[Alt History] P.R National Army 1920's

    If you all thought the whole alt history thing was done and over then you where wrong, just like myself when I decided to make this. A long time ago, back in 2020 I posted  This my first alt history figure based around an independent Puerto Rico, back then I mentioned how before the uniform I put together they used a white one and well.... here it is! This figure was a bit of an impulse bash, I saw the uniform and I just couldn't help myself in coming up with how they probably looked for all of 10 years, it's a somewhat simple figure since I forgot how to make those pouches. The rest are just items modified for example a whitened uniform, and a modified firefighter's helmet, the shoulder mark's I made myself and so with that let's get onto a bit of alt history.

The Early Days

From 1907 to 1917 the Puerto Rico Defense Force (Fuerzas de Defensa de Puerto Rico) wore either US uniforms that had been donated or civilian clothing with an armband with the letters F.D.P.R. These early days of the national army where filled with low quality recruits, lax training and abuses perpetrated by commanding officers who had achieved their ranks thanks to either their wealth or their connections, while the 1930's reforms are lauded as the first and the ones that would reshape the entire military it  was the ones passed in the 1920's that would help lead to them. In 1917 the Puerto Rico Department of Defense carried out a review of troops, in it they found inadequate training, improper gun handling, unpaid soldiers, broken or tattered  uniforms and a lack of discipline. Seeing this the PRDD sought to reshape the military and thus in 1920 the National Army of Puerto Rico was born, trained by a handful of US veterans that where paid quite handsomely to do so. While these reforms carried out by the PRDD increased the quality of the troops and bettered their pay there was still some politicians meddling in the affairs of the military which is one of the main reasons why a white cotton uniform was adopted, these white uniforms where perhaps one of the worse things that could have happened, the uniforms where made by a wide variety of manufacturers all of which used different quality fabrics which often lead to low quality uniforms, the shade of white used was also another issue. The troops received these uniforms in 1919 and where then quickly put to the test in both training and in military displays on the streets of the capital.

The new uniforms made the armed forces look professional but also elegant and at the same time harkened back to the Spanish rayadillo uniform that was in use in 1898, notably the use of three different colors for three different branches, red for artillery, blue for the navy and green for the army. Other aspects of the uniform where the engraved buttons with the seal of P.R. the green piping on the collar was made non removable unlike the shoulder marks. As for equipment the armed forces adopted the same style of pouches used in 1898, soldiers where also outfited with a long bayonet that would not see prolonged use as most where shortened and only a handful where left as they where, usually for use in parades. However while most of the equipment was normal it was perhaps the short lived "Adriano criollo", a local made version of the French Adrian helmet that stands out on images of the period, the helmets where based on the adrian but the number produced is not well known due to a lack of marking it is estimated that anywhere between one thousand to four thousand helmets where produced from 1920 to 1924, this number will probably never be known due to most of them being scrapped due to their low quality and lack of ventilation.