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Old 03-03-2012, 18:06   #54
Astronomy
Quiet Professional
 
Join Date: Feb 2012
Posts: 492
Sorry for the necropost, but I figured I'd add some flesh to the story before all my latent memories dry up and blow away...

Quote:
As I recall the 10th SFG/ARSOFE food fight over the 1/10 flash occurred in late 1983 ...
It did indeed happen in '83, but began in early '82 with a multi-month tussle between the Det Europe Commander (COL Bill Holt) and the Devens 10th SFG Commander, COL Parrish(sic?) Davis. As 10th SFG Main Cdr, he flew into Tölz and let us know that we (1-10) worked for him. This was true in a war-trace kinda way if/when we ever joined up the entire Group in Sculthorpe to fight the Big Red Machine. Otherwise, it was bullshit, because we were a EUCOM organic asset. I can't remember if Davis was still Group Commander by late '83, but the push for 10th SFG Unification continued unabated.

We were directed from Ft Devens to strip off our 1-10 / Det Europe flashes and go to full green Ft Devens flashes. Of course we didn't actually have any Devens flashes at clothing sales...so that procedure took a few weeks. The BC was trapped between two bosses, but only one was his rater, and that guy lived in the same HQ building on the Flint Kaserne quadrangle. He would get an order from his stateside ADCON boss, put it out, and then wait for his OPCON boss to countermand the order.

Eventually we started played musical berets at 0900 formations, with the entire battalion being told to repeatedly change back and forth depending upon the political vagaries of the day. For a time, most of us just started showing up with two berets in our cargo pockets. One sewn with each kind of flash. Complete buffoonery.

On a side note, about a year earlier in this field grade dominance dance, the 1-10 Sr NCOs reminded Davis that, if we were his guys, we probably oughta be getting the same cutting edge gear then being issued back at Devens. Nicht War?

Shezzam! Size of an Airlift Pallet! A few weeks later, a C-130 landed out at the airstrip with a couple of pallets of then very newly fielded, Devens SF issue, Gen I Goretex and its associated swag. We were like kids playing Mom against Dad.

IIRC, the flash issue got permanently resolved for 1-10 about the time I left late Fall of '83. Everyone went to solid green. Det Europe kept the Tölz Flash for several more years...until re-flagged as 7th SOSCE...when they changed the background color from green to blue...around 90-91.
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