On old soldier’s uniforms, at least on TV (which I assume is accurate), why did sergeant’s stripes on old US Army uniforms point down instead of up? And, how did it come to switch to up?
Answer to both questions is simply fashion. Fashion changes over time.
Monty! Very good point! Here I was looking for something much more complex, but you nailed it! Speaking of which, I recall hearing something like how the US Army Beret, or its shade of color, was NEVER officially approved through proper channels. That’s our Gov at its best wasting our tax dollars! When the official paperwork finally comes through to approve it, they’ll spend millions changing it yet again!
The US Army and Marine Corps wear chevrons with the points facing up, while the Navy, Coast Guard, and Air Force wear theirs with the points facing down. Some special uniforms (such as the US Army Band), IIRC, also wear (or used to back when I was on Active Duty) their chevrons with the points facing down in special situations (I can’t recall what those special situations may have been).
The green beret began as a technically unauthorized modification to the US Army uniform. You can go to this Wiki page and scroll down to the section on the United States to see more information on the wear, color, and qualifications for the beret. Even in my Army days and then in my Navy days and also now that I’m retired, I always thought that the beret, especially the mythos, if you will, attached to it in the US military is just plain stupid. On top of that, the beret is a pain to wear.The beret for the US Armed Forces did begin as an unauthorized uniform modification, but it has been approved through proper channels and regulations cover everything you would ever want to know about it.
By the way, even though I’m retired military, I have always thought that the mythos, if you will, surrounding the beret is just so much stupidity.
Oh, here is a fun website about uniform insignia around the world. Some of the pages on that site include extra information about other uniform items besides rank insignia.
Was there a specific date (E.g. “stripe day”) when the stripes switched from down to up, or was it gradual? E.g. was there a transition period when old uniforms were “grandfathered” in and there was gradually increasing pressure for new soldiers and recently promoted soldiers to stick theirs pointing up? Did an order go down where soldiers went to bed with their stripes going down, and then when they got up the next morning, they flipped them upside-down before roll call?
Organizations that have uniforms can vary in their strictness of when and if a uniform needs to be updated. I seem to recall being told that Boy Scouts in the US can (or could in the 1990’s) wear a vintage Boy Scout uniform as long as it was a valid Boy Scout uniform when it was made. So you could wear dad’s old uniform even though the cut of the collar might be different today or the color specified in the rules might have become slightly less brown and more gray. Or you could buy a new one in the new style. Your choice. What you could not do was have grandma sew you a replica WW2-era Boy Scout uniform. Well, you could, but you wouldn’t be allowed to wear it to meetings.
Here’s a page on the wear of chevrons on military uniforms from the US Navy History Command (as part of their detailed Why is the Colonel Called “Kernal”? The Origin of the Ranks and Rank Insignia Now Used by the United States Armed Forces report). It explains:
Initially, U.S. Air Force enlisted chevrons were U.S. Army chevrons at the moment the Air Force became an independent and co-equal service, 18 Sep 1947. The Air Force got its own distinctive chevrons on 9 Mar 1948.
There’s little documented evidence of why Air Force chevrons were always structurally like “points down” Army chevrons, but the resemblance to the Army Air Force “winged star” insignia is probably not a coincidence:
From http://www.afhra.af.mil/shared/media/document/AFD-090611-103.pdf
I could never tell the difference between an AF Airman 1st Class (E-3) and an AF Sergeant (E-4).
“Buck Sergeant” doesn’t exist any more. That’s “Senior Airman” now. Has been for a while actually. (I was a Sgt at one time; they changed that rule half a dozen years behind me.)
As to distinguishing between A1C and SrA stripes, the safest is to see where the top edge of the stripes connect to the middle circle. SrA (or Sgt, before) connects flush with the top edge of the circle. The wings are the same width as the diameter of the center meatball, so you don’t see the shape of any part of the circle in the outline of the entire chevron.
OTOH, A1C stripes has one fewer stripe so the “wings” are narrower and connect to the circle with a discernible arc of the circle above the top edge of the stripe.
Did that ever get in you in trouble? Salute the peon, unsalute the lofty?
As a general* (no pun intended) rule, enlisted personnel don’t salute each other. An enlisted member salutes an officer, who returns the salute. It’s pretty easy. Enlisted just do the “head nod, how ya doing mumble” thing or just ignore each other.
*Major (still no pun intended, really) occasions for an enlisted member to receive an initial salute: Metal of Honor recipient (who is customarily saluted first in any situation). Functioning in a position in an inspection or parade formation which receives a salute, such as a squadron commander in an all-enlisted formation. (Air Force terminology, translate as appropriate for other services. This latter is pretty artificial, as far as I know; I’ve only seen it in military training situations.) Similarly, in a ceremonial situation where it’s customary to salute the person occupying a particular role in the ceremony.
I really don’t recall seeing that in any of the “honors rendered” instructions/regulations/what-have-you. I also have never seen it happen. By the way, it’s medal, not metal. No doubt, that was just a typo.
No, I was never in any situation where I’d be required to salute any member of the Air Force. And I can only think of one situation where an enlisted man would salute another enlisted. That’s when in uniform and boarding a ship and the person on the Quarterdeck Watch as Officer of the Deck is a Petty Officer or CPO. First you salute the National Ensign (fancy words for the US Flag) then you salute the OOD and say “Request permission to come aboard, sir!” unless the OOD is female and you insert the word “ma’am” where appropriate.
Oh, in CG recruit training, they had the recruits salute CPOs, mostly because they needed to practice saluting and there weren’t any warrants or commissioned officers around for the recruits to practice on.
Please don’t come in here with this crap. This is not true. We’ve done it to death. There is nothing written anywhere that would even suggest it. Not in any of the various regulations, Field Manuals, DA PAMs, Directives, UCR, or anything even quasi official outside of ignorant blog and message board posts (see above) and that idiot, Rod Powers writing for about.military.com
Not sure what makes him the resident military expert over there, but I have twice emailed him for a retraction or citation. He refuses to respond, but doesn’t update his stupid article.
:smack: Dammit, I hate doing that. Stupid finger autocorrect. :o
The funny thing about “customary” is that it’s not written down, or required, or anything. But it happens. So it’s not crap, unless you’re arguing that reality is wrong.
Tone down. Reality doesn’t give a rat’s ass about your overheated opinion.
ETA: Argue with the “Official Blog of the U.S. Army”:
Considering the very next sentence of hers is factually incorrect, I see no reason to believe the first. There are instances where a lower rank salutes the subordinate. That blogger clearly has not done her homework. And for your information, customary things are actually written down. In fact, there are entire manuals full of them.
Just checked on your blogger. She is a writer for NPR. She is a reporter, not an official Army spokesperson. Are you to suggest they never get things wrong or report mere rumors without ever fact checking? Good luck with that.
Let’s just say it’s a hijack and leave it at that. As you point out, there are many threads about this little tangent, and this one ain’t one of them, in spite of your best efforts to the contrary.
Moderator Note
Bear Nenno and gnoitall, drop the hijack and drop the snark. No warning issued, but this has nothing to do with the subject of the OP.
Colibri
General Questions Moderator