Big Red One Inc.

1st Infantry Division site here.

Politico

From Cantigny, France, and the Argonne Forest to North Africa, Normandy, Vietnam’s Iron Triangle and Iraq —and now hauteconcept.com?

Foreign battles aren’t new for the 1st Infantry Division, but this firefight is from another world, a clash between the New Army and Old over plans to commercialize the 1st Division’s historic “Big Red One” insignia in a sportswear line at Sears.

Caught most by surprise are combat veterans of the 1st Infantry Division, who see their familiar red-and-green shoulder patch splashed across Internet websites celebrating soldier chic.

“The U.S. Army launches an all-out fashion offensive,” reads the headline on stylelist.com. A Sears corporate press release quotes an unnamed Army spokesman extolling the new line for melding the “Army’s timeless traditions with iconic styling.” And following the Republican convention, the fashion blog Haute Concept added this note: “Now gun-toting soccer moms like Sarah Palin [can] get all their fight gear with one stop!” (my em)

What a fucking outrage! Selling the rights to the insignia of the oldest division in the United States Army for crass commercial usage is bad enough, but implying that some goddam no doubt made-somewhere-else-by-sewing-slaves cheap-ass sportswear somehow equates the wearer with generations of fighting infantrymen takes alternate reality to a new level and directly benefits Repug warmongers. That was the whole idea, I'm sure.

Charles Horner, a retired Army officer now working for Murtha, isn’t happy. He served with the 1st Division in Vietnam, as did his father in World War II, including landings in North Africa, Sicily and Normandy.

“That patch is to be worn by only people who served in the 1st Division,” said Horner. “What right does the Army have to sell our patch?”

My advice to 1st ID Vets is to take a tip from outlaw motorcycle clubs - when you see someone wearing your patch without authorization, i.e. not a member, pull it on the spot. In other words take it away from them wherever and whenever, then and there, whatever it takes. Make a public announcement that this will happen.

Note to DoD: You fuckers stepped on yer dicks big time with this bullshit, but if you wanta see blood in the streets, sell the rights to the Eagle, Globe, and Anchor.

Absolutely disgusting.