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=                            Shelter-half                            =
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                            Introduction
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A shelter-half is a simple kind of partial tent designed to provide
temporary shelter and concealment when combined with one or more
sections. Two sheets of canvas or a similar material (the halves) are
fastened together with snaps, straps or buttons to form a larger
surface. The shelter-half is then erected using poles, ropes, pegs,
and whatever tools are on hand, forming an inverted V structure. Small
tents like these are often called pup tents in American English.


                             Background
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Shelter halves are a mainstay of most armies, and are known from the
mid 19th century. Often, each soldier carries one shelter-half and
half the poles, etc., and they pair off to erect a two-man tent. The
size and shape of each half shelter piece may vary from army to army,
but are typically rectangular, triangular or lozenge shaped. When time
and space allow, some forms of half-shelters can be combined into a
larger, more complex tent.

Shelter-halves are usually designed to serve double duty as ponchos
against the rain, or for the concealment of snipers. While the fabric
is often simple olive drab, several nations use camouflaged fabric.
The first printed camouflage for soldiers were the Italian 'Telo
mimetico' introduced in 1929 for their half-shelters. The first
camouflage uniforms were the Second World War German paratrooper
smock, based on their M1931 Splittermuster shelter-halves. The
Austro-Hungarian army used the M888 zeltbahn that was first issued in
an ochre color, later in grey color that had a bayonet hole allowing
the rifle to be used as an ad-hoc tent pole. Russian Army has used
'plasch-palatkas' (literally "cape-tents", designed to be used as both
a part of a larger tent cover, or an individual weatherproof cape)
since 1894, and the modern version, virtually unchanged since, was
introduced in 1936, with the camo version being available since 1942.
To add some confusion, the ordinary waterproofed cape with a similar
name ('plasch-nakidka', "cape-overcoat") was issued at the same time,
but these were not intended to combine with each other.

A commercially sold example known as a zelter shelter exists.


                              Gallery
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File:Camp Crane Pup Tents.jpg|Camp Crane pup tents
File:Dutch army tent 1955.jpg|Dutch Army pup tent from 1955
File:PolnischesMilitaerzelt Bild10 ZweiZeltbahnenOberseite-I 17Aug2013
(9543480062).jpg|Two Polish Army shelter halves fastened together
File:PolnischesMilitaerzelt Bild07 ZeltAufgebautEingang-I 17Aug2013
(9543481422).jpg|Polish Army tent erected
File:Pfadfinderstamm Ägypten - Wanderung bei St. Bartholomä,
Eiskapelle, 1993.png|German Boy Scouts with M1931 Splittermuster
shelter-halves in 1993
File:Плащ-палатка, МО РФ, лежит на земле.JPG|Russian 'plasch-palatka'
spread over ground


                              See also
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* Bivouac shelter
* Lean-to
* Swag (bedroll)
* Swedish torch


License
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License URL: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
Original Article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shelter-half