This was mixed in with a small group of mostly US military patches. I am minimally familiar with Vietnamese made patches but not so much with beret insignia like this. Good? Bad? All opinions welcome.

The rear.

I saw your post and it has taken me a while to get back to it to reply. Here are two examples that I know are authentic to the Vietnam War period since I brought them back in 1971. You will notice that they are very different from each other, but carry the same meaning as a symbol of the Republic of Viet Nam Airborne, NHAY DU. RVN patches and badges have wide variations since there were hundreds of 'mama-san' sewing shops all over South Vietnam sewing patches, badges and insignia for all the different units. Your example is a variation I have not seen before and it looks to be handmade, but by whom? They crank out a lot of bullion insignia for the collectors market in Pakistan, Thailand and also in today's Vietnam. So I am not able to say if yours is real or not. It is at the very least an interesting variation..

I'll show the backs of mine below.

Here are the back sides. Both above of these beret badges were never sewn on a beret. The sewing shops in RVN regularly used newspaper as a backing when sewing patches on their machines. The paper made the cloth patch slide easier when sewing I was told. Anyone else have a comment?

I agree that your piece doesn't look like any of the SVN War era bullion I have seen over the years. Here are four more examples of SVN War era ARVN bullion beret badges. The first two are both ARVN Airborne.

 

The next two are ARVN Special Forces (LLDN) and ARVN Ranger.

 

I saw your post and it has taken me a while to get back to it to reply. Here are two examples that I know are authentic to the Vietnam War period since I brought them back in 1971. You will notice that they are very different from each other, but carry the same meaning as a symbol of the Republic of Viet Nam Airborne, NHAY DU. RVN patches and badges have wide variations since there were hundreds of 'mama-san' sewing shops all over South Vietnam sewing patches, badges and insignia for all the different units. Your example is a variation I have not seen before and it looks to be handmade, but by whom? They crank out a lot of bullion insignia for the collectors market in Pakistan, Thailand and also in today's Vietnam. So I am not able to say if yours is real or not. It is at the very least an interesting variation..

I'll show the backs of mine below.

 

Your badge on the left is also ARVN Special Forces (LLDN). The one on the right is for the ARVN Airborne.

I have doubts about the badge that was presented. It seems to be lacking a number of details compared to other examples.

Gil,

Thanks for pointing that out. I should have remembered the difference. Getting old...

Gil,

Thanks for pointing that out. I should have remembered the difference. Getting old...

LOL! You are not the only one...

These are my 2 examples of ARVN Patches: a stand alone ARVN Special Force and a Beret Mount ARVN Airborne, acquired before 1975.

 

Tim

I like them but I’m not an expert.

On 12/29/2018 at 2:34 PM, siamundo said:

The rear.

Reproduction. These are what they should look like.

Excellent post and information!