[Alt History] The Spear of the Navy! Puerto Rico Naval Infantry

    It's time for that alt history post for that series of figures I've made! Two star wars bashes in a row is too much (who am I kidding) which is why I'm posting this guy. The idea started out first as a foreign volunteer, a territorial guard and lastly as a specialized landing unit of the navy, as with all my alt history figures thus far the pouches where made by me, in this case I drew inspiration from the 1896 pattern colonial infantry belts used by the Spanish Army, I personally do not know if such belts where ever used in Puerto Rico but I know they where used in other places (such as Cuba and the Philippines). The original belt had 4 pouches at the front with a larger reserve one, the one I made has 6 pouches and no reserve one.

Other things I did was fabric medium paint the uniform tan (it didn't bleach), remove the lower pockets, and paint the helmet light blue and do some brown spotting on it to make some weird camouflage.

Created in 1923 the naval infantry was meant to be the Navy's land based force, over time new tasks where added to them such as attacking land objectives after the navy had bombarded them, board enemy ships and secure landing positions and start construction of basic infrastructure needed to land supplies, vehicles and troops. The uniform chosen for the naval infantry was the same as those of the standard army but in the lesser seen color of tan, their equipment was also different as they employed a cartridge belt of six pouches that could carry a total of four clips each. Originally the naval infantry wore ankle height boots with puttees or gaiters but these where slowly fased out in favor of canvas boots or leather boots if they where on land.

Puerto Rico's naval Infantry would undergone other changes in the 1930's, they replaced their old rifles with newer ones, they also adopted the stahlhelm which where either produced or bought, some surplus helmets also made their way to them. Since navy helmets where usually painted a light blue the marines would often stain their helmets with the help of paint and sponges to create a pattern known to them as "Blue Coral". The naval infantry would be one of the most active of all branches, often times carrying out operations against smugglers, their largest operation would be in 1937 when a group known as "Frente Unido Revolucionario (United Revolutionary Front) declared the at the time unincorporated territory of Vieques a republic and sovereign nation free from Puerto Rico's uncaring leadership. Naval Infantry troops would make landfall on May 7th 1937, 16 hours after the declaration, navy ships fired upon positions while the marines advanced, the revolution was put down two days later with the incarceration of the rebels and the execution of the leaders, Vieques would be placed on martial law for a total of two years.