Why do they keep on putting those shiny patches on their hats? They might as well put a target on that hat that makes a sound of a ding when it gets hit.PAP summer combat shirt.
Infantry Combat Equipment (non-firearm): Vests, Body Armor, NVGs, etc.
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Help with friend-or-foe identification. Ukrainian soldiers are wearing bright yellow armbands to identify themselves.
New patches aren’t shiny in real life, old ones are indeed shiny, but in combat you are supposed to wear a helmet anyway
Dude, you can’t see the patch from behind
TerraN_EmpirE
Tyrant King
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Mickey Mouse rules. It’s like why do some armies have polished boots with camouflaged uniforms? Why pin metal rank or wing insignia to said camouflage? What does a beret serve any tactical function? Why should your camouflaged uniform be pressed?
It’s part tradition dating back to older uniforms and eras when camouflage wasn’t used. It’s also meant to give a look of discipline and smartness in garrison. It’s not an issue unique to the PLA, other military have done similar things especially those who have been or are still eastern aligned. Often they as modernization requires choose to either subdue it to black or tan or green to blend more into the uniform material. Or they just remove it from some but not other equipment.
For example the USMC put the Eagle Globe and Anchor logo on its boonie hat and helmet cover (previous version). Then came to problems first boonie hats like the one earn by the soldier in the picture are considered in US DOD as a field cover and not worn in formation so why badge it? No badge on them. As to the helmet cover well night vision mount covers it. It’s gone too. The PLA is still an army in transition but very much a Garrison army. Said device is visible on helmets boonies and caps.
As can be seen in the image I posted above, the hat device has clearly gotten larger. However a patch generally is lower profile than a metal pin. So imo less of a target still generally a boonie hat is just not suited to such a device.
You don't have to, if you're approaching from behind and they're facing away from you, then it's 99% likely you're approaching a friendly unit.
If you encounter a group of human figures facing towards you though, it might be the enemy, or it might be friendlies.
The shape of your figure, and movement (humans are good at spotting movement), and your hat/helmet, will give away your position far before the enemy notices there's a patch on it.
There's only 2 possibilities, they're facing away from you, in which case you have the drop on them, even if they're enemies, or they turn to look at you, in which case you can immediately tell who they are from the patch on their helmets. It's slightly better than colored armbands since anyone can get colored armbands and pretend to be on your side.
Not so much a problem for regular warfare, but for infiltrators it makes a difference. They'd have to know what patches the specific unit in that area is wearing.
The history of the PLA involves civil war where the enemies look exactly like you and you're using mostly equipment taken from them and with a whole bunch of defectors on your side. After that also came war with Vietnam where they look exactly like you and use similar uniforms and equipment.
I think a patch isn't ideal, but you need a way to tell quickly whose side those human figures approaching you in the distance are on, and bright yellow/red/white/blue armbands seem like a worse option than patches.
Here's a video from the 80s during the Sino-Vietnam Border conflicts featuring BIG patches on helmets. (around 8 minutes)
MwRYum
Major
Try to remember the job and scope of the PAP, and you should understand IFF would be a higher concern than that of low vis camo...besides, that "PAP special" gives me a vibe of service branch identification practice, like that with the Type 07 camo era, which is supposedly ended with the Type 19/21 uniform series.
The good news is, they finally introduce low-vis insignia service wide.
Though, at the risk of being regard as off-topic, I should point that PAP can potentially choose to use something like this for their urban outfits...
Yes they're HKPF recently introduced new gear, and considering the realpolitik at this time my money on that those were procuring from Mainland China.
They use Motion Tracking to have the various gadgets and vehicles perform tasks.Very Efficient way to make entities more accessible during War or CTU Operations.