[HN Gopher] U.S. Army Camouflage Improvement Explained (2013)
___________________________________________________________________
U.S. Army Camouflage Improvement Explained (2013)
Author : BonoboIO
Score : 248 points
Date : 2022-08-01 13:57 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.hyperstealth.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.hyperstealth.com)
| chasebank wrote:
| Tangentially related -
|
| Arguably the most famous golf course architect, Dr. Alister
| MacKenzie (Augusta National, Cypress Point, Pasatiempo, etc), was
| a civilian physician in WWI and became interested in camouflage
| design during the war. He made significant contributions to the
| British military camouflage during his tenure. He later based his
| golf course architecture, primarily the bunkering, from
| camouflage design principals he had learned.
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alister_MacKenzie
| yboris wrote:
| WWI & WWII related: the _Dazzle Camouflage_ for ships!
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dazzle_camouflage
| chasebank wrote:
| Thanks! That was interesting! Now I know where the phrase
| razzle dazzle came from!
| jrochkind1 wrote:
| the term seems to pre-date the camo.
|
| > The expression was then always in the form of 'give
| someone the razzle-dazzle', that is, confuse them. The
| earliest use that I can find of that sense of 'razzle-
| dazzle' is the US newspaper The Saint Paul Globe, April
| 1885:
|
| >> Sir: As you seem to be in earnest in your efforts to
| give someone the dazzle-dazzle... [I think that's a typo
| and the original source is indeed razzle-dazzle as being
| discussed!]
|
| > The expression very quickly came to be used with a more
| positive intent, that is, where 'razzle-dazzle' was
| considered to be indicate enjoyment rather than deception.
| That's found in the Pennsylvania newspaper The Daily
| Republican, June 1887:
|
| >> A meeting at City Hall resolved to celebrate the Fourth
| [of July] by a general old-time razzle-dazzle.
|
| https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/razzle-dazzle.html
| jeffrallen wrote:
| The parts about "they changed it but didn't test it and then
| we're surprised when it didn't work right" made me so mad I
| couldn't finish reading it.
|
| Arrrrgh.
| JoelMcCracken wrote:
| I feel like eventually they'll be back to highland plaids as
| being the optimal pattern.
| XorNot wrote:
| Anyone reading should check out the links at the bottom: the
| nightvision images in particular really highlight the issue with
| having poor NIR performance.
| JohnTHaller wrote:
| [2013]
| trhway wrote:
| It is 21st century. Flex OLEDs displaying pattern depending on
| your background is your camo. Your tank is covered with 80inch
| displays too.
| dqpb wrote:
| color e-ink displays would be kind of fun
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| Now I want to show up at our Zoom meetings in full camo. Doctors
| and soldiers get such cool uniforms, but us programmers are just
| business casual.
|
| Plus then you could convince a few of your coworkers to show up
| in camo with you and make your manager nervous you're about to do
| a hostile takeover of the company.
| biofox wrote:
| I go for the classic 'Big Blue' look and wear a suit and tie.
| Helps me to mentally separate work and relaxation time, with
| the added benefit of getting better treatment from management.
| the_af wrote:
| Out of curiosity, in which kind of company do you work? In
| many techie environments, wearing a suit and tie would select
| you out of the job...
| dfc wrote:
| I like to dress up for work. If I have ever missed a job
| opportunity because I dressed "too formally" I think they
| did me a favor.
| corrral wrote:
| > Doctors and soldiers get such cool uniforms, but us
| programmers are just business casual.
|
| Programmers' uniforms are excessively-expensive hiking clothes,
| or selvedge jeans with flannel and full-grain leather boots,
| ideally in a work- or jump-boot style.
| ahazred8ta wrote:
| "his colleagues, a gender-parity posse of young, smart-
| looking people, along with one graybeard (literally -- he had
| a Unix beard of great rattiness and gravitas) who had no
| fewer than seven devices on his belt, including a line tester
| and a GPS." -- Cory Doctorow
| rthomas6 wrote:
| Related: the engineer's uniform of blue oxford button down
| shirt, khakis, and Clark Desert Boots.
| shard wrote:
| This makes me think of the camo scenes in RDJ's Sherlock Holmes
| movie: https://tenor.com/view/sherlock-holmes-robert-downey-jr-
| chai...
| cobertos wrote:
| I really like the mandatory programming socks my company
| prescribes. Waaaay better than business casual
| mothsonasloth wrote:
| Interesting take on design decisions for modern camouflage.
|
| In my opinion Tigerstripe camouflage is one of the best patterns
| to be invented both for aesthetics and function.
|
| Followed by British DPM in second place.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tigerstripe
| 323 wrote:
| Somewhat related, urban sniper camouflage:
|
| https://i.imgur.com/hhQDS9c.jpeg
| [deleted]
| malkia wrote:
| Why do (US?) hunters go in camouflage? Would that trick the
| animals... or rather trick other hunters, and not see them...
| always seemed weird going in full camouflage... for hunting.
| happyopossum wrote:
| Most hunters in the US wear a blaze orange vest or hat to
| identify themselves to other hunters. In some states it's
| codified by law, and in others it's strongly encouraged (in
| California it's a big part of the mandatory hunter safety
| course, but is not legally required).
|
| Many big game animals are color-blind (or more specifically,
| see color differently than we do), so a camo pattern with
| orange can still hide one from a deer, while making you visible
| to humans.
| bendur_ wrote:
| For deer (with guns), yes. For things like turkeys, ducks,
| geese, deer with bows, etc they do not. In hunter safety they
| really stressed to be careful hunting turkeys.
| shard wrote:
| What if the deer is also color-blind? What colors do deer see
| anyway?
| bendur_ wrote:
| Deer have a hard time with orange and red, which makes the
| blaze orange work well for deer hunting. Deer don't notice,
| and people really notice.
| jessaustin wrote:
| Ungulates see yellow and blue, but not red.
|
| https://www.rmef.org/elk-network/what-you-see-isnt-what-
| that...
| jabl wrote:
| Slightly related, in case anyone wonders why most military
| aircraft are gray and not the camouflage patterns that were
| previously common on top surfaces, hushkit has a writeup:
| https://hushkit.net/2020/03/09/grey-aircraft-who-is-to-blame...
|
| tl;dr: gray is a good camouflage color against clouds or haze,
| which is a fairly common background for aircraft operating at mid
| to high altitudes.
|
| (The logic is fairly similar to what results in Navy ships being
| painted haze gray and not azure blue or whatever color the ocean
| happens to be today)
| battery_glasses wrote:
| If you want this website to remotely readable you can run this in
| your browser console when the page is up:
|
| document.querySelectorAll('p').forEach(elm => elm.style.width =
| "93vw")
| [deleted]
| russellbeattie wrote:
| I really wish Chrome for Android had a menu option for "Show
| Simplified View", rather than just guessing. Some of the worst
| sites won't trigger it, presumably because the HTML is so
| simple the algorithm assumes you don't need it.
| wyager wrote:
| An interesting evolution in the camouflage meta is the
| proliferation of inexpensive thermal cameras. Chinese companies
| like Infiray are producing reasonably-priced thermal monoculars
| that defeat all colour-based camo. Low-spec monos and COTI-style
| devices start around $2k and high-spec (around 720p 50Hz) for
| around $5k, same price as a nice omni VIII NVG mono.
| woevdbz wrote:
| Feels like a great application for adversarial generative
| networks
| causi wrote:
| _It appears that someone circumnavigated the scientific process
| and forced UCP in._
|
| That would be whoever benefitted financially from the decision to
| fuck our soldiers over.
| furyg3 wrote:
| I mean, there is an obvious (gigantic) budgetary and logistical
| advantage of having one form of camouflage for all situations
| over more than one.
|
| If it works, of course, which it doesn't.
| bovermyer wrote:
| Much more likely is that multiple entities just wanted
| something done quickly and didn't follow all the right
| procedures the way they should have been.
|
| Don't presume malice when incompetence will do.
| michaelbuckbee wrote:
| Having worked (as a civilian contractor) for the military it's
| equally plausible that the decision was screwed up for other
| reasons. High up decision makers that "trust their gut" over
| what the data tells them or who arbitrarily decide that a
| certain pattern looks silly to them.
|
| It's absolutely not intuitive that the digital looking blocky
| camouflage patterns [1] are going to perform better than the
| blob style camo patterns they replaced.
|
| 1 - https://www.businessinsider.com/why-militaries-have-
| strange-...
| bumby wrote:
| Commanders have wide discretion and it's part of the
| decentralized command mindset. They can sometimes make such
| decisions on no more than "I think this pattern looks cooler
| than that pattern"
| bityard wrote:
| Yep. But it depends on the relationship the commander has
| with his or her superior officer. Some commanders are
| burdened with having to justify every single decision they
| make. Others have basically free reign to lead how they see
| fit (for better or worse) as long as they stay within the
| regulations.
| olalonde wrote:
| Hanlon's razor strikes again.
| sam_lowry_ wrote:
| Are these people in prison yet?
| bovermyer wrote:
| You're assuming malicious intent, multiple co-conspirators,
| and illegal action.
|
| None of that information is available to you.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| What law was broken?
| _tomcat_ wrote:
| idk, but it seems to undermine national security.
|
| Maybe in here somewhere, "Various statutes supplement the
| provisions of Chapter 37 to criminalize activities that
| jeopardize the national defense or national security."
|
| IANAL ;)
| some_random wrote:
| I'm sure the senior military officials pushing UCP
| through were doing so to intentionally handicap the
| organization they spent their entire life working for.
| Rather than just making a mistake based on overestimating
| their own knowledge. If that's criminalized, all of HN is
| going behind bars.
| _tomcat_ wrote:
| thats a weird take, very defensive. But, since youre sure
| about it I guess everyone should be too.
|
| I'm sure no one is trying to destroy US democracy either
| or stage insurrections, etc. oh wait...
|
| If I had to guess, I'd say it was intentional and all
| about money. That could make it illegal. Even if they
| didn't intend to lose in combat, it still gave US
| soldiers a handycap.
| some_random wrote:
| So to sum things up, you're suggesting that either US
| army officials in 2004 chose UCP to weaken the US
| military in preparation for a fascist coup in 2020 OR
| they chose a US gov owned pattern over commercial
| patterns to make money (somehow)? And you're calling my
| response defensive and weird lmao
| PastaArt wrote:
| They said their guess is "money". This looks like your
| trying to put words in someone elses mouth. The examples
| of corruption in government seems to be just that,
| examples.
|
| Im not sure why you try to act like they all need to be
| tied together somehow?
|
| Seem pretty defensive & weird.
| some_random wrote:
| Alright so to avoid putting words in anyone's mouth,
| please outline how corruption could have caused the US to
| fast track a pattern it developed itself rather than one
| of the superior commercial patterns that they would have
| had to pay royalties on.
| _tomcat_ wrote:
| The US didn't fast track anything, individuals did. As
| far as motive goes, there could be many reasons, and what
| might be able to motivate you may not have the effect on
| someone else. Since you want something to help you
| understand motivation and how it relates to corruption,
| here is a link with some explanations.
|
| https://hackbrain.net/main-causes-of-corruption/
|
| Happy reading!
| [deleted]
| pookha wrote:
| I was deployed to CENTCOM in the USAF when these uniforms
| went into service. Worked closely with Army...If memory
| serves they were flammable and poorly tested (circa
| 2006). I can remember the Army units I talked to were
| having major problems. So if you had the misfortune of
| getting deployed outside the wire and had to wear those
| things I could see why you might be a little keyed up 15+
| years later.
| some_random wrote:
| Seeing as UCP is owned by the US government, I'm very curious
| to hear who could have financially benefited from its
| selection. If anything, HyperStealth here is the one with the
| financial motivation seeing as their US4CES pattern was not
| selected.
| jcranmer wrote:
| If I'm reading this correctly, the decision process that resulted
| in the horribly-ineffective UCP pattern amounts to: "We want one
| pattern. So let's pick one color from the best camo patterns in
| every environment [the only one that has good NIR performance],
| and the result will somehow work well!" Which is... yowzers.
|
| (For what it's worth, the Multicam pattern, which is slightly
| modified to the OCP pattern now in use by the US Army/Air Force,
| manages to do a better job than the UCP pattern at actually being
| universal camo, and it's not even the best of the tests.)
|
| The NIR requirements means you can almost see how the decision
| might be justifiable... but that no one actually tested the
| resulting pattern as a check? I mean, one of the most salient
| facts about human color processing is that we evaluate colors
| based on their surrounding context, so even if individual colors
| work well, you would need to check their performance in their
| context to make sure they _still_ work well.
| alexb_ wrote:
| I'm in the Air force, and while not relevant to actual
| camouflage ability, I can personally say that OCPs look _much_
| nicer than the uniforms before. A lot of the old camo patterns
| looked painfully ugly. And the ability to camouflage isn 't too
| relevant for me anyways, unless I'm trying to blend into
| chairs/desks.
| mensetmanusman wrote:
| It would be funny to have chairs and desks with the same
| pattern so you would actually blend in...
| munificent wrote:
| Relevant famous old photo:
|
| https://soldiersystems.net/wp-
| content/uploads/2019/09/img_64...
| jessaustin wrote:
| Who left his boots on the couch?!
| bityard wrote:
| C'mon, the Army and Marines already give the Air Force
| enough crap... I can just imagine it now... "Hey Airman
| Ikea, we need a good desk lamp over here, is that something
| you can help us with?"
| dotancohen wrote:
| > the decision process that resulted in the horribly-
| ineffective UCP > pattern amounts to: "We want one
| pattern
|
| Just wait until you read how the F-35 was procured. "We want
| one airplane for the Air Force, Navy, and Marines. Oh, and it
| had to include parts from almost all NATO allies, even those
| who we won't sell it to."
| ghaff wrote:
| Which was not an unreasonable goal to at least _consider_
| given the well-known tendency of all the service branches to
| want their own unique "toys."
| antisthenes wrote:
| Tell me you want a jobs program without telling me you want a
| jobs program.
| vopi wrote:
| The F-35 ended up being great though. Even now, it's cheaper
| on a per unit basis than other aircraft that are worse.
| jessaustin wrote:
| If you had stopped with the first sentence, we could have
| written it off as sarcasm.
|
| _The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program appears to be in a
| state of suspended development, with little progress made
| in 2021 toward improving its lackluster performance. The
| latest report by the Pentagon's Director, Operational Test
| & Evaluation (DOT&E) reveals stagnation and even
| backsliding in some fleet reliability measures.
|
| And that's just the public DOT&E report.
|
| In an unprecedented move, DOT&E is concealing many of the
| key details of the F-35's poor performance. For the first
| time ever, the testing office created a non-public
| "controlled unclassified information" version of its
| report, and although there is much overlap between the two
| versions, the meaningful details about the ever-troubled
| program are only included in the non-public one._
|
| https://www.pogo.org/analysis/2022/03/f-35-program-
| stagnated...
| vopi wrote:
| Could you comment on the price aspect I thought up? As I
| understand it is cheap and only the cost per hour is an
| issue. Obviously the actual program is expensive, but I
| wanna ignore that for now and focus on the actual
| performance.
|
| Because I'm at work and can't look through the full 372
| page non-public report linked, can you provide some page
| numbers I could look at? I'm curious what the actual
| issues are in actual use.
|
| Btw I'm not of the same mindset of the other guy, I'm not
| gonna call you a "Luddite Reformer" because I saw a
| YouTube video.
|
| From when I know many of the issues are FUD, but
| obviously there is real issues and I'd like to better
| educate myself. But I am just a layman with limited
| research time.
| jessaustin wrote:
| _I am just a layman with limited research time._
|
| You and me both! Given the wild swings in points-voting
| seen ITT, it seems perhaps MIC reptiles and other lovers
| of arcane jargon have more time on their hands than we
| mere subjects have. I linked the POGO report first as it
| seems most authoritative with respect to overall program
| cost and military effectiveness. With respect to the
| specific question of cost/plane (although I don't think
| we can just forget cost/hour), this Forbes article has
| the best explanation I've seen. [0] The beginning of the
| following selection acknowledges one accounting method
| that might support the idea that the unit cost is low.
| However, when more accurate methods are used, that idea
| makes less sense.
|
| _At $78 million the fifth-generation F-35A's unit cost
| compares favorably to the latest non-stealth
| 4.5-generation Western fighter. The Rafale, Typhoon,
| Gripen-E and F-15EX are more expensive at $85 to $100
| million apiece. The older F-16 and Super Hornet are
| modestly cheaper at $65 to $75 million each. But while
| these aircraft do have certain performance advantages
| over the F-35, all are vastly more vulnerable to long-
| range anti-aircraft missiles proliferating in militaries
| across the globe.
|
| However, the F-35 unit price metric has the shortcoming
| of failing to reflect additional costs in spare parts,
| logistics facilities and so forth that come with F-35
| purchases. When those are spread out across F-35A orders
| in 2021 they lead to a 'Gross Weapon Unit Cost' in budget
| documents of $110 million for 2021, higher than in
| preceding years due in part to decreased volume of
| orders.
|
| Overall, though, a moderate increase in unit price
| arguably isn't the main issue, because procurement costs
| account for less than a quarter of the $1.7 trillion
| projected lifetime cost of the F-35 program.
|
| Instead, a report published by the Government
| Accountability Office (GAO) on July 7 warns that its
| sustainment--currently expected to total $1.27 trillion
| in real dollars--which threatens to break the Pentagon
| budget._
|
| [0] https://www.forbes.com/sites/sebastienroblin/2021/07/
| 31/f-35...
| some_random wrote:
| It's so interesting how luddite Reformers hold such a
| sway over the usually techno-optimist HN. Turns out that
| new technology has teething problems, what a shocker.
| jessaustin wrote:
| Wow, my first comment on the thread, consisting entirely
| of a quote from expert analysts, and already I'm a
| "luddite Reformer". (Idiosyncratic capitalization also
| doesn't help you seem balanced and rational.)
|
| This turkey was designed in the 1990s. The contract was
| awarded in 2001. The first f35 flew in 2006. When will
| this "technology" no longer be "new"? Presumably it will
| be some time, since the entire fleet was grounded again
| last week due to safety concerns.
|
| https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-07-29/f-35-f
| lee...
| some_random wrote:
| As far as I know you're not a Reformer, which is a proper
| noun and therefore capitalized, but the "expert analyst"
| you quoted is. Honestly that tells me enough about your
| familiarity with this subject
| jessaustin wrote:
| Please link to any source that indicates "Luddite"
| shouldn't be capitalized or "reformer" should, especially
| with Capt. Grazier cited as some sort of exemplar of the
| concept. You've had lots to say ITT but haven't cited a
| single authority to indicate you're not just making it
| all up.
| Armisael16 wrote:
| The Reformers were/are a group arguing for a particular
| class of weapons and vehicles in procurement, mostly
| focusing on relatively low-tech solutions. They're most
| famous for their influence in the Fighter Mafia and in
| the Bradley (see: Pentagon Wars). They're...
| controversial.
|
| That one gets capitalized because it's a proper noun (is
| that a confusion name? sure).
|
| Luddite strictly should be capitalized as well, but there
| isn't any confusion around that one and it isn't the
| focus, so I can understand why it wasn't capitalized. I
| wouldn't've.
| spamizbad wrote:
| I think the reason why you're getting some pushback is
| because we've heard all these before with another
| aircraft that had similar teething and development
| problems: the F-15.
|
| The F-15 project was supposed to be a small and light
| fighter but feature creep" blew the project up into a
| massively expensive boondoggle. Some of this was due to
| the fear of the MIG-25; an aircraft we later learned
| wasn't so scary.
|
| Yet today, the overpriced, chronic cost-overruning F-15
| sits at an impressive 109:0 kill to loss ratio, making it
| the best performing aircraft in the United State's
| history.
|
| But you would be correct in saying the F-35 is no F-15.
| It has a stealth coating that is expensive to maintain
| (this is true for all stealth aircraft). It also flies
| with a ton of electronics to function as a "sensor
| network in the sky".
|
| But in many ways, this is similar to the complaints about
| the F-15 and its (For the time) dizzying array of modern
| technologies: An advanced lookdown/shootdown radar,
| support for BVR missiles, IFF, EW and ECM systems all
| linked to a central computer. Technically other aircraft
| had these technologies in the 1970s, but none until the
| F-15 had them all in the same aircraft. Fast-forward a
| few decades and that "feature creep" doesn't even quality
| as "bare bones" for any air superiority fighter.
|
| Anyway, if you want a multi-role aircraft without the
| stealth or sensor network gizmos of the F-35 there's the
| Gripen E series. Its purchase price is greater than the
| F-35 but its operating costs are much less. If you don't
| envision your country's airforce performing too many SEAD
| missions this tradeoff might make sense... but there's no
| free lunch!
| bumby wrote:
| I believe the list is long of airframes where you could
| initially find this complaint. I think the F18 had
| similar concerns after it originally lost its
| experimental competition to the F16. But the F18 found
| itself as a capable workhorse for the Navy for decades.
| Same with the Space Shuttle, etc.
| spamizbad wrote:
| The F-16, incidentally, got loaded to the gills with
| expensive gizmos after the fact because the Airforce (and
| other F-16 customers) quickly realized it made the
| aircraft a far more effective platform.
| formerly_proven wrote:
| > This turkey
|
| Spreyian detected, opinion discarded.
| bumby wrote:
| You do understand that most new airframes take a decade
| or more of R&D before they are put in service, right?
| jessaustin wrote:
| This thing _is_ in service, so conventional wisdom about
| how long it takes to do stuff before that is irrelevant.
| From the introduction of my original link:
|
| _Despite more than 20 years and approximately $62.5
| billion spent so far on research and development alone,
| program officials still haven't been able to deliver an
| aircraft that can fly as often as needed or to
| demonstrate its ability to perform in combat, which
| places military personnel in jeopardy._
|
| I would have said the "R&D decade" was the _1990s_ since
| JAST began in 1993 and developmental contracts were
| awarded in 1996, but POGO are conservative in their
| judgments.
| bumby wrote:
| Your first comment was about suspended development,
| implying you think the system should be part of a
| continuous R&D cycle. Yet this comment implies you think
| the system should be outside of development. It's hard to
| tell what you're criticizing when your points are
| inconsistent.
|
| I question some of the critiques in your link. For
| example, they claim the JSFs 61% availability rates are
| far below the standard of 75-80%. But if you look at
| published numbers, none of the legacy aircraft
| F15/F16/F18 variants (which have had decades to work out
| reliability issues) are above a 60% availability.[1]
|
| What, specifically, are you critical of in terms of the
| JSF capability? Is that criticism due to what you
| perceived as mismanaged development or mismanaged
| priorities (e.g., the tradeoffs of a single platform)?
| And what is the base rate for comparison?
|
| [1] https://www.cbo.gov/publication/57713
| jessaustin wrote:
| I don't agree that any of my statements have had any of
| those implications. USA citizens have the right to
| complain about any expensive government program. F35 is a
| $1.7T program, which qualifies as expensive. It's
| perfectly ordinary to see administrators of non-military
| programs called before Congress and raked over the coals
| for spending that seems excessive to some legislator
| playing to the basest instincts of voters. We recently
| decided, somehow, that a few billion dollars was too much
| of a tax _credit_ to justify keeping _millions_ of
| American children out of poverty. [0] We never see any
| elected politician complaining about military spending,
| however.
|
| It's a commonplace that we spend more on the military
| than the next ten nations put together, most of whom are
| our allies. That obscures the more amazing fact that over
| a third of the military spending _in the world_ is spent
| by USA. Obviously the Pentagon budget should be halved if
| not quartered, as we were promised before the Saudis
| dropped the WTC. In such a context, there would be no
| room for a plane that offers the prospect of more expense
| instead of more capability. Northrop lobbyists and their
| employees at think tanks and in the media might be able
| to dry-lab some "rates" and "figures" to distract from
| the obvious state of the F35 program. The scale of the
| disaster cannot be hidden from unbiased investigators.
| Even if it never makes the evening war media news, those
| who care to know can consult experts like POGO.
|
| However, if you insist on a criticism in the proper
| jargon, F35 will never, ever, regardless of how much is
| spent, be as capable at close air support as the vastly
| less expensive A10 "Warthog". You can ask any American
| serviceman who has served on the ground in the last two
| decades. This isn't the only important role for a
| military aircraft, but it is an important role.
|
| [0] https://www.povertycenter.columbia.edu/news-
| internal/monthly...
| bumby wrote:
| I agree with much of what you say. The citizenry have
| every right to criticize and lobby for their tax dollars
| to be spent differently. But it appears you've already
| come to the conclusion that the JSF isn't worthwhile. Put
| differently, what would the JSF need to show capability-
| wise in order to change your mind?
|
| I would like to see us spend less in the military if it
| goes to better use instead. Particularly when commanders
| are advocating getting rid of programs and Congress keeps
| them anyway. The US is effectively subsidizing NATOs
| military capability and mitigating the blowback requires
| more thoughtful analysis than just slashing the budget.
| I'm not convinced yet that POGO are the experts worth
| listening to because they seem a bit out of touch (see my
| last comment about what they claim the availability
| should be vs. the parity that matters).
|
| As one of those service members who was supported by the
| A10 overseas, you're right. Grunts on the ground love the
| sound of that cannon overhead when close air support is
| needed. But you are comparing the one specialized thing
| the A10 was designed to do. Stray in any direction away
| from that and it loses the comparison miserably. Compare
| avionics, speed, maneuverability and munitions capability
| etc. (really, anything outside of the cannon) and the JSF
| is just far superior. In other words, if I was only
| allowed to have one plane in theater, it wouldn't be the
| A10.
| jcranmer wrote:
| Wanting one pattern to work everywhere isn't necessarily a
| bad goal. The OCP pattern, for example, works decently in
| most environments, and is basically superior to the UCP
| pattern in virtually all environments (it's marginally weaker
| in NIR, though). So the real problem seems to be that the
| criteria for deciding the best pattern was chosen
| incompetently.
| foxyv wrote:
| There is an argument out there that the UCP camo patterns were
| more to make US troops distinct from enemy forces and reduce
| friendly fire than to provide any advantage for camouflage
| purposes. That it made American troops extremely identifiable
| by the distinct look of UCP.
|
| I don't know if I believe it, but it makes a little sense. What
| would have made more sense is if they had allowed tinting it to
| different colors based on the region. There is an example here:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9WckhOUMfHk
| autokad wrote:
| when I was playing paintball, some people would wear that junk.
| they may as well wear bright orange hunting jackets. I can see
| them easily.
| wyager wrote:
| One thing I was surprised to learn about NIR requirements is
| that it apparently doesn't just mean "dark". I have some coyote
| brown NIR compliant gear (water carriers etc) and under NIR it
| has the same shade as grass (which is quite bright, relatively
| speaking).
| spicymaki wrote:
| Today's camo is so much better than the red coats the British
| were wearing in the 18th century. _chuckle_
| chrisseaton wrote:
| The British red coats were a kind of dazzle camouflage, making
| it hard to see individuals within the group. People weren't
| stupid back then - they just had different design goals to what
| we have now.
| Alupis wrote:
| Flamboyantly colored uniforms of the time also helped prevent
| friendly fire. Each volley of musket fire filled the air with
| a white smoke cloud. [1][2]
|
| [1] https://d1w82usnq70pt2.cloudfront.net/wp-
| content/uploads/202...
|
| [2] https://www.goonhammer.com/goonhammer-historicals-firing-
| in-...
| function_seven wrote:
| "Lieutenant! We're sticking out like sore thumbs here! Why
| did we go with _bright-fucking-red_ as our uniform colour?
| The enemy can clearly see us coming! "
|
| "Corporal, your job is to bang on that drum as we march, not
| complain about military fashion."
| chrisseaton wrote:
| > We're sticking out like sore thumbs here!
|
| As I just said, the design consideration wasn't to not
| stick out.
|
| 'Shock action' is a modern military term, but that's partly
| what they were trying to achieve in those days through
| visual impact. 'Shatter the enemy's cohesion and will to
| fight' is something they were trying to achieve through
| visual impact.
|
| As another example today, think about why the UN paint
| their vehicles white. It's because their visibility and
| presence on the battlefield provides a tactical effect.
| seanw444 wrote:
| > UN
|
| > Tactical effect
|
| Hehe. Last thing I want helping me are Peacekeepers.
| denton-scratch wrote:
| I didn't think that UN peacekeepers appeared on
| battlefields - don't they normally stay in their bases,
| or patrol peaceful areas? There usually has to be some
| peace before the peacekeepers rock up.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| > don't they normally stay in their bases, or patrol
| peaceful areas
|
| The point is they turn up and show they're there to react
| if needed. You can see they're there because they're
| painted white.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Protection_F
| orc...
|
| I think 60 or so British UN peacekeepers were killed
| there, for example.
| [deleted]
| omginternets wrote:
| In addition, C2 was not what it is today, so an important
| design goal for military uniforms was to distinguish friend
| from foe on the battlefield.
|
| In the same vein, modern militaries often attach IR strobes
| to personnel and vehicles to identify them at night. This
| will likely appear silly in a few years when night optics are
| pervasive (if that hasn't happened already).
| Spooky23 wrote:
| Also life isn't a movie. That red dye would be worn away
| pretty quickly. They probably looked more brown in the field.
| the_af wrote:
| What advantage would it provide to make it harder to
| distinguish individual soldiers? Wouldn't their enemies just
| volley fire into the mass of red coats, instead of picking
| and choosing?
| Majromax wrote:
| > What advantage would it provide to make it harder to
| distinguish individual soldiers?
|
| Distinguishing individual soldiers is an important step in
| counting the size of a line. Accepting "red coats blend
| together" as truth, that would make it more difficult for
| an opposing general to determine which parts of a battle
| line were stronger or weaker, thus making it more difficult
| to preposition forces to exploit weak sections.
|
| Once the battle was joined the camouflage effect would not
| have mattered as much, but before the deployment of radio
| it was also very, very difficult to change battle plans "on
| the fly."
| the_af wrote:
| When determining weaker sections visually, wouldn't you
| go by "mass" of soldiers? I don't think anybody would
| count individual soldiers.
|
| In any case, given the technology of the time, if you
| were beyond engagement range, I don't think you would
| have been able to pick out individual soldiers by sight
| regardless of which uniforms they were wearing...
|
| My theory is that vibrant color uniforms were chosen
| simply to make identification of different formations
| easier.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| It helped to identify friend-vs-foe yes, but not
| formation, as formations were distinguished by the lining
| of their uniform, which wasn't very visible!
|
| Also red was just an easy colour to get hold of and to
| dye with, and it hid blood.
|
| The red mass of undistinguished soldiers created an
| imposing sight on the battlefield. It's not about wanting
| to hit individuals (why would you?) it's about the shock
| factor.
|
| This is only infantry as well - where shock action was
| even more important - cavalry - and distinction didn't
| apply - you had less uniform more elaborate uniforms.
| Spooky23 wrote:
| The British had long lines with not too many ranks to
| maximize delivery of bullets to the enemy.
|
| Figuring out how many where there was harder than it may
| seem.
| esaym wrote:
| I don't know, maybe ask a zebra.
| the_af wrote:
| It's funny because zebra stripes don't make them harder
| to be seen by lions. There was an article about this on
| HN, showing the low-res vision of lions cannot tell
| stripes or no stripes at a distance.
|
| Apparently zebra stripes have more to do with reducing
| _fly bites_ , among other things.
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| Camouflage was absolutely not a goal of 18th century
| uniforms. When you are wheeling around infantry units like
| big blocks camouflage is more or less tactically irrelevant.
|
| Furthermore, if they were trying to blend in with each other
| like one big homogeneous mass of infantry they wouldn't have
| given everyone hats in a contrasting color.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| I said _dazzle_ camouflage, and it was.
|
| The goal of their uniforms wasn't to hide individuals
| within the environment, but to make it hard to discern
| individuals within the imposing mass of soldiers.
| denton-scratch wrote:
| That doesn't explain why early-modern generals adopted
| costumes with extremely distinctive hats. Napoleon's hat,
| for example, was meant to allow troops to discern him
| instantly.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| A leader would want to stand out - this was before long
| range marksmen would be able to hit them from a distance.
| notatoad wrote:
| part of the benefit of a distinctive hat is that you can
| take it off for an instant disguise.
| spicymaki wrote:
| Just a little context here! I was just adding a little humor to
| the thread. I did not actually think they were wearing
| camouflage.
| Rastonbury wrote:
| Makes me think of active camflague like a cloaking device,
| probably not practical for military, but give 360 camera,
| processing and miniaturization technology advancement how hard
| would it be to make a see through car for instance
| cxcorp wrote:
| There's a system named ADAPTIV [1] which is essentially a bunch
| of tiles that can alter their temperature to make a tank look
| like a civilian car on the infrared band.
|
| [1]: https://www.baesystems.com/en/feature/adativ-cloak-of-
| invisi...
| spywaregorilla wrote:
| Spotting dudes in camo seems like a prime opportunity for neural
| net ar
| qbasic_forever wrote:
| There's nothing useful to deploy it on though--the 'future
| soldier' concept of the 90s never went anywhere
| (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_Soldier) and we don't
| have a computer platform on every soldier. IMHO I'd stick to
| using machine learning to detect stealth aircraft and missiles
| to improve intercepting them.
| spywaregorilla wrote:
| I've heard the javelin missile launchers have been great in
| ukraine because they can double as night / thermal vision.
| This concept seems similar to me. Never been on a battlefield
| but I guess it seems dubious that most modern soldiers don't
| have some form of digital aid?
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| Yes and no. Special ops forces could definitely make use of
| it. The hard part is ensuring the deployment equipment is
| reliable 99.99% of the time, since bugs on the battlefield
| get people killed.
| bloqs wrote:
| Random but does anyone know where to buy a official Crye
| precision multicam texture for game dev? Their website gives the
| impression they just sell fabrics to the US market
| chrisseaton wrote:
| Sounds expensive.
| tiffanyh wrote:
| I'm somewhat surprised the article didn't discuss "contrast" as
| it relates to patterns and background.
| some_random wrote:
| This is a fascinating read that I recommend to anyone interested
| in modern camouflage.
| mNovak wrote:
| I'm actually stunned just how effective that MARPAT pattern is
| compared to the NATO blob camo, in the second image.
| fho wrote:
| Question (from somebody who only skimmed the article): how much
| variance exists of that fabric? Is that pattern repeated after x
| meters if fabric?
|
| If so: wouldn't knowing what to look for greatly increase the
| ability to automatically extract the pattern from image data?
| (Like how it is possible to extract signals from below the noise
| floor in LoRa communication?)
| denton-scratch wrote:
| I was hoping to learn why the pixelated designs started
| appearing. Author says they work; but what led anyone to think
| that those designs might work? Why did they try them in the first
| place? And actually, _why_ do they work?
|
| I find it bizarre that this is all done by private companies,
| competing in public competitions, with royalties to be paid for
| the chosen design. And I'm quite surprised that some designs were
| found wanting because they don't work under IR (e.g. the soldier
| shines against the background). That sounds like they're using
| the wrong dyes; surely a decent design methodology would lead to
| such problems being remedied by incremental improvement?
| jcranmer wrote:
| The answers to your first paragraph is in another part of the
| series:
|
| > Now we can address the Micropattern - digital pixels. These
| are required to add background noise and texture matching with
| the background and this is designed to fool with the focal area
| of the eye - when you are looking directly at or close to the
| target to make it more difficult to recognize what you are
| looking at.
| [deleted]
| ryanmercer wrote:
| >Why did they try them in the first place?
|
| With no knowledge what so ever my gut reaction is to simply
| point to nature. Leaves get eaten/bitten/broken/ripped, a
| branch might be in front of another adding depth with similar
| patterns, rocks and sand in a desert can vary sharply at
| different focal depths, urban environments can have dozens of
| materials in use along with random detritus and objects at
| various focal depths.
|
| Pixilation was probably a logical step towards recreating these
| varied environments. Look at a ghillie suit that has leaves
| incorporated, they'll have a pixilated appearance - example:
| https://static5.gunfire.com/eng_pl_Ghillie-Suit-camouflage-s...
| denton-scratch wrote:
| Well, that ghillie suit doesn't look pixelated to me - it
| just looks like it has quite a few straight-sided polygons in
| it.
|
| Actually, that's what's bugging me most about this camo made
| from regular square blocks: it looks really easy for a
| recogniser to spot. No AI <spit>, an old-fashioned neural
| network would be enough to recognise edges, and then spot
| squares on a grid.
|
| [Edit] Yeah, I get that your average stag deer doesn't have
| access to thermal imaging and neural networks. But this is
| military camo, not deerstalking camo.
| somerandomqaguy wrote:
| CADPAT works terrifyingly well in the temperate forests of
| Canada during spring/summer. I had a chance to go try and to
| spot people wearing CADPAT in the early 2000's and it was a
| royal pain to try and see them compared to the olive drab or
| even the US woodland patterns.
|
| Just a fun aside: when Canada invaded Afghanistan, there was a
| lack of the arid variant of CADPAT. It left soldiers to land in
| the brown and tan desert wearing vivid green camouflage
| designed for summer in the Canadian rain forests.
|
| >I find it bizarre that this is all done by private companies,
| competing in public competitions, with royalties to be paid for
| the chosen design. And I'm quite surprised that some designs
| were found wanting because they don't work under IR (e.g. the
| soldier shines against the background). That sounds like
| they're using the wrong dyes; surely a decent design
| methodology would lead to such problems being remedied by
| incremental improvement?
|
| It was fixed AFAIK. IIRC issued CADPAT clothing were controlled
| items in 2000's because they had the the treatments designed to
| work against near infrared. Civilian CADPAT lacked those
| treatments so companies like Tru Spec[1] could sell it on the
| open market. There were other teething issues I am aware of;
| the dyes bleeding into splotches instead of the digital pattern
| as called for, as well as fading issues after laundering. Fixed
| of course but it took some iterations.
|
| [1] I just double checked, Tru Spec never sold it. There were
| some smaller outfits in Canada that produced CADPAT available
| on the civilian market for short time; Drop Zone Tactical out
| of Edmonton for sure was one. Rumor mill is that it was
| material made by Consoltex under military contract that failed
| to meet the military's specifications and sold off to licensed
| DND manufactures to recoup costs.
| fartcannon wrote:
| What was worse, CADPAT or UCP? I couldn't find it in the
| article. Instinct is that CADPAT was worse, but UCP was just
| that style without the contrast thus negating one of it's
| features (disrupting the human shape with high contrast).
| lwansbrough wrote:
| CADPAT is the basis for MARPAT. It's the most effective
| generic pattern that has been produced (according to the
| article.)
| fartcannon wrote:
| Thanks. Is MARPAT what the Canadian soldiers showed up to
| Afghanistan in?
|
| Edit: looks like the wore the forest green stuff to
| Afghanistan. The only articles I can find suggests they
| did it on purpose, to stand out for peace keeping
| reasons, but that could easily be damage control. Anyone
| know the real story? GP suggests they just didn't have an
| arid design at the time (which I would believe).
| jimmygrapes wrote:
| I can't comment on Canadian forces, but I can, with some
| reasonable level of confidence, say that some number of
| U.S. forces arrived with old forest green BDU pattern
| (despite the existence and previous use of the "chocolate
| chip" pattern) simply because that's what we had.
| mikechalmers wrote:
| > Just a fun aside: when Canada invaded Afghanistan, there
| was a lack of the arid variant of CADPAT. It left soldiers to
| land in the brown and tan desert wearing vivid green
| camouflage designed for summer in the Canadian rain forests.
|
| This is a (kinda funny) plotline in Generation Kill.
| muro wrote:
| Shining under different light (e.g. IR) is nothing new. I think
| it was Soviet paint on tanks that was highly visible early in
| WW2 through a filter.
| retSava wrote:
| An interesting macro-variant is the Berlin brigade tank camo
| pattern, which is surprisingly cool! No idea where that comes
| into uniform camo pattern history nor how efficient it is, but
| who cares. It's cool beans.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berlin_Infantry_Brigade#/media...
| _petronius wrote:
| Maybe it is related to dazzle camoflauge used on ships?
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dazzle_camouflage
|
| There the goal is less to avoid detection and more to make it
| hard to determine direction/orientation.
| jabl wrote:
| My guess would be that the thinking behind it was that in
| urban environments you have more straight
| vertical/horizontal lines (houses, roads etc.) and thus
| wavy camouflage patterns would stand out more from the
| background.
| rtkwe wrote:
| Dazzle camo wasn't so much a "hide me" camo as it was a
| "hide data needed to shot me" camo. It was designed to make
| it harder to estimate heading and speed so it was harder to
| calculate accurate shots by submarines and naval guns which
| needed data about the target ship's speed, distance and
| heading to calculate an accurate shot.
| kingofpandora wrote:
| Honestly, the first thing that came to mind was the pattern
| used on V-2 rockets: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-2_rocket
| ...
| cwillu wrote:
| Wrong photo: this just shows a bunch of disembodied heads
| floating down a street.
| danielvf wrote:
| It's not really so much about the pixels being square as the
| fractal-ish nature of mordern pixel camos that result in a
| "scale invariance" effect. There's details and contrast at the
| level of the small pixels, and there's details and contrasts
| are medium levels, and then again at large levels. Previous US
| army camo mostly had detail at only one scale level.
|
| As jcranmer says, there's more details on the reasons it works
| somewhere down in this page,
| https://www.hyperstealth.com/US4CES-ALPHA/index.html
| Gordonjcp wrote:
| So basically, "if I make them fractal they look like patterns
| in nature, and if I scale tiny pixel fractals on screen up to
| the width of a bolt of cloth they still look like fractal
| patterns in nature, and if I get it right the details end up
| about the same scale as details in nature, mostly" kind of
| thing?
| Sharlin wrote:
| Exactly. Very very few things in nature actually are made of
| large blobs of a single color (unless you're very
| shortsighted). Honestly, it baffles me why militaries didn't
| realize this earlier.
| hnarn wrote:
| > it baffles me why militaries didn't realize this earlier
|
| Waffen-SS used dotted camouflage in the late 1930s
| (Platanenmuster), so depending on what you mean by
| "earlier" the idea of camouflage without "large blobs"
| isn't that modern.
|
| The Erbsenmuster from 1944 is an even better example of
| this type of camouflage.
| Sharlin wrote:
| Thanks, good info!
| rtkwe wrote:
| The ability to easily print and create those patterns has
| likely improved over the years to where it's cheap enough
| to be worth the mild improvements vs the cost of the
| printing of the uniforms.
|
| Plus, like another commenter said camouflage is a last to
| second to last line of defense. Most units aren't moving
| stealthily in close proximity to their enemy and those that
| do adopt better camouflage techniques like ghillie suits or
| using terrain to hide while staying still (eg: waiting to
| ambush another group).
| Sharlin wrote:
| As a Finn, my conception of warfare is probably biased
| towards a specific type that happens in woodlands with
| short sightlines and lots of natural concealment. Direct-
| fire engagement distances tend to be short, infantry
| tactics are informed by the desire to get as close as
| possible without being seen, and by unit movement
| (possibly under aerial surveillance) while giving away as
| little information as possible.
|
| I do think that the Finnish M05 woodland camo [1] is one
| of the best in the world =)
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M05
| bityard wrote:
| Source: former military member.
|
| In combat, camouflage is really the VERY last line of
| defense possible, and a fairly weak one at that. If the
| difference between staying alive and being dead is the
| pattern of your clothing, a lot of things have already gone
| seriously wrong and your chances of survival are not great.
|
| In the grand scheme of things, camo relatively high-hanging
| fruit. Money and time have mostly been spent on building
| superior weapons, armor, and of course training. Camo is a
| very small optimization in comparison and when the Army and
| Air Force decided to change up their BDU patterns, it was
| viewed by me and my fellow service members as largely a
| public image stunt. ("Look everyone, we're modern!")
|
| Edit: to be clear, I'm only referring to uniforms...
| snipers and such use camouflage netting for example that is
| tailored to their exact location and can be extremely
| effective at "hiding in plain sight."
| ncmncm wrote:
| Snipers need good camo, but the people snipers snipe
| don't?
| samstave wrote:
| I just had a really odd thought cross my head and want to
| just document here before I forget it:
|
| The way rifles work with recoils driving the expulsion of
| a shell after firing and using that force to load the
| next round to chamber (the famous AK47 design)
|
| --
|
| Would there be a method of attaching a compressed water
| bottle with valve with a donut nozzle with vents out at
| angles to the optimal suppression of the muzzle flash.
|
| The idea being that, like a paintball gun, the machine's
| trigger pull, also has a tangential trig that pulls an
| outburst a micro second from the rifle, in a ring mist of
| water/(some more expensive, toxic military fire-
| suppressant (ironic) to reduce the muzzle flash on
| shot...
|
| May it reduce the muzzle flare? or is it too weak? Should
| it launch behind muzzle, after muzzle?
|
| The bullet down the barrel triggers the valve when it
| hits 50% of barrel length. Once that induction occurs, it
| triggers the valve, and the flame suppressant cloud is
| spit out micro seconds prior to bullet breach...
|
| ---
|
| I am convinced that we can use Davincis micro fluidics...
| turbulence drawings.
|
| ----
|
| So let talk about next gen firing
|
| The barrel release could be routed to drive the exhaust
| through channels which drive micro-turbine motors that
| slurp back through the external of barrel and infuse with
| water.
|
| Working on this in Solid
| mechanical_bear wrote:
| I think TempleOS started in a similar fashion...
| samstave wrote:
| sandworm101 wrote:
| In all honesty, there isnt much room to improve the
| actions of modern assault rifles. There are dozens of
| post-stoner improvements that have bern tried. Millions
| have been spent on them. They have all been shelved as to
| complex or cumbersome. The gas-operated rotating bolt is
| so elegant, so reliable, that fundimental improvements
| are hard to imagine.
|
| Adding water to the equation? Rust, mud, weight, boiling
| ... you would need some radical improvements to justify
| such added complexity.
| akerl_ wrote:
| You're basically describing "muzzle brakes and flash
| suppressors, but with more components to refill/repair"
|
| Separately, using the force of the round (either via a
| gas tube or via direct rearward motion) to propel the
| action of the firearm isn't really an AK47 thing, it's
| common to all semi automatic rifles and predates the AK47
| by quite a while.
| abrokenpipe wrote:
| A flash hider such as a "3 prong" achieves the same
| affect with no moving parts, also suppressors can pretty
| much eliminate all flash and offer hearing protection and
| additional signature reduction by reducing the db levels
| and changing the pitch of the noise.
| samstave wrote:
| I want to compare the modern versions of suppressions
| with the old designs of one-way-fluidic valves.
|
| The reason:
|
| Davinciy was cabable of documenting the vortices of
| variues pulses of fluidicsbut the vortices expecticed
| creates the fluid dynamics
|
| Hopw the fuck in 400 years have these guys come NOT up
| with better?
|
| I dont trust a single structural eng.
| rtkwe wrote:
| Yeah for a fraction of the cost in complexity, weight and
| issues with consumables a suppressor does all of what
| they were talking about and more. The US army is in
| theory going to a new rifle and issuing suppressors to
| every (frontline) infantry unit with the NGSW contract.
|
| (We'll see how widely the new system and everything
| actually gets deployed but it was an important part of
| the whole program at least)
| Sharlin wrote:
| Why not just build one in? I guess I'm accustomed to
| assault rifles having flash suppressors because the one
| that I've actually handled and lugged around and shot
| with, the Valmet RK 62, does have a suppressor built in,
| a distinctive feature [1].
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RK_62
| avereveard wrote:
| Possibly length is a factor
| rtkwe wrote:
| I'm not seeing anything about a built in sound suppressor
| just a flash suppressor which is a fairly common feature
| on modern assault rifles and their civilian variants. You
| don't generally build in a suppressor because they're
| technically wear items as the hot gases will slowly erode
| the baffles over time. That plus their extra weight and
| cost meant most militaries only issued them to units that
| were built for stealth missions in the past.
| Sharlin wrote:
| Ah, when you said "suppressor" I thought you meant "flash
| suppressor" but rereading I realize you meant "sound
| suppressor" like the GP.
| Sharlin wrote:
| I don't think muzzle flash is a big problem in today's
| rifles. Any powder left burning by the time the bullet
| exits the barrel is wasted energy, so things tend to get
| optimized pretty thoroughly (this is the field of
| internal and transitional ballistics). Carbine-length
| firearms (if they're chambered for rifle rounds) do tend
| to have bigger issues with muzzle flash. Flash
| suppressors [1], either integrated or add-on, help and
| have exactly zero complexity compared to a hypothetical
| water mister.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_suppressor
| jollybean wrote:
| In the first phase of Ukrainian war soldiers were firing
| a lot of line of sight, it does matter. And especially
| the IR / night vision opportunities are real.
|
| It's very 'low hanging fruit'. It's ridiculous that that
| a 20 Trillion dollar Army has 'camouflage' that is very
| clearly crap next to better camo.
|
| These tests could have literally been run in a day, even
| back in the 1950s.
|
| Some soldiers, some screens, a few cameras, some changes
| in lighting and it would have been evident.
|
| Moreover, it's reasonable to be suspect in whether an
| organization that can't handle such a basic R&D task is
| going to be able to handle the more complicated things.
| jcranmer wrote:
| There are, it seems, a few aspects that went into the
| seemingly-obviously-poor decision to go with UCP.
|
| The first is that the criteria that appears to have been
| most important was performance in near-IR (i.e., night
| vision). Humans can't see in NIR themselves, so it's not
| readily apparent that the UCP is actually _pretty good_
| camo in NIR conditions. It 's pretty atrocious in visible
| light, though.
|
| The second is the requirement that the camo pattern be
| good in all environments. And "standard" woodland
| patterns to be utterly horrendous in sandy desert
| environments, while desert patterns do similarly bad in
| woodland environments. And you can see how something like
| the UCP might score well--while it's not a good camo
| pattern for any visible pattern, it sticks out less than
| a standard woodland in desert or vice versa. Of course,
| there were other patterns at that time that performed
| strictly better than UCP in all environments (save NIR).
|
| The main kicker, though, is that the winning pattern
| seems to have been constructed out of elements of all the
| participating patterns... with no follow-up work done to
| make sure that the resulting combination _actually
| worked_. As you say, this is where some tests would have
| saved an awful lot of embarrassment, and my suspicion is
| these tests were not run for either time or money
| reasons. (And yes, this is a false economy here, but it
| 's one that I can really believe bureaucracies pursuing).
|
| There is historical precedence for this kind of short-
| sightedness however: the Mark 14 Torpedo, the main
| torpedo the US used in WW2. Which didn't work, and the
| Navy's Board of Ordnance took a couple years (and
| ultimately an unsanctioned live-fire test demonstrating
| that it didn't work) to be convinced that they actually
| didn't work rather than the submariners being packs of
| incompetent morons.
| lupire wrote:
| Axien wrote:
| With thermal imaging, do snipers still rely on
| camouflage?
| Sharlin wrote:
| Good camo is broadband. Camo nets, ghillie suits help
| spread and dissipate a thermal signature, making it more
| difficult to pick up from the noise. And unless you have
| a JWST and know exactly where to point it (and obviously
| the whole idea of snipers is that you _don 't_ know),
| good luck trying to find a human head-sized target that's
| a klick away from you.
| tablespoon wrote:
| > With thermal imaging, do snipers still rely on
| camouflage?
|
| Does everyone on a battlefield have thermal imaging? Even
| if there's a technology X that can defeat Y, if X can't
| be deployed widely, then X can still be useful.
| sandworm101 wrote:
| >>In combat, camouflage is really the VERY last line of
| defense possible
|
| Current military member here. It is also the first line
| of defense against fratricide. It means your friends can
| tell you from the not-friends. A distinct pattern, unique
| to your organization, is what stops aircraft from
| dropping on you. So as current patterns trickle out into
| private hands, eventually every military organization
| needs to update its look.
| tomcam wrote:
| Sadly I'm a large blob of a single color
| denton-scratch wrote:
| Well, I'm now much better informed!
|
| It does sound as if there's not much methodology in this
| business, beyond empirical testing. Like, is there a science
| of 'camouflagology'? [oops, when inventing words, never mix
| latin and greek]
|
| It just seems like it's basically lore, gathered from talking
| to fgillies and field experience, augmented by tests (which
| may be omitted, or the results ignored). Anyway, it might be
| fun to take a minor in camouflagology.
| mindcrime wrote:
| _Like, is there a science of 'camouflagology'? [oops, when
| inventing words, never mix latin and greek]_
|
| I don't know if there's a more specific term or not, but
| camouflage is studied (along with other things) under the
| general subject of "Crypsis".
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crypsis
|
| Note that this seems to be more particularly about natural
| forms of camouflage / etc., as opposed to military
| camouflage used by humans. But the two areas are clearly
| related.
|
| Regardless of what you call it, it does appear that there
| is some science that goes into at least some aspects of
| this. See, for example:
|
| https://phys.org/news/2021-01-camouflage-arbitrary-
| environme...
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| That still doesnt answer the question of why pixels.
|
| You can scale invariance and fractals with squares,
| triangles, or whatever shape you want.
| shawabawa3 wrote:
| > "Pixels have minimal impact on the ambient vision but a
| large impact on the focal cone causing further delay as the
| brain attempts to process the increased detail, when
| pixelation in camouflage is done correctly (color and
| scale) the brain will confuse the background noise with the
| pixels, removing the anomaly as a threat or delaying the
| identification of a threat. (6)"
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| I read that as having more to do with the length scale of
| features represented by the pixels than the shape of the
| pixel itself.
|
| From the biological perspective, the same phenomenon
| should happen with dots or triangular shapes
| blt wrote:
| Maybe it's easier to implement the pattern generation
| algorithm for pixel output?
| adolph wrote:
| _In development since 1983, the camo saw no use in the field
| until it was deployed during the first Gulf War (1990-1991)._
|
| _The purpose was to disrupt primitive Soviet-era night vision.
| The grid pattern was intended to interfere with the generated
| grid used by these devices for targeting._
|
| _Even after plenty of research I could find no cases of this
| pattern ever disrupting anything. By the early 90's, night
| vision technology had progressed greatly and this green grid
| was completely ineffective. There is even some anecdotal
| evidence it made detection easier!_
|
| https://guide.sportsmansguide.com/gulf-war-desert-night-camo...
| nonrandomstring wrote:
| Pattern is only one small factor. It's usually taken to be
| "Surface" in the list:
|
| - Shape
|
| - Shine
|
| - Shadow
|
| - Speed
|
| - Surface
|
| - Silhouette
|
| - Spacing
|
| - Smell
|
| - Sound
| guessbest wrote:
| I personally find the who camouflage switch to every branch of
| service, including the navy to be bizarre. Who thought it was
| good idea for navy seamen to be camouflaged in the water? With
| that line of reasoning why didn't the airforce get their own
| camouflage to look like a flight line? hah
|
| > After six years in the fleet and some controversy, the blue-
| and-gray cammies could be headed for Davy Jones' seabag.
|
| https://www.navytimes.com/news/your-navy/2016/04/23/the-navy...
| Gordonjcp wrote:
| > why didn't the airforce get their own camouflage to look
| like a flight line^W^W bar stool?
|
| ftfy
| NovemberWhiskey wrote:
| The Air Force did get their own camo - the ABU (Airman Battle
| Uniform) digital tiger-stripe; based on a Vietnam-era tiger-
| stripe uniform but with a color palette similar to the UCP;
| only with more blue.
|
| In fact, it's not just their own camouflage pattern, the ABU
| actually had a distinctive blouse and pants that are
| different from the BDU that came before, or the ACU that the
| Army had adopted. Then they took the sage-green fleece from
| ECWCS Gen III (what the Army was wearing), and added the
| APECS Goretex parka that the Marine Corps was wearing, only
| in the ABU tiger-stripe rather than MARPAT.
|
| Most of the actual battlefield airmen (i.e. the people who
| might reasonably expect to find themselves in combat
| conditions where camouflage could help like combat
| controller, TACP, PJ) didn't wear it anyway.
|
| As pointed out elsewhere, this is very largely about esprit-
| de-corps in the context of a military organization, even if
| your job is actually avionics maintenance or personnel.
|
| It does seem like a huge waste for all the services to have
| their own completely distinctive utility uniforms though -
| the pendulum is swinging back the other way now with the
| Army, Air Force and Space Force all back in the redesigned
| ACU/OCP with stitching color (black/spice-brown/blue) as the
| service-distinctive element.
| volumetric wrote:
| I don't get why the branches in which very few folks are
| likely to need camo (basically anyone other than the army,
| then, and some sub-divisions of other branches like the
| marine corp) don't go with old-school olive drab or navy or
| something. Those single-color uniforms with a slightly
| dressy cut looked damn slick. I'd think that'd be better
| for recruiting or improving morale or whatever than the
| camo uniforms (which, often as not, are the butts of jokes
| and not considered at all appealing)
|
| Then again, maybe those old styles only looked good when
| they were made with nice materials, like wool and heavy
| waxed canvas, and would look bad with cheap modern
| synthetics.
| imwillofficial wrote:
| As a sailor, I always really liked the Coast Guards
| working uniform.
|
| Simple, effective, dare I say elegant.
| NovemberWhiskey wrote:
| >camo uniforms ... _which, often as not, are the butts of
| jokes and not considered at all appealing_
|
| I think you'll find they're pretty appealing to a lot of
| the people who want to be in the military.
| jcranmer wrote:
| One advantage of camo uniforms for working utility
| uniforms is they tend to be effective in hiding things
| like grime and mud, which consequently means you need to
| launder them less frequently to keep up the same
| appearance. If you've got a solid single-color uniform,
| chances are that these will stick out like a sore thumb.
| That was one thing that sailors liked about the old US
| Navy NWU (the one that camouflaged you very effectively
| if you fell in the water)--really good at hiding paint
| drips.
|
| With regards to looking good, I don't think it's
| necessarily that the look good with appropriate
| materials, but more that they look good only when they
| are properly starched and the like to maintain crisp
| lines.
| jessaustin wrote:
| _...camouflaged you very effectively if you fell in the
| water..._
|
| This seems good in some situations and very bad in
| others?
| Taniwha wrote:
| I think that seeing 'Space Force' going around in camo is
| even more asinine ....
| imwillofficial wrote:
| Space force is still in many ways still a child of the Air
| Force, and follow Air Force uniform refs.
| jcranmer wrote:
| Space Force does have its own dress uniforms.
| imwillofficial wrote:
| Former US sailor here. The "camouflage" blue is no longer in
| use, but when it was, we jokingly referred to each other as
| "ocean warriors". The reasoning for why this pattern was
| chosen for working use, was that it hid oil stains and fresh
| paint really well, letting you wear the uniform longer.
|
| The reality? Some politician or admiral wanted to leave their
| mark.
| nordsieck wrote:
| > I personally find the who camouflage switch to every branch
| of service, including the navy to be bizarre. Who thought it
| was good idea for navy seamen to be camouflaged in the water?
| With that line of reasoning why didn't the airforce get their
| own camouflage to look like a flight line? hah
|
| Not everything the military does is about effectiveness.
| Sometimes senior NCOs want the enlisted to "look military",
| not just be effective.
|
| Here's another example: why is the military PT (physical
| training) test varied by sex and age? If it was only about
| combat effectiveness, presumably there'd be 1 set of values
| that determine if someone had sufficient fitness relative to
| the rigors of combat (or whatever their job requires).
| rtkwe wrote:
| In addition to things other people have said there's a lot
| of roles that aren't combat so increasing the number of
| women who can qualify can fill out those roles (logistics,
| the reams of sundry clerical work, maintenance, etc) where
| physical strength isn't as critical helps fill out a
| volunteer army.
| jcranmer wrote:
| There's a concept called 'tooth-to-tail ratio' which is
| the ratio of combat personnel to non-combat personnel in
| an army. The modern US army has a tooth-to-tail ratio of
| about ~1:8. This isn't necessarily a great correlation to
| physically demanding versus not-physically-demanding
| jobs, it does illustrate how tiny the front-line portion
| of the military actually is.
| rcurry wrote:
| The new Navy camouflage is designed to keep your uniform
| looking clean when you are working around paints and oils
| and so on. It's purely for workplace aesthetics and not
| intended to hide you from anyone.
| Retric wrote:
| It was a diagnostic test. Like how a loss of fuel
| efficiency is a sign that something is wrong with an
| engine, if someone can't meet the standard something has
| gone wrong. Which is why it was treated as a pure pass
| fail.
| imwillofficial wrote:
| It's a standards test, where failing can potentially get
| you kicked out. While also used as a diagnostic to let
| you know if you're slipping, its primary and only stated
| purpose is to uphold an objective standard.
|
| This makes variations by age and sex concessions to that
| goal, rather than design elements.
| Retric wrote:
| The standards test is different. Occupational Physical
| Assessment Test results are Unqualified, Moderate,
| Significant, or Heavy which is then used to decide if
| someone meets an appropriate standard.
|
| Meanwhile the Army would sometimes retain people
| incapable of passing the old age and gender standard. As
| an extreme example people with missing limbs could be
| retained.
| ARandomerDude wrote:
| Much of this is service pride, politics, and recruiting. If
| the other services switch and you don't, your service looks
| dated, boring, and irrelevant.
|
| Imagine the JavaScript cool kid mindset but with guns.
| russellbeattie wrote:
| > _Imagine the JavaScript cool kid mindset but with guns._
|
| A more terrifying sentence than this has rarely been
| written.
| imwillofficial wrote:
| The table stakes are uniforms here, lets not blow it out
| of proportion.
| hinkley wrote:
| During the I-for-get-which war, the army hired color-blind
| spotters because the enemy camo turned out to be fooling fully
| sighted people but was less effective with red-green color
| blindness. I don't recall if it was texture or contrast issues
| but they stood out against the trees and shrubbery enough to
| locate.
|
| So we not only have to worry about invisible spectra, but some
| filters on visible light may reveal the target as well.
| evan_ wrote:
| This was used in Vietnam. My neighbor growing up had this
| condition and was a spotter in Vietnam. He'd be flown over
| areas of jungle in a helicopter and he would be able to
| easily spot camouflaged structures. He would then photograph
| them and mark up what he saw. He parlayed this experience
| into a successful career in photojournalism after he got out
| of the military.
| rcurry wrote:
| That's kind of like hunters who buy expensive camo and then
| their wife washes it with laundry detergent that contains
| brightening agents. To human eyes it still looks like camo,
| but to the deer you end up looking like Barney the Dinosaur.
| bluGill wrote:
| Very real issue. My uncle used to be a big hunter (he died a
| couple years ago), and could never see other hunters wearing
| the required blaze orange, but when they were wearing
| camouflage he had no problem seeing them in the woods.
|
| I have lots of other stories about the wierd things color
| blind people see and don't see. (My sisters are color blind,
| none of my family sees colors exactly the same, makes for
| some weird situations)
| ncmncm wrote:
| Funny, considering most game animals are color-blind.
| outworlder wrote:
| If that works, wouldn't wearing glasses to filter out some
| wavelengths work just as well?
| ncmncm wrote:
| Removing light reduces vision. Color-blind people pick up
| all the photons, they just don't distinguish them.
| kodah wrote:
| MARPAT is a very well documented case:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MARPAT In its case, it was chosen
| because the blocks actually blend very well into environments
| when viewed from a distance.
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