Any guess on this vest?

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[Buckhi]

Hiya all,

Picked this vest up while passing through Kazakhstan recently, looked WAY different than the vests I have in my collection which is why I picked it up.   I have no clue if it's a local production or something else, I'm hoping someone here maybe in the know.   The label is totally worn so I can't figure out who the manufacturer is, there is some Cyrillic writing but again I'm clueless as to what it says.   The mag pouches are single mag only and really only work with my steel 7.62 mags, my bakelites and 5.45 mags barely fit.   The stitching is actually pretty nice & uniform so I'm wondering if factory produced vs. a homemade rig.

Any ideas?   Anyone seen something like this before?

TIA & Appreciate the help!

Boomah

[michelwijnand]

I have a very similar vest, in this topic here: http://www.red-alliance.net/forum/index.php?topic=17689.msg209988#msg209988
The green one I posted a bit before that is of very smilar construction, and both came from Bosnia, though I also saw a woodland
one in use by an Uzbek soldier, and I posted the picture of that over there too

[FIDO]

second the guess, shares a lot similaritis with OS BIH vest:

http://www.abload.de/img/borbeni-prsluk-os-bih3xob9.jpg
http://www.abload.de/img/borbeni-prsluk-os-bih67qgm.jpg

http://www.abload.de/img/originalslika-1050809gjr53.jpg
this is the m16 variant though...

[michelwijnand]

Yes that's the green one I meant, which can also fit ak mags very well, maybe that's in case they need to
use another weapon for some reason

But I have never seen such a woodland version in use with Bosnian troops, so maybe those still are from
another country like Uzbek. or Kazakhstan, and Bosnia was inspired by those to make their own vests like
it, possibly after acquiring some of them, like the woodland one I got from Bosnia.

Oh and the cyrrilic letters read OA Nazar, maybe a name of someone using it

[MRUD]

Those are Turkish assault vests. There is a version for HK G3 mags , and for AK mags ...  Turkish army uses both AK & G3 rifles , and some M16 ( at least what I have seen so far ).

And it's true , Bosnian army had some of those - they got them from Turkey. I had 4 or 5 of those vests - and they all came from Bosnia , but were signed with Turkish army soldiers names.

[Buckhi]

Big thank you gents, appreciate the info & translation as well! I've been wondering about this thing! 

Boomah

[michelwijnand]

That's definately a positive ID
Do you have an idea as from what year these Turkish G3 vests were first produced?

[MRUD]

Well I can't say for sure , but I belive mid '90 - early 200x years. They can be seen worn by Turkish troops in mountain regions , fighting Kurdish gerillas even today. I even found a website of the company that makes them.

As far as my intel goes , they were received after the "Dayton peace accord" as a donation of Turkish army to Bosnian army. Some may have been present even during the war , but it seems that larger numbers were only given to Bosnia after the war.
Also , it seems that vest that were given , prior to their delivery were in fact worn by the Turkish troops , because every one that I had in my possesion was signed by turkish soldiers , and note that Bosnian names and surenames are very different from Turkish , so no mistake there.