Wednesday, December 21, 2005

Fashion Concious?

You're gazing at the hippest trend in combat zone fashion. The "Blackwater Gear" Combat Shirt from Crye Precision. You'll note the trim torso without bulky pockets. This streamlines the shirt for wear underneath body armor. It eliminates chafing too.
This is the Field Shirt, which incoporates extra pockets, and may be worn on regular duty or long patrols. Plenty of veldro for your identification patches, badges, and name tapes.

"Blackwater Gear" is a joint venture between the Crye Associates subdivision, Crye Precision, and the Blackwater Inc. provider of --ahem -- "Private Military Operations" services. (The old fashioned word "mercenary" is so passe.) Blackwater provides specialized security services and appropriate personnel for high risk duty around the world. As you might imagine, they have a rather large presence in Iraq. Now that they have successfully branded themselves as THE name in high risk security, they have decided to capitalize on the brand by slapping their name on tactical accessories.

That doesn't mean these things aren't good. They certainly appear to be extremely good, and several reviews have rated the clothing system as outstanding. They are probably a much better solution than the US Army's answer.

The first trousers are the Combat Pants, which incorporate knee pads and hardwearing cordura fabric.

The Field Pants are more traditional fatigue pants, and will eventually come in a less obvious khaki color.
This is an example of the matching load-bearing equipment. It follows the current trend in load systems, which is to move the load to the chest. The modern version of this arrangement was pioneered by the British operating in Northern Ireland, and took several decades before we Yanks caught onto the ergonomic advantages of this arrangement.

For those interested, all these items will be released in the distinctive Crye Multi-Cam camuoflage, and black, with selected items in khaki.

Note: Some of the sources on what Blackwater does are clearly biased against them. However, they do make interesting reading, and a likely to be reasonably accurate. But I make no promises.

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