These lovely ladies are wearing a modern combat uniform. The pattern is a derivative of Tiger stripe, its the same family of camouflage patterns as seen as on the Iraqi Police instructor above. Tiger stripe is really popular variations can be found on both eastern and western combat Uniforms. Now note the patch on the upper right arm. This is a subdued color patch. One of the lessons the US learned in Vietnam was bling is death. Enemy insurgents like to target specialist. Leaders, medics, senior NCOs. For them it was quickly realized that bright or polished insignia was a bulls eye. Since the end of the Gulf War more and more militaries have also taken blending there gear and camouflage to heart. And subdued colors for national markings is becoming a standard. Now the material that patch is on is Velcro. This is a bit of a hit or miss. It seems to have started with flight suits where a flight crew member would get a leather name plate for there gear and could rapidly move it between flight suits and bomber jackets. The US SF adopted it as it allowed them the ability to remove some Uniform markings that were a hindrance to them or add elements that they felt could help tell friends from foes. Around 2004 the US Army adopted this feature as standard issue on the ACU and a lot of military services that work or are aligned with the US Army have copied it. The reason why the big army did it though is not the same as SF. The idea was that it would allow the individual Soldier to quickly change from uniform to Uniform without needing to have the uniforms tailored. The problem I have is well as you can see there is a large area of extra black material left over, and in thicket if the patches get caught on something the Velcro can make a loud noise.
