purple

adj. associated with or concerning all branches of the military. Subjects: English, Military

Editorial Note: Purple is often used in the names of joint or inter-service exercises or task forces. A purple-suiter is someone who works on behalf a joint service operation or task force.

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Citations: 1967 Los Angeles Times (July 16) “Defense News Policy Passes On Unmourned” p. F7: The Pentagon nickname for the new breed is “purple-suiter,” indicating an officer wears no particular uniform’s bias. 1986 Charles Stafford St. Petersburg Times (Sept. 18) “Congress gives final approval to Pentagon’s reorganization” p. 3A: If you combine the colors of the uniforms of the four services, you come up with the color purple. Thus officers who do joint duty, working on projects that cross service lines, are called purple-suiters. 1993 Jeff Gauger Omaha World-Herald (June 9) “Navy, Air Force Set Aside Rivalry to Run StratCom” p. 1: Behind his desk at U.S. Strategic Command, Rear Adm. Ralph Tindal keeps a purple military hat. On the front of the hat is a patch of Velcro, where the service emblem normally would be. Tindal has Navy and Air Force emblems, and he can attach one or both. In the past, purple was bad news to military people. It represented a blending of the four services and the loss of identity for each. 1998 Alexander J. Hindle Jr. (United States Naval Institute: Proceedings) (Dec. 1) “Coast Guard is joint” vol. 124, no. 12, p. 30: It must accept the idea that a cost of jointness is the assignment of personnel to action-officer status who will do “purple work” that may have no direct connection to day-to-day Coast Guard business. 2001 Maryann Lawlor Signal (Apr. 1) “Using information mandates a military on one” vol. 55, no. 8, p. 19-21: Information does not distinguish between military uniforms or service ranks. It is not limited by borders drawn on a map. It can be deployed and employed to coordinate a battle or deliver humanitarian aid. Information is truly purple. The U.S. armed services recognize that, when fighting as a joint force, information is a powerful common denominator. 2003 Charles Heyman (National Public Radio) (U.S.) (Mar. 17) “Talk of the Nation: Military leadership in possible war with Iraq”: I’m quite surprised sometimes when I come to America and I find the interservice rivalry still surprises me in many ways. It doesn’t happen here because we are so much smaller as far as armed forces go than the Americans. And nearly all of the senior officer education, senior officer posts are what we call purple. By the time you get to be a brigadier general, you start to be very, very purple and you start to be very, very triservice. 2003 James Dunnigan Strategy Page (July 22) “The Purple Headquarters Eater”: But since the 1980s, the Department of Defense has been pushing real hard for everyone to think “Purple” (what was good for everyone) than just concentrate on what was best for their particular service. 2005 PR Newswire (Apr. 7) “Nationwide Registration for Operation Purple Summer Camps Begins April 15”: Operation Purple is the only summer camp program that focuses on helping kids deal with deployment-related issues and is open to children of personnel from all branches of the U.S. Armed Forces ("purple” is a military term representing inclusion of all branches)

Posted 13 Apr 05 | Permalink | Tell a Friend