Uniforms are odd. They are not “normal” clothing, in the sense that they are not worn as ‘casual’ or ‘formal’ wear, nor really for most jobs in the workplace. Whether a person works as a mechanic for a shop, a security officer, a store attendant, a delivery driver or what have you, the uniforms that those people wear for their daily jobs are rarely anything those people would wear when stepping out after work. In the civilian job world, a uniform may be practical, but most often functions as an advertisement for the employer.
In contrast, military uniforms are rarely given a second thought, as most people unconsciously associate a uniform with some sort of armed force. While military uniforms certainly do that, their rationale does not necessarily make sense, unless one looks at them more closely.
There are very few verifiable “uniforms”, as we would recognize the term, in antiquity. Most of the references that mention uniform-like garments in armies are very shaky, and are likely confusions with ethnic or tribal dress, which are not “uniforms”, per se. The first recognizable and unequivocal military uniform was that of the Roman state. Down through the centuries, Roman military attire remained remarkably stable, at least compared to modern norms. Until the very late period of the Western Roman Empire, what we think of today as the “classic” Roman uniform remained more or less the standard attire, for parade, general duty or combat.
After the fall of the Western Empire, “standardized” uniforms would not reappear in European armies until roughly the dawn of the 17th Century, during the “Dutch Revolt” against the Hapsburg dynasty of Spain. The Dutch needed a way to identify their own troops; short of money, they first tried long, colored sashes. Because of the problems of the sashes getting too dirty to recognize, the Dutch hit on the idea of wearing smaller versions of the sashes as scarves, and tying them in unique knots. Together with the Croatian mercenaries hired by France – wearing distinctive cravats (thus bringing the word ‘cravat’ into western Europe) – during this period, armies began to realize that some form of standardized uniform was a very useful item, despite the added expense.
To many people new to the subject, the military uniforms of the 17th to early 20th Centuries look bizarre. They are certainly highly distinctive, but to the modern mind, appear useless on a battlefield, as they are usually brightly colored and definitely stand out against the backdrop of natural foliage. The reason for the brightly colored uniforms – as with the combat tactic of the rigid firing line, in the open, with no real cover (meaning, protection from bullets) – was dictated by the combat technology of the time, as the smoothbore flintlock musket was notoriously slow to load and unreliable. Because of this, armies were forced to line up their troops, and have groups of them fire in sequence, like a giant shotgun. As should be obvious, this was a dangerous and terrifying experience, and it was felt that clothing the troops in distinct, flashy and (comparatively) expensive uniforms would help improve the morale of the troops.
Whether troop morale was improved or not during this period is an open question, but the rapid pace of technological development in firearms technology during the 19th Century swiftly dictated that research was desperately needed to help the troops blend into their surroundings, the better to avoid fire from rifles and machine guns. While this trend was firmly established in the aftermath of World War 1, as that war had starkly demonstrated that modern weapons had fundamentally altered the battlefield, creating all the conditions necessary for staggering casualties, with France losing so many troops (well over one million), that large sections of the French Army mutinied in 1917, it had begun well before that war broke out.
Following World War 2, uniform development continued, with the general drabness of the US Army’s OG-107 pattern uniform giving way to the “Battle Dress Uniform” in the aftermath of the Vietnam War. The BDU would eventually be replaced by the modern “digital camo” uniforms, starting in 2001.
While it should be obvious that a military uniform – whether for combat, day-to-day work or for formal parades – should be “distinctive”, that begs the question: What, exactly, constitutes a “military uniform”?
Remarkably, aside from generally practical notions of being distinctive, and comfortable to move in, there is no hard and fast definition of what constitutes a “military uniform”, aside from the admonishment of the 1949 Geneva Convention (pdf link) to not wear an enemy’s uniform for the purpose of deception.
In the final analysis, then, a formally organized military force can essentially design any uniform they want, as long as it is distinct from common civilian attire, and will be protected under the Geneva Convention…
…Assuming, of course, that the other side abides by that document.
