I think the berets are hot . . . my husband looks great in it. Sure, it is a little awkward looking, but I don't think they should be done away with.

The Ohio Military Reserve does not use the beret. We have kept to using the patrol caps when wearing Class C uniforms. For Class A & B uniforms we use the garrison cap. Berets are hotter to wear and provide no eye protection from sunlight like the patrol cap does. I also think that they look very bad with all uniforms.

I say lose it for the BDU/ACU and keep it for the class A/B.  I think they look sharp if shaped and worn correctly.  The challenge is, some do not know how to make them look good.

How TRUE!! I've seen so many people wear the beret all wrong. It just looks bad. At least there are fewer variations with a patrol cap. In the 4th Regiment, we have this as a guide. You may recognize the model :-)



The biggest problem comes from people not forming the beret properly when they buy it. You just can't put it on your head. Berets are like a good pair of Levi's. You have to make them YOURS. Soak it in hot water, shave the fuzz off, put it on your head still hot and wet, shape it like the above photo and wear it til it dries. When you take it off, it will be perfect and will fit ONLY YOU (properly)

Last edited by ChiefLee (2006-07-13 17:29:30)

Mine says pretty much the same thing without going 8 pages. :-)

I always wondered what happened to the propeller on top.  If they keep it, maybe they can put the propeller back on.  (evil grin) LOLOL

Well, the problem has always been that you can get too much of a good thing. When I see the short, fat (nearly obese) soldier wearing the beret and it is not even fitted right, it disappoints me. Even before the Army switched to the black beret, I would sometimes see this with the Airborne support units that still wore the beret even though they had probably never even been on a plane or helicopter.

Just as with many SDF's, where I see some out of shape members, the Regular Army, Army Reserves, and Army National Guard all have some soldiers who must be paying to get out of the PT test and physicals. . . I really wonder what it is coming to when I see people wearing the uniform (and certainly the beret) and they barely even fit into the uniform they are wearing.

Last edited by gallagheria (2006-10-19 10:08:37)

I really could care less if we keep the beret....uniforms change all the frigging time.....bdus.....dcus....bonnie hats.....patrol caps.....acus.....gripe about change all ya want, but change will always be a constant....I remember hearing people gripe about losing the greens

i still say that was wrong for them to issue black ones.  rangers have to put up with alot more to earn them.  then we (figure of speech) jsut get them handed to us.  i perfer the ole standard cover.

I joined when we still had the patrol cap, and would love to have it back.  While not as practical as the boonie cap, it still provided shade. The only reason we went to berets was to make soldiers feel good about themselves. It was a "look at me, I look like a badass" type of a thing that was supposed to make substandard soldiers feel like "warriors". I wonder how the Rangers (real warriors) felt to have their status symbol taken away and cheapened by Gen. Shinseki. The beret was a waste of the army's time and money. (Can you sense the bitterness? lol)

I thank the gods of good sense that we get to wear patrol caps 99% of the time in the TNSG. No one seems to have a clue how to wear the thing correctly. I see NG guys at the armory wearing them in 50 different styles, and it's not much better in the regular Army as well. I vote for patrol caps. At least the only individuality there is the tanker roll around the top if you want to be different (which admittedly, I'm guilty of that one as I look goofier with it poofed out all the way) I hate the BERET and would love to see it go back to just being paratroopers, Rangers, and SF guys as they earned the distinction and actually knew how to wear it.
SGTLou
TNSG

I am a firm believer that keeping earned marks of distinction to reward success in certain MOS and units is a great motivator and a huge point of pride. The 9th Regiment belt buckle, the Ranger Black Beret, these things give the soldiers who earned them a point of pride. I loved the patrol cap and it looked just the way it should with BDUs. Lose the beret except for use with the Class A, (because I hated the "garrison cap" and we all know I normally did not refer to it as the garrison cap either)...and find another color...