In GW I, a lot of troops that went didn't get desert camo's until they returned to the U.S.

They had to look good for parades.

The real question is whether or not they've been issued spanking new MOPP gear.

Also, unless we're really planning on taking our time and telegraphing an invasion, the troops will not be using the heavy equipment they train on at Ft. Riley to go to war. There's no way the press wouldn't pick up on them moving all that onto railheads to ship it to Belmont, and it would take weeks for the transport ships to get the equipment in theater.

Conversely, the light wheeled vehicles can be shipped reasonably quickly and quietly on C-5As, which would explain the NG troops being issued tan trucks. Still, I would think NG troops would be more likely to be used for the occupation following the fight. Which may mean we're closer to invasion than anyone would have thought.

More proof that the StatFor posting was pure speculation.

I wouldn't get into too much of an uproar over painting vehicles. Sand has been almost a default paint scheme since Dustup In The Desert '91 and repainting costs money, big money if you're using the current crop of acrylic anti-chem type paints and I haven't heard of too many NG outfits complaining of being over-funded. Also, overall sand is way easier to paint then NATO 3-tone ;)

And in Riley, lessee, one tank company CO in scheduled services decides repainting is a good idea (good cheese points, possible bullet comments, yatta yatta...) and said company gets noticed by others (Hey, that looks pretty good, Major I want my batallion to look like that, too, make it happen...Hey that looks pretty good, Colonel, I want my brigade to look like that too, make it happen...)

That explanation ignores the money question. Switching paint schemes isn't cheap, not for that number of units. The change doesn't necessarily mean we're getting ready to send the troops to the desert, but it's not an instance of the good idea fairy visiting various commanders at Riley, either.

Live near Ft. Riley. Lots of their equipment has been sand color scheme for a long time.

Possibly not a Good Idea Fairy-ism and I suspect that Riley's brigades have been in sand paint since GW1 to begin with along with most of the rest of the US-based heavy brigades.

But speaking of the Bright Idea Fairy and piddling away money, lemme tell you about the time a certain maintenance battalion at a certain base between Waco and Austin TX decided that .50 cal machine gun barrels after being driven into the ground and having heavy guage chain welded to them would make real nice fence posts around their battalion HQ. This back in the Carter presidency when bucks were not exactly easy to come by (Ever seen tankers simulate tanking by riding jeeps cause fuel's too expensive? It ain't pretty. ;)

I was pulling duty as an armorer at the time so was quite aware that said barrels were recoverable/accountable items and worth a pretty penny even after being 'shot out'.

A phone call to the Corps fraud waste and abuse line later and gee, where'd the fence go?

There's been tan painted vehicles since The Gulf War. Painting a vehicle isn't prohibitively expensive, but the military's always kept a certain percentage painted that color because of our continuing Gulf commitment and also because of potential conflicts in regions that would require that color. If you get a no-notice tasking, you don't have time to paint all the vehicles desert tan, so it makes sense to have some already painted for such an eventuality.

I've never heard of people being issued BDU's en route to a destination, unless it was on a special case basis. In the Air Force, we deploy with everything we'll need and have mobility processing lines to insure we have what is required. If you have some lead time, you might be able to get some desert BDU's, but most of the time you travel with your three standard sets of woodland BDU's and keep those until you're either rotated out or can get your hands on some deserts in-country.

Unfortunately, we can't buy deserts at military clothing, so we can't get on the ball ahead of time just in case.

I got my deserts last March. I was on-deck for an AEF.