The 172nd Stryker Brigade was the one of few first units to deploy with new Universal Camouflage Pattern- Army Combat Uniform (UCP-ACU). There wasn’t any UCP colored patches available yet so Olive Drab patches from BDU era was used, with velcro added to those. This is one of the earliest “transitional uniform era” in the collection. The 172nd was one of the unfortunate units that had one of the longest deployment (16 months) due to US. Army’s stop loss policy in 2005. This soldier was in the 4/11th Field Artillery. He was eventually promoted from Specialist to Corporal, presumably during the deployment and patches for ACU were finally available.