Swiss splinter - mysterious?

Hi,

I have got a piece of clothing that looks very much like the Swiss splinter pattern used for Zeltbahns.

My Swiss Zeltbahn is to the left in the photos - and the "mysterious" piece of clothing to the right:





But there are two things that puzzles me:

- On the piece of clothing there is no thin green lines connecting the green parts of the splinter pattern

- The pattern is mirrored compared to that of my Zeltbahn.

Any comments?

Best regards
Henrik

This is a documented feature of Swiss Zeltbahns, though I've never heard a definitive story behind it or dates.

The earlier type is a 100% duplication of Wehrmacht Splittertarn. It is said that part of the reason for this is that some Swiss companies had contracts with the Wehrmacht. Hey, just because you're neutral doesn't mean you can make a few Francs off of the bad guys, right?

Then, at some point, they changed the pattern a little bit:

1. Added green "breaks" to some of the shapes, as you pointed out

2. Overprinted yellow blobs in addition to the green strokes. Sometimes faint, sometimes very strong

You noticed it is also reversed, but I don't know if that was standard of a variation for a specific print run or by a specific factory.

There are examples of the yellow dots on the pattern without green breaks and on those with green breaks.

That's about all I know of the pattern!

Steve