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Coat of Many Colours Parades gone?

FSTO

FSTO

Army.ca Fixture
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I know that many on this site are so operationally focused that their poop is camo coloured  ;D. But I liked the move made today at the GG investiture. The royal guard of honour had a division of Army, a division of RCAF and the flag party was all sailors. That looked very sharp. I'm sure that positions will rotate among the 3 traditional elements. (but what of CANSOF? Me thinks they have better things to do).

Now if we can just get the RCN officers to hook up their damn scabbards, swing their left arm and get rid of the white gloves all will be good.  :nod:


 
See below ... you can see the RCN colour party and the RCAF guard.
 

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Yep! You can tell it's a RCAF guard: The front rank is not sized properly! Double dip to shortest member  [:D

Neither the Army nor the RCN would make that mistake.  ;)
 
Oldgateboatdriver said:
Yep! You can tell it's a RCAF guard: The front rank is not sized properly! Double dip to shortest member  [:D

Neither the Army nor the RCN would make that mistake.  ;)
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To be fair to the junior service, could the furthest-away "dip" be a supernumary NCO/officer position of some sort, as opposed to the rest of the front rank?
 
Yes, but still double dip.

Assuming the member closest to the colours is the NCO, we would have, starting at the colours, and in relation to the member on their right:

NCO, Marker, shorter mbr., shorter (and shortest actually), taller (we only see the mgr's chin), taller, equal, shorter, shorter, shorter, taller, taller, etc.
 
 
In fact, in NDHQ, the RCN has been doing the Colour Party for a long time.  An intelligent sailor noted that there are far, far fewer positions to worry about if you're tasked with that; let the CA and RCAF worry about the bigger numbers*.


(* In fact, all positions in such guards are sourced from far & wide in NDHQ, and not only the three ECSes.  A quick review of cap badges show that the guards are composite groups pulled from many, many different places.)
 
dapaterson said:
In fact, in NDHQ, the RCN has been doing the Colour Party for a long time.  An intelligent sailor noted that there are far, far fewer positions to worry about if you're tasked with that; let the CA and RCAF worry about the bigger numbers*.


(* In fact, all positions in such guards are sourced from far & wide in NDHQ, and not only the three ECSes.  A quick review of cap badges show that the guards are composite groups pulled from many, many different places.)
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True. Cap tallies, beret and wallet badges were all over the place.
I'm just happy that uniform colour in each division and the Flag Party were well, uniform! ;D
 
Oldgateboatdriver said:
Yep! You can tell it's a RCAF guard: The front rank is not sized properly! Double dip to shortest member  [:D

Neither the Army nor the RCN would make that mistake.  ;)
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Nope, it's not an RCAF guard, nor a Canadian Army guard nor a colour party provided by the RCN.  It was a bog standard Guard of Honour mounted by the Canadian Armed Forces and formed in review order as per the applicable drill manual.  And I don't even have to see any parade order to know the make up:

2. A 100-person royal or state guard of honour
is composed of:

a. one major;
b. two captains or lieutenants;
c. one master warrant officer;
d. one warrant officer;
e. two sergeants; (though there were a number of extra sergeants taking the place of C/Ps)
f. 96 corporals/privates.

6. The guard shall form up in two divisions, as
per company drill (Figure 10-2-1). The warrant and
senior non-commissioned officers shall take posts in
order of seniority as the:
a. right marker;
b. left marker;
c. right marker of the left division;
d. left marker of the right division.
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There are no supernumeraries in a guard.

As for the sizing and blaming it on an "air force" attitude, if you look at the video of the parade, the guard MWO was in an army uniform.  It would have been his responsibility to form the guard and then hand it over to guard commander.  So if any service is to blame for laxity, it was the army.  But really, looking at the command badges (if any worn) and formation patches (very few on army uniforms) it seems the majority of pers on parade were from organizations other than the commands known as RCN, Cdn Army and RCAF, therefore an appropriate NDHQ mob, whose turn-out and performance was respectable.

But then, it has now (with this installation of GG) become a tradition to pick apart the guard.
 
FSTO said:
I'm just happy that uniform colour in each division and the Flag Party were well, uniform! ;D
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Given who the PM is, I would have thought that the guards would be more, well, joint.
[Xp
 
If the book is to be believed, then the parade was improperly led, Blackadder, because I didn't see any major there ... at all!!!  ;D
 
And two more pics showing the green part of the guard ...
 

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FJAG said:
I've always liked the look of the German Armed Forces Wachbataillon (Guard Battalion) which is used for numerous ceremonial occasions has a number of companies but always parades with a band, colour guard and a small company each of army, air force and navy personnel.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROuBL0ahXRQ

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wachbataillon

:cheers:
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Well, what they do would definitely solve the different DEU issue.

The soldiers of the Wachbataillon are from all three German Armed Services (i.e. Army, Navy and Air Force) and have the uniforms from all forces at their disposal to be able to perform any drill mission on every occasion. Green berets are used for Army uniform, the (dark) blue beret for Air Force and the Navy wears traditionally the sailor suit (Matrosenanzug). The beret badge for Army and Air Force uniform shows the letter "W" as an abbreviation for Wachbataillon.
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I've always liked the look of the German Armed Forces Wachbataillon (Guard Battalion) which is used for numerous ceremonial occasions has a number of companies but always parades with a band, colour guard and a small company each of army, air force and navy personnel.
Click to expand...

A long time for the Guard to be at "The Present". Are they using the old WW2 Rifle? The Band Master did a left about turn. Is that what their drill is? Great video and music. Thanks for posting the links.
 
Rifleman62 said:
A long time for the Guard to be at "The Present". Are they using the old WW2 Rifle? The Band Master did a left about turn. Is that what their drill is? Great video and music. Thanks for posting the links.
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I watched the Naval elements take part in Fortissimo 2017 on Parliament Hill in July.  They are carrying Mauser K98s.
 
No kidding.  We have one, and they all wear the same red outfits....
 
But they're not the guys being tasked, ad nauseam, to provide Guards of Honour personnel in the NCR.
 
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