FRIDAY FOTO: October 2, 2020

Uniform Tour.

(All Defense Department photos by Lisa Ferdinando)

This week we thought we would return to a thing we haven’t done for a while: A look at honor guard uniforms in countries where the Secretary of Defense is visiting. We haven’t done it for Mark Esper, who, because of the coronavirus pandemic, hasn’t been traveling much outside the United States.

But recently he made the rounds of North Africa and the Mediterranean and here are some of the uniforms that Defense Department staff photographed.

The first one (above) is from the island nation of Malta. You can see the influence of the British Empire in the garb of these two very tall guards.

Next up is Morocco, a former French colony in North Africa, now ruled by a king.

The uniforms still showed European influence, if a little more formal with epaulets, in Rabat, Morocco where Esper met with General Abdelfattah Louarak at the Royal Moroccan Armed Forces Headquarters.

Then there was Tunisia.

(Defense Department photo)

Lots of different uniforms were on display in a welcome ceremony with Tunisian Defense Minister Ibraham Bartagi in Tunis.

(Defense Department photo)

Here’s another look at those caped, saber brandishing, red clad honor guards.

(Defense Department photo)

And then there are the U.S. Marines in their dress blues meeting with the Defense Secretary at the North African American Cemetery and Memorial in Carthage, Tunisia.

(Defense Department photo)