Let me tell you a story about military logistics and PPE....

For about two decades, the US military had a single type of protective boot for CBRN (then called NBC) protective clothing for general use by the troops. The so-called "mopp boot" or "fishtail boot"

It was a one-size fits all overboot. Some tiny female corporal with size 3 boots could put them on. So could some corn-fed Iowa Nat Guard giant with size 15 paws.

Now, the US Army, in its infinite wisdom, decided to phase out these one-size fits all overboots. They weren't well-liked necessarily, and a lot of soldiers either were poorly trained or forgot entirely how to put them on.

However, as someone who managed a stockpile of PPE and served as an S4 of a battalion, and as a battalion NBC officer (before it was CBRN or WMD or any of that fancy shit), I learned that the great joy of the "chemical protective footcover" was in its logistics

It was the only bit of the Mission Oriented Protective Posture (MOPP - Army speak for PPE for CBRN environments for the rank and file) that was truly one size fits all. 100 soldiers, 100 pairs of MOPP fishtail boots and everyone had one that would fit.

In the early 1990s, the US Army decided to phase out the overboots. I'm still not sure why. It was decided that soldiers could use normal Army issue green vinyl overboots ("rubber galoshes" in 1990 US-army speak). (Yes, I know "galosh" means different things in other places.)

The GVO looked like this.

From an effectiveness standpoint, the GVO was fine. It provided ample protection.

Now, here was the logisticians nightmare... the old fishtail boot came in one size, one NSN 8430-01-0215978. Savvy readers know where I am going with this...

The new GVO came in a multiplicity of sizes, from size 3 to size 14.

The transition from the one-size fits fishtail boot to the many-sized green vinyl overboot was, to use epithets common to the vernacular of the time "a soup sandwich" "ATFU" and "SNAFU". It took years to sort through the mess.

There were many fine examples of how it all worked out, particularly in Guard and Reserve units. I was, in fact, the NBC officer for a USAR battalion when it was our turn to transition.

But lots of great military minds found new and interesting ways of making this whole thing rather fun, in retrospect.

A common snafu in the logistical channels was the idea prevalent in the S-4s and G-4s that only a one-for-one swapout could be done without "messing up the property book"

But when you replace a one-size fits all item with an item that comes in 12 different sizes, that never works, because Cpl Smith is size 8 and leaves and is replace by Cpl Jones who is size 11, and so forth.

You'd think this would be easy to understand. However, the US Army only barely gets its head around the idea that some soldiers are lefthanded.

Some units literally ordered a 1 for 1 replacement, without even looking too closely at the charts and tables. They ordered the next thing with an NSN and "overboot" on the data table

So, a USAR battalion I know of got a whole shitload of size three boots that would probably fit a Brownie troop.

Several units I know of ordered equal amounts of each size.

Some units came close to doing the right thing, and surveyed the boot sizes of the personnel at the next drill weekend. I say "close" because with these boots, they are like actual boot sizes. If you are size 8, you'll need a size 9 overboot.

I'm very proud of the fact that I ordered correctly and kept a stash of the old overboots for the (inevitable) folk who were caught out.

My Army Achievement Medal citation might as well have read "made sure that his was the only battalion in the 80th Div that wasn't a soup sandwich in the NBC inspection"

I'd also done a lot to un-ass other things in the NBC department....

The moral to this story is that military logistics can be good. They can also wind up with a shit-ton of size 3 boots that nobody can use.

Remember Kaszeta's Axiom of Military Logistics:

"Just be glad that you don't get all the logistics you pay for"

I know of at least one case where, in the Vietnam War, time, money, effort, and risk went into a high risk operation to supply a remote Special Forces A-Team camp with a special item requested through official channels.

Due to a cockup somewhere (did the punch cards get mixed up - they used computers the size of a house to order this stuff) the NSN - the stock number - of the requested item got botched.

I'm not sure what the urgent request was - spare part for a 81mm mortar? Headspace wrench for a .50 cal? Spare radio part? Green dye for the berets? This part of the story got garbled in version I heard.

But what got delivered, by airdrop, was a bassoon.

Trust me, any Army logistician in any army is capable of delivering bedpans as helmets and sending surplus WW2 tin helmets to an NHS hospital.

Here endeth the lesson. Please give generously on the way out.... buy me a coffee. Hell, I ain't gonna lie. Gonna spend it on beer. https://ko-fi.com/dankaszeta