AWACS Patches of Operation Southern Watch

The Plessls’ (Bob, Parnell and Boyd)

Copyright Ó 2003

As members of the United States Army, Air Force patch collecting is somewhat new and foreign to us; however, Boyd just had the opportunity to learn how the Air Force operates in an Air Expedition Force (AEF). Recently, spending six months in support of Operation Southern Watch he became a fast learner.

Spending a lot of time working with Joint Task Force – South West Asia (JTF-SWA) Boyd had the change to visit many of the flying units. From his understanding of the AEF concept some Airmen have a 45-day tour of duty while most have a 90-day tour of duty. This is the primary reason why there are so many different patches for USAF personnel serving in that region.

As for the patches themselves, each one is hand sewn on a sewing machine. No two patches for the same unit are exactly alike. The size of the letters maybe different, the color of the thread may be a shade lighter or darker, and the shape of the patch could be different.

The process for making the patch is much like all other hand-sewn patches. The unit makes a drawing of the desired design; the person doing the sewing takes the drawing and punches small holes in the drawing outlining the significant shapes on the patch making the drawing into a template for the unit patch. He than lays the template on the colored cloth that will be the background color for the patch. With the template in place he rubs a blue power over the holes transferring the basic pattern to the cloth. From that point the quality of the patch is determined by the skill of the person at the sewing machine.

We plan on continuing to present articles on more theater made patches from the Southwest Asia region of the world and anything else that comes up in our travels.