South West African Police Camouflage (originally posted by nkomo)

This is a set of South West African Police camo.

Hi.

What sizes are the trousers and shirt? Any info on the labels?

Regards.
Bernhard

germanmilitariauk wrote:Hi.

What sizes are the trousers and shirt? Any info on the labels?

Regards.
Bernhard

hello Bernhard, we would appreciate if you posed an introduction in the intro section. Thanks a bunch, and welcome!

Not label on my set
And it is size small
Gilles

Compare with my other shirt

Hello Gilles,

Your AIR marked shirt is a genuine issue item. They were made in both the SWAPOL camo pattern as well as the light olive green. The material has a more coarse weave to it, and is distinct when compared to the normal cotton and thin poly/cotton shirts. Also, as you've noticed, the camo patterns are not exactly the same. The AIR pattern has very muted colors, and the shapes are a bit different, especially the "dots" which are much larger.

The rumor has always been that AIR stands for anti-infra red, however, I highly suspect that is not the case. SWAPO was not equiped with any sort of night vision equipment, and I've yet to hear of any evidence that FAPLA or Cuban forces had it either. Add to that, Koevoet didn't operate at night, as they would encamp and wait until first light to continue tracking with air support. Sure, they would attempt the occasional night ambush, but that was not a common tactic.

In any event, the AIR marked items are more rare than the typical Thrustor Group made uniforms. So, that's a nice find.

Cheers,

Mike

Hello Mike
Thank you for your answer
Gilles

[ Spanish made commercial Koevoet camo
ripcord

Commercial Spanish made Koevoet Camo

ripcord

Here's my AIR tagged set.  



Shirt tag:  


Pants tag:  


Pants pocket:


The stitching in the pants is not very good. There are many loose threads and threads between seams everywhere, as if whoever made it didn't bother to finish a seam before moving onto the next one.

Here's my jacket I received earlier this week from South Africa.



It's pretty crude compared to the standard South African Police jacket.





Interestingly, the bottom half of the front is made of a separate piece while the entire back side is one whole piece of cloth.

Is this crudeness I'm seeing the result of difficulty in procurement? You'd think an elite unit would have no problem getting what it wants.

You have to remember that this is not Koevoet camouflage but rather SWA Police (SWAPOL) camouflage. Koevoet, as part of SWAPOL used it, but so did every other SWA Policeman. That was why Koevoet got their own distinctive green uniform in the later stages of the conflict. The unit's CO got tired of hearing reports that his constables were responsible for incidents the police caused and created the green uniform and banned wear of SWAPOL camo. As a police uniform most items are pretty well made but you've got some items that are very poorly made, like the late issue trousers that omitted any form of fastener for the cargo pockets or even pockets at all.

I got 2 shirts recently, a medium sized one from 1982:  




and a small one from what I assume is later in the war.:



The details like the seams are definitely nicer on the 1982 example, but there's still a major problem:  The button stitching for the left epaulette goes through the back fabric several times.