On December 16, the official WeChat account of the Anhui Armed Police of China released an article entitled “Look for the Difference! What is the difference between the Army and the Armed Police Force?” The report revealed that a reconnaissance battalion of a certain brigade of the Chinese army has adopted the “Starry Sky Camouflage” (Xingkong Camo) series of combat uniforms and the next-generation individual combat system in batches, which were unveiled at China’s 70th anniversary parade. And this is the first time that “Starry Sky Camouflage” has been used for a combat unit.
From the pictures and images released by the Armed Police, in addition to the new camouflage and carrying equipment, this unit of brigade reconnaissance battalion is also armed with a Type 10 sniper rifle with a new scope and a QTS-11 system. At present, there were has “a certain division in the central theater”, “Xuefeng Special Combat Brigade” and “Shajiabang Troops” of the Chinese Army were exposed with QTS-11 rifles.
Earlier, at the routine press conference of the Ministry of Defense held on October 31, Colonel Wu Qian, the director of the Ministry of Defense Information Bureau and a spokesman for the Ministry of Defense, answered a question from the media reporter – “Will the PLA receive a new round of camouflage dressing?” Wu said that in order to meet the requirements of national defense and military reforms and better meet the needs of military combat readiness training, the Chinese army optimized and perfected its clothing color, style, fabric, and logo clothing based on type 07 camouflage clothing, and developed a new type of camouflage., which appeared in the military parade celebrating the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China. The next step will be to distribute to the army forces as planned.
“Starry Sky Camouflage” is based on the color blocks of Type 07 digital camouflage clothing, and improves the color block matching to adapt to China and its surrounding environment. The camouflage is superimposed with complex small white spots called “starry sky” (Xingkong, or “starry” for short). These spots enhance the long-distance cutting effect and the concealing effect on the optical system to ensure the soldiers’ further integration into the environment.
The Starry Sky Camouflage System is a complete and complex system. There are currently five subsystems of it, namely temperate forest land, temperate desert, tropical jungle, tropical desert, and urban ruins. It is suitable for China’s vast territory and complex geographical latitudes and longitudes. In the future, camouflage will not be distributed based on armed services as the past. Marine Corps in the southern theater and the Chinese Army will have the same tropical camouflage uniform. Similarly, the Airborne Army in the northern theater will also have the same temperate or city camouflage with the Chinese Navy.
It is reported that starry sky camouflage draws on a lot of foreign military advanced design concepts, while its complexity is far more than the same type of foreign military systems, especially the US military OCP ACU series camouflage and Russian EMR series camouflage.
In the history of camouflage development, only the Butan camouflage family developed by the Soviet Union is similar to the design concept of China’s starry sky camouflage, but the former was interrupted with the collapse of the Soviet Union.
In addition to advanced and sophisticated camouflage, in the next generation of combat uniforms, the Chinese army draws on the design experience of the world’s advanced combat uniforms and adopts a variety of humanized and tactical designs: the new starry sky camouflage clothing has a quick-open zipper, which can be quickly put on and taken off. Its built-in knee and elbow design is adopted to meet tactical action requirements of the Chinese army’s individual soldiers; the use of diagonally inserted irregular pockets is practical; the use of pedal straps and a large number of velcros for easy matching with combat boots; the use of three-dimensional tailoring is ergonomic and beautiful.
In terms of tactical expansibility, the new combat suit has velcros on both left and right arms, and the right arm is equipped with new low-visibility armbands, while the left arm is equipped with the identification code of foes and foes to deal with reconnaissance and observation equipment.
In terms of rigid indicators, the new-generation starry sky camouflage clothing has improved flame retardant, antistatic capabilities, and night vision (IR) capabilities lacked on Type 07. So its overall performance is better than the Russian Army’s Ratnik series and also better than the US military ’s OCP ACU series combat clothing. This is also reflected in the cost: one-meter cloth of Type 07 camouflage only costs more than 40 yuan, while one-meter cloth of the starry sky camouflage reaches hundreds of yuan.
In addition to the next-generation combat suit, the reconnaissance battalion is also trying a new generation of body armor and a next-generation helmet.
The new body armor is a kind of modular body armoring device under test. It is similar to the Russian army 6B45 body armor and US-made IOTV series body armor. It has modularity, large protection area, good expandability, and overall quick release. As the next generation of individual combat systems must conform to the general trend of information-based operations, it can be seen in the figure that the new equipment of some officers and soldiers must be compatible with military mobile phones with cameras to improve the overall situational awareness of soldiers.
The next generation of helmets uses new suspension and protective materials. It achieves expandability and modularity under the premise of ensuring that the protection area is not less than Type 03 Kevlar helmets, and it has installed a variety of guide rails. Therefore, its overall performance is better than the Russian army’s 6b47 helmet.