M81 Woodland

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M81 Woodland is the official name of the default camouflage pattern issued to United States soldiers, Marines, airmen, and sailors from the 1981, with the issue of the M81 Battle Dress Uniform until nearly the present day.^[1][2][3] It has been phased out by the Marine Corps with the digital MARPAT with the introduction of the Marine Corps Combat Utility Uniform, and the Army's digital Universal Camouflage Pattern with the introduction of the ACU, and is being phased out by the other services.

Woodland pattern is identical to ERDL pattern, but is printed from an enlargement of the original pattern.^[4] ERDL pattern was enlarged and the borders of the splotches were re-drawn making them less regular.^[5][6] Part of the earlier pattern was left off the later pattern because the enlargement made them no longer fit on the width of the pattern. The pattern does not repeat horizontally across the width of the bolt, but only vertically along the length of the bolt.

The effect of enlarging the pattern was to make the pattern more visible at a distance, avoiding "blobbing", where smaller areas of color seem to blend into larger blobs. This also made the pattern have a higher contrast, and stand out more sharply at close distances. This defeated the camouflage effect of Woodland pattern at closer range. Digital and Flecktarn camouflage patterns resolve this problem by using small blobs that converge into larger ones at longer range.

This exhibits a shift in the tactical focus of the United States military from an extremely close-range war in Vietnam to a longer-range battlespace on the fields of Germany.

[edit] See also

• Military camouflage
• List of camouflage patterns
• United States Army Engineer Research and Development Laboratory

[edit] References

[edit] External links