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What is an Alice pack?


stratasfan
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stratasfan

I've seen several posts over the past couple of weeks, as I've been watching the New Posts thread, posting about wanting Alice Packs. what is an Alice pack? I've never run across them on the forum before, and when I tried a google search, I didn't have enough to find out what it was . . . as I assume it isn't Alice in Wonderland packs of things! ;)

 

 

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If I remember correctly, it is for Army Lightweight Individual Load Carrying Equipment, ALICE. It's the post-M1956/M1967 (and maybe MLCE) soldier's field gear. It was used up until the 1990's.

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stratasfan

Oh, many thanks! I just wondered. Seems like I've seen it referenced several times lately, and I was just getting a bit curious. But the one post I just found, didn't have a picture, so I thought I would post! :) Now I'm off to Google a picture! 

 

Thanks so much, atb!

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stratasfan

Oh . . . it is actually like a whole harness that you hook all the web gear pouches on! Wow!

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It is still a pack in demand with active duty, hikers, campers, etc.  It just wears well. This is the larger one . We used to call it a winter or mountain pack/ruck

 

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On 5/23/2020 at 5:16 PM, atb said:

If I remember correctly, it is for Army Lightweight Individual Load Carrying Equipment, ALICE. It's the post-M1956/M1967 (and maybe MLCE) soldier's field gear. It was used up until the 1990's.

It was issued well into the 2000's. I was issued a large ALICE ruck as late as 2007 in 25th ID. Replaced by MOLLE, but I'm sure ALICE is still out there. 

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Can someone add to when they were first issued? I was at Bragg in 1977, I still have mine. We had at the time all Vietnam web gear, TA50 if I remember correctly. Was the ALICE pack Vietnam issue?

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GUDMAR1975

I was issued a medium ALICE in 1977 at Camp Pendleton, California. Before that we only had the M1941 Marine Corps pack. We got the large ALICE pack when we went to cold weather training or some other extended missions. There were modest improvements over the years: better buckles and waist belts are two I recall. A woodland camouflage version appeared in the early.1990s, but only for the medium size. I retired in 2002. I heard of Mollie and CFP 90, but was never issued anything but ALICE. The Marine Corps has since developed and used a couple of different packs.

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The Rooster

ALICE Gear was used 1973- the 1990's before molle gear.

LBE suspenders pistol belt rucksack ammo pouches canteens first aid pouch compass pouch which was really just a first aid pouch used for the compass etc etc etc was all alice gear.

I carried two 1 quart canteens on the belt and 2 in the ruck sack.

Carring a gallon of water was standard for me.

ALICE Equipment was all I ever used. I got out before MOLLE gear was introduced.

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Although MOLLE made an initial appearance around 1997, it wasn't widely issued until after 2001. There were several types of load bearing vests (LBV) issued between ALICE load bearing equipment (LBE) and MOLLE. Both vests were garbage in my opinion, when given the choice I never really switched from an ALICE LBE until I received MOLLE in 2005. I saw a number of other Soldiers that did the same. I never saw a piece of issued MOLLE prior to 2005. I was still issued an LBV with ALICE ammo pouches, canteens, a pistol belt, and an ALICE rucksack in 1st Brigade, 25th ID at Fort Wainwright in 2007. I rarely saw a CFP90 pack, it wasn't fielded to the entire Army. Again, they were kind of a partial transition between ALICE and MOLLE.

 

The Army didn't start to update and replace individual field gear Army-wide until after 2002 when combat deployments started to really increase. We had a mix of green, woodland and desert pattern gear until 2006 when Universal Camouflage Pattern (UCP) equipment started to be fielded. Even then it took awhile to make it out to everyone (see 2007 comment above). It seems like UCP equipment just made it out to everyone when we switched camo patterns again. Now we've got a mix of patterns again and I'm sure it'll be another 5 years before we get Multicam pattern gear out to replace all the UCP gear. 

 

Table of Allowances 50 or TA50 is a general term to refer to ALL Army individually issued field gear. It isn't specific to type or date range. 

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  • 3 weeks later...

ALICE packs are still being used by some infantrymen today. The picture was sent to me by a buddy of mine who's with the 25th Infantry division. (Hes the miserable looking RTO on the far right) In the picture you can see the soldier in the middle is still using a large alice ruck. From my understanding the Alice ruck is still authorized to be used in the field for training, but dont quote me on that, that's just what I've heard.a968dfbd113fab69e1c8deff892a8162.jpg

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Gman, thanks for posting a recent photo. Authorized gear is a relative term. A lot of units have a very liberal field equipment policies, and some units have very strict policies. It's all based on commander's policy and unit SOP. I'm glad to see an ALICE pack still in use, and it is somewhat surprising to see a young troop using it. More commonly, you'll see seasoned troops using older gear.

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