ops in sub saharan continent in the 80s.

I take it there's a reason why our Longbow fleet does not have the bog standard camou paint job as was on the Lynx/Gazelle fleet. Most of the global operators of the 64D have the same coat of paint as the US Army brethren bar the IDF/AF ones

cheers

Not so much camouflage, but the deception cockpits make you wonder which way is up!


http://www.aerospaceweb.org/aircraft...a10/a10_18.jpg

Years ago, my bike was painted in Yamaha France Blue, At night time under the security camera system you couldn't see it. Just the black seat apparently in mid air. Weird. If ever i'm asked to gain unauthorised access to somewhere, I know which colour I'm wearing.

Rubbish in the daytime though.

In this case, Part 3 of the holy trinity of 'camouflage, concealment and deception'

I do wonder why the false canopy is not used more often, as I have heard it can be a very useful device. The only other regular use of it is on the Canadian CF-18.

A serious question, and one which has often puzzled me: back when they did the trials at Chivenor of different colours on the Hawks the overall black came back as the one with highest visibility. Granted, when seen against the sky. But in what way is it more effective than the old red/white/grey scheme when seen against terrain, and if was so good why did some aircraft (Dominies and ETPS Alpha Jets) receive white wingtips? It has bugged me ever since the decision was announced, and I still can't see it (pun not intended).

Mind, I still think trainers should be all yellow, or silver with yellow stripes...

The all black schemes were to do with reflectivity. They certainly did stand out better at low level than did the earlier Red/White/Grey.

The Dominie had a tendency to vent fuel at high fuel weights on hot days. Had the wings been painted black it would have exacerbated this problem, hence they were painted white.

Additionally it was judged that, had the fuselage been all black then the cabin would have become unbearably hot (especially in view of all the extra electronics fitted to the post DAU aircraft). Thus the white roof.

Re: False Canopy ... one of my functioning brain cells tells me that I once read that the Canadians had patented the idea.

Alternatively, I may have been under the affluence of inkahol, and dreamt that.

The story around crew rooms was that the device was too effective, and following a couple of near misses during combat training, the false canopy was dispensed with as a safety risk (although it could always re-appear during times of tension).

I think you will find that it was the USN that started it with the 'Ferris Schemes'.

Thanks, gents. Anyway, that was Deception, a rich dish of its own.

Back to Camouflage, with a side serving of Concealment! :cool:

MK 1 tropics were the bright coloured DPM. Seem excellent most of my time in the grass.

Lynx AH1 in black/dark green was quite easy to spot on the North German Plain, particulary as the Gem engine would deposit a nice sheen of oil down the sides of the fuselage making them quite shiney.

The later (1980s) grey and light green scheme was much more effective, allowing the aircraft to blend in with the forestry at ranges greater than about 2km.

False Canopy
 

Martin the Martian wrote

Other air arms also adopted the false canopy. See following links.

http://www.pprune.org/military-aviat...ml#post8378853

http://www.pprune.org/military-aviat...ml#post8379443

From

http://www.pprune.org/military-aviat...amouflage.html

The Russians also use the false canopy on some of their Flankers

Photos: Sukhoi Su-27UB Aircraft Pictures | Airliners.net

Photos: Sukhoi Su-27UB Aircraft Pictures | Airliners.net

The A10 was hard to (FAC) control because, partly, of that canopy. Other jets would tip in, on a fixed heading, and you could generally control them in with relative ease. But the A10 would loiter and sometimes only be seen, fleetingly, above a woodline of tactical crest. So you'd instinctively pick up the visual cues (heading, attitude, bank rate and 'canopy' etc) and give instructions based on where your eyes told your brain the jet was heading (and where the pilot was looking). Invariably, you'd be wrong. If it was hard for us, a terrified GBAD bod running a pulse of 150, in poor biz and trying to calculate aim off in nanoseconds would certainly have their work cut out.