The US Military's $5 Billion digital camo project may soon end

Did you know the US military has spent 5 billion on their digital camo uniforms and equipment you see? I didn't. I thought the US was broke?

Here's a very well detailed history of the program, and why the military may soon scrap the digital patterns:

Even before the UCP was issued to soldiers, lab tests showed that it didn't perform as well as other designs. But the Army's textile researchers now say that military brass had already made up their minds in favor of the new-fangled pixelated look.

It didn't take long for sergeants to begin complaining from the field, and by the summer of 2009, the $5 billion boondoggle had made its way to the floor of the House of Representatives. Soldiers in Afghanistan were issued replacement uniforms with a more traditional, splotchy camouflage known as MultiCam, and the Army embarked on a three-year study to choose a permanent replacement. That period is almost over, and though critics have focused more on the UCP's washed-out colors than its pixel scheme, it's starting to look as if the military's long-running experiment with "digital camouflage" is about to end, once and for all.

www.slate.com...

www.strikehold.net...

The Army commanders (CinCs) saw the "really cool" digicam that the Marines were using and decided they wanted to be cool too. So they contracted out to develop something similar for the Army. The problem being that instead of hiding the troops, they stood out like a pink pekinese in a pack of black dogs.

So they threw more money at it, and more money at it.....

Over the next year, America’s largest fighting force is swapping its camouflage pattern. The move is a quiet admission that the last uniform — a pixelated design that debuted in 2004 at a cost of $5 billion — was a colossal mistake.

Soldiers have roundly criticized the gray-green uniform for standing out almost everywhere it’s been worn. Industry insiders have called the financial mess surrounding the pattern a “fiasco.”

As Army researchers work furiously on a newer, better camouflage, it’s natural to ask what went wrong and how they’ll avoid the same missteps this time around. In a candid interview with The Daily, several of those researchers said Army brass interfered in the selection process during the last round, letting looks and politics get in the way of science.

“It got into political hands before the soldiers ever got the uniforms,” said Cheryl Stewardson, a textile technologist at the Army research center in Natick, Mass., where most of the armed forces camouflage patterns are made.

www.thedaily.com...

This is what happens when the commanders at the Pentagon butt into projects. They think that since they're generals they know better than everyone, and they all want to get their name recognized so they can get higher, and they don't care what happens to get where they want in their careers.

I'm completely confused by this news, having been an Army cavalry scout, I understand the need to blend into the environment.....What I don't understand is the cost.....How in the world could testing patterns cost so dang much.....try a pattern, make a uniform, put it on a person, send them out 100 yards maybe 200, see what it looks like......5 billion.....OMG, you would have gone through every single iteration of uniform possible. Sorry, but I can't possibly believe that taking our previous uniforms and pixelating them (since that is really what it looks like) cost that amount of money.....Either one HUGE over charge or that money went somewhere else.

I think digital camo is very cool, but I can see where it wouldn't be very effective. MultiCam is the real deal. There are demonstration pictures online of soldiers in MultiCam standing in various environments including urban, and the stuff is just amazing. I've always wondered what a pixelated version of MultiCam would look like and how effective it would be.

It doesn't surprise me that they'd spend that much, though. There seems to be this sense of having no fiscal constraint when it comes to military spending.

reply to post by Zaphod58


I suspect that more than the generals thinking it was a great idea, they just knew it was a moneymaker for the consulting companies they represented (and were paid handsomely by).

One interesting comment below the article:

Ask any soldier in the US Army and he/she will tell you that the ACU is trash. Absolutely horrible. It doesn't disguise us in the mountains of eastern Afghanistan, it doesn't disguise us in the deserts of Iraq and southern Afghanistan, and it was all done to fill the pockets of former high-ranking officers of the Army in private industry now heading organizations in charge of recommending and manufacturing uniforms.

For eight years, soldiers have complained that the ACU is bad. For two years, soldiers have declared that the multicam we had when deployed to Afghanistan made us look like soldiers, disguised us in the battle environment, and already had been partially fielded with equipment. It was too easy to just make it the standard. But of course, first we have to fill the pockets of private contracted industry. And so it goes on and on and on...

It's like aything these days all these "wonderful" ideas and decisions are made in a boardroom without any input from these guys that are actually going to be using the stuff.

As for the actual cost, if they are spending $5 Billion dollars on trying to make camo, I shudder to imagine what kind of money is being spent on other more advanced projects.

reply to post by stanguilles7


Of course. Where do you think the CinCs go when they retire? They don't just fade into the woodwork and write a book, they go to work for defense contractors in high positions. Just look into the KC-767 debacle, and that wasn't even a CinC. They do everything they can to make themselves look better, and to get a good OER, line the pockets of their favorite defense contractors in the hopes that when they retire, they get a nice cushy job as a VP, or some consultant somewhere.

Originally posted by stanguilles7
Did you know the US military has spent 5 billion on their digital camo uniforms and equipment you see?

Yes, I did know.
www.abovetopsecret.com...

It is effed up. Officers will have to cough up a lot of dough bc some high brass jackwad decided hed didnt want to be "outcooled" by the marines.
Kind of typical, though.
The ACUs are apparently dangerous to our soldiers, though. So if if it helps them to change, we should do it. Shame how it happened though and someone should be punished.

reply to post by pierregustavetoutant


How do you punish the CinCs though? The only way to do it is to fire them, and then they retire, keep all their benefits, and go to work at that sweet contractor job a couple of years sooner than they planned.

Originally posted by alfa1

Originally posted by stanguilles7
Did you know the US military has spent 5 billion on their digital camo uniforms and equipment you see?

Yes, I did know.
www.abovetopsecret.com...

Thanks. I really did use the search function. I promise.

$5 B Wasted on Army camo uniforms that make trooops Stand Out

Some patterns are better than others.
It all depends on location.





By matching your environment, you can fool the human eye, even for a few seconds,
it can save a soldier's life.

Fine just freakin fine,
Firstly, why not just use the Marine Corp colors and pattern if it is more inconspicuous ?
Why reinvent the wheel?
Next, this has been on going since forever, but mostly the ww2 got the thing really rolling...now humans main industry and occupation bu far is killing other humans.....
After the BIG WAR... there were just too many high ranking people from the military and the civilian war effort, who had blended into a homgenous group towards the war effort, with cate blanche its easy...then they simpy attempted to maintain this control up to this day....
Thats why the military gets the biggest dollars and the most attention....its their cash cow and also recruiting office, as they pick up general officers of all the services...and use their rank and position to obtain contracts regardless if they are sane or not....
Thiradly for five billion i believe they could have come up with electric camo that makes you invisible ////

PRIMADONNA generals at play.The same guy who took an elite units historic headgear and gave it to the entire Army because they were trying to make everyone feel elite.Now Rangers wear tan and really don't like it.
If they're going to screw up uniforms they should at least respect the troops they command.Why didn't they figure out a way for each branch to have it's own color...Cav wears Stetsons,the rest of the Army hates it.
All scouts I have ever met could have figured out that green pastel wasn't a good color for any field.

reply to post by pointr97


It wasn't the testing that was expensive, it was the issuing and replacement of equipment in the pattern that was. UCP is a stupid pattern though the principle is sound. The way it works is that in sandy deserts the uniform reflects the color of the sand creating a natural look at distance. Its a terrible pattern in every single environment that isnt sandy desert. Multicam uses a gradient, along with light reflection and color blending. In desert environment it becomes more brown, in a greener environment it takes on an overall green hue. It's blending and light reflection very much make it a superior camo pattern.

UCP was never going to be useful. Personally I hate the stuff. We're waiting to have new uniforms and equipment issued in October.

I think it's interesting that one of the designs they've been working on is called "Syria".

www.strikehold.net...

Originally posted by pointr97
I'm completely confused by this news, having been an Army cavalry scout, I understand the need to blend into the environment.....What I don't understand is the cost.....How in the world could testing patterns cost so dang much.....try a pattern, make a uniform, put it on a person, send them out 100 yards maybe 200, see what it looks like......5 billion.....OMG, you would have gone through every single iteration of uniform possible. Sorry, but I can't possibly believe that taking our previous uniforms and pixelating them (since that is really what it looks like) cost that amount of money.....Either one HUGE over charge or that money went somewhere else.

The cost is because they purchased the uniforms already. Now they have to replace them so it's wasted money.

Yep.. heard about this before.

This is Proof that the people in charge of our military are Morons. !!!!!!!!

They bought the uniforms based on how cool they looked without ever bothering to find out if the Actually Worked as Good Camouflage ! STUPID !!

They did this because other branches of the services got cool uniforms and they didn't want to be left out.

You would think the spotters for the shooters would have noticed - or somebody would have noticed.. " Hey.. these uniforms don't blend in so well" a Long time ago. More proof they don't teach these grunts to think for themselves. LOL

reply to post by JohnPhoenix


It became political, I am sure it was noticed and passed up, and the guys at the top were the ones who ordered them and discounted the information.

Yeah but you know.. one has to wonder if there is a real conspiracy here. perhaps they are working for the global elite who want to depopulate the earth. They actually wanted these boys to get killed because the uniforms didn't hide them so well. Perhaps they really wanted the US to lose the battles. I would not put it past these people - they take their orders from Obama and look how much he's screwing us to hell.