Was half heartedly looking at some Joes and noticed that they all had bloused pants legs. Got to looking, and come to find out, most of the Joes have their boots bloused, while few, if any, Cobras do. I thought that was a neat touch from someone at Hasbro. Pretty subtle, too, as many years as it took me to notice that.

Even with the more outlandish aspects of GI Joe it is the little "military" nods that made it all feel like it could be real.

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I'm not familiar with that term, "bloused". What does it mean?

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Tucked pants into their boots. Then bloused out, like when you tuck in your shirt and you have a tumtum. You. Not me.

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no way, those joes are from the 80's they use blousing straps. tucking in is against the rules.

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Hell yeah on blousing straps. Straps for life! Tucked in sucks. LOL. I have noticed a pretty even split, though it seems like NCOs tuck in more and officers use the straps, but it's not hard and fast as a rule.

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what are blousing straps?

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Yeah, but any combat troops are going to tuck. Heck, even in BMT field training, they take away your straps.

To answer the "what are they?" question, blousing straps are these little green elasticy straps that you can wrap around your leg just above your boot in order tuck your pants under and give that blousing effect without actually tucking your pants into your boots.

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Well, I'm not exactly hard core. I work at HQ lol. They don't care what we use.

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Tucking helps keep the critters out. Tucking can give the same effect, as long as you don't "pegleg" them (tucked and wrapped supertight).
I have never liked blousers, but have always used 100mph tape, or the wide velcro bands.

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A pic of Flint's legs to show what the effect is. Marines, Army, and Air Force in BDU have to have the legs flared above the combat boots.

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The idea is as above - to keep nasty crap out of your pants legs. However, since you can roll them "under" and then put a strap around the extra part, you can get the look without all that fabric shoved in your boots. The look is the same, but more comfy. The downside is, stuff can more easily get in your boots. Not bad if you're in an office though. But out in the field it'll keep you safer by a tad.

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And yet Tunnel Rat wore bell bottoms.

I did notice it looked like a lot of Joes tucked their pants into their boots, I just never realized it mirrored an actual military practice.

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Tucking in is NOT against the rules, it actually is the rule. At least back then. In ten years, I don't think I ever saw blousing straps even once.
Of course, the majority of my time I wore a flight suit, which was worn over the boots, so a different story for me. But there was plenty of others not on flight status, that wore regular BDU's.

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Air Force you can do either one, but I've only been in 6 years. I have no idea what the regs were in the early 80s. But considering that Joes actually got in the mud/jungle/junk etc, I'd say they were probably all tucked.*

*2011 Joecustoms award for nerdiest/most military accuracy in a fantasy toyline thread.

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