What is the source and history of "green on blue attack" expression?
score:10
From Green on blue, unboxing, and brass: on the radar in September 2012:
... Green on blue is modeled after an earlier phrase, blue on blue, referring to inadvertent clashes between members of the same side in an armed conflict... Blue on blue originated in the British military in the early 1980s, but has now spread around the world, and even moved beyond the military sphere to describe accidental shootings among police officers.
What are the blue and green referred to in these phrases? It doesn’t have anything to do with uniforms. The formulation is based on the standardized military symbols used to indicate different forces on maps. In this system, the color blue is used for friendly forces, red for hostile forces, green for neutral forces, and yellow for unknown forces. Thus, blue-on-blue shootings are incidents in which members of the same force fire on one another.
What green on blue means is a bit more complicated. In addition to Afghanistan, green on blue has also been used in the context of Iraq; US General Raymond Odierno referred to the threat of “green-on-blue attacks” by Iraqi security forces on US personnel in Iraq in 2009 (Politico, 28 May). It would seem that in the context of the Iraq and Afghanistan, the local security forces are regarded as neutral, or green: not hostile, but not fully allies, either.
Upvote:3
The phrase "green on blue" originates from the colour assignments for the various forces in a theatre of operations as shown in the tactical displays. These displays are now all electronic, but this holds true for older systems of markers on paper maps as well.
Red traditionally signifies danger, and is therefore used to show the enemy. Both green and blue were used for friendly forces in the past. However, with the proliferation of UN "peacekeeping" missions in the 1970s and 80s, the blue was used more for UN forces. This is because UN troops always wear a bright blue helmet or beret due to the UN needing to have it's forces clearly recognizable as UN rather than any one nation. UN vehicles are usually white with the letters UN marked on them, for the same reason.
From this, "green on blue" has come to mean "friendly forces firing on the foreign international peacekeepers".
More post
- 📝 Who did Mussolini meet after Hitler, on arrival to Germany after rescue?
- 📝 Why in the 70s and 80s was the United Kingdom called Great Britain in the international naming conventions?
- 📝 Did the German ship SS Hansa (former Albert Ballin) continue her journey to the West after 30 January 1945?
- 📝 Jewish Money Lenders in England: What happened to Money Lendings after Expulsion?
- 📝 Did a capital ship ever hit anything with a torpedo?
- 📝 Why were bloody religious wars so incredibly frequent in Europe in the century following the Reformation?
- 📝 Baldwin IV, the Leper King
- 📝 Why was Folke Bernadotte assassinated by Zionist Jews, when he had helped many Jews to escape holocaust?
- 📝 Is there a historical precedent to the vaccine scare?
- 📝 Has being a single mother been always stigmatized?
- 📝 Did Americans in the later half of the 18th-century have more freedom in choosing a partner?
- 📝 Was there ever a situation where members of two warring militaries were on leave in the same neutral location?
- 📝 What was this building and what happend to it?
- 📝 How was Hitler able to rearm?
- 📝 Croatia's reparations to Serbia after WWII
- 📝 Why is the nuclear powered USS Nautilus (SSN-571) a museum, when nuclear aircraft carriers are not converted to museums?
- 📝 Was the United States meant to be a confederation of states?
- 📝 Was Columbus viewed as a failure at the time of his death?
- 📝 Did any Native Americans make tomahawks from metal?
- 📝 What were the FBI's motives for wanting to discredit MLK?
- 📝 Has there ever been a great power that offered a major concession to a non-great power from a position of strength?
- 📝 How do numbered names work in history?
- 📝 What is Russia's official reason for invading Crimea?
- 📝 Who was the last person "Hanged, Drawn, and Quartered" under British jurisdiction?
- 📝 What is the symbolism behind the Sauser family crest from Sigriswil, Switzerland?
- 📝 What was the reason Jesus allowed Christians to eat pork?
- 📝 How did the US plan to use nuclear shells for naval guns?
- 📝 Why doesn't Eusebius of Caesarea mention Julian calendar in his Chronicle?
- 📝 Were the Japanese aware of Desmond Doss's actions?
- 📝 Was the Earth's sea-level significantly lower in ancient times?
Source: stackoverflow.com
Search Posts
Related post
- 📝 What is the source and history of "green on blue attack" expression?
- 📝 What is the date and original source of this medieval picture?
- 📝 What is the primary source for this quote by Julius Caesar's on Celts and Germans?
- 📝 What is the source of "the three most useless things in the world are the Great Wall, Pyramids, and the Yamato"?
- 📝 What is a good, authoritative source on the history of Tibet?
- 📝 Other than coffee and tobacco what major product became Cuba's source of wealth in the 18th century?
- 📝 What is the source for the Arabic name of the penguin and when it is first used?
- 📝 What is the source of the claim that Enigma codebreaking efforts shortened the Second World War by years and saved millions of lives?
- 📝 What are the origins and history of shaking, trembling, jerking, contorting, collapsing, fainting and similar manifestations in Christianity?
- 📝 What is the source of a half remembered art history quote possibly about Bruneleschi's Florence Cathedral?
- 📝 What is the history of Research and Development laboratories?
- 📝 What incentives were there for Soviet and Chinese politicians to try climb to the top when there was so much history of deposing their own?
- 📝 What irreplaceable manuscripts were lost in the burning of Jaffna Public Library and what history did they contain (and subsequently lost forever)?
- 📝 What is the source of this quote about hope and POWs?
- 📝 Is the history of relations between Ukraine and Russia similar to what was between Ireland and Uk?
- 📝 If the Union Jack joins the flag of England and Scotland, why does it have a different shade of blue than the Scottish flag?
- 📝 What is the oldest authentic example of people complaining about modern times and the young?
- 📝 What is the source of quote attributed to W.E.B. Du Bois: "When you have mastered numbers..."
- 📝 What is the difference between the Ancient Greek religion and the Ancient Roman religion?
- 📝 What do the modern Japanese people think about the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki?
- 📝 Were there any Germans in Japan after the surrender of Germany in May, 1945 and if so, what happened to them?
- 📝 What is the difference between the Middle Ages and the Dark Ages?
- 📝 In WWII, what were the major differences in tank combat on the eastern and western fronts?
- 📝 What are the text and subtext of this 1949 Soviet cartoon?
- 📝 In this cartoon from Puck, what indicates the identities of France and Britain?
- 📝 What is the evidence to claim that political order in ancient Rome was sufficiently different under "kingdom", "republic" and "empire"?
- 📝 What was the average height of Roman men and women?
- 📝 What is the origin of the "wheat and chessboard" legend?
- 📝 What was the first battle in history fought by vast-majority-% "distance-shooting" non-mechanized force?
- 📝 What were the EMP effects, if any, of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki?
