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AEP-2333
National Authorities of NATO member nations that specify and procure combat clothing, and the manufacturers that supply it
AEP-2333 sets NATO's recommended performance and protective-property criteria and troop-trial guidance for combat clothing, covering water-resistant, tropical, extreme cold weather and flame-resistant garments.
AEP-2333, Combat Clothing Performance and Protective Properties and Trial Guidance, is a NATO Allied Engineering Publication (AEP). Edition A was promulgated in December 2021, replacing separate NATO material on waterproof clothing (the former STANAG 4364), arctic clothing (the former STANAG 4573) and the 1992 ACCP-01 heat-transfer methodology, now Annex A. Like every AEP, it is not a ratified agreement in its own right: it is covered by STANREC 2333, a Standardization Recommendation, so nations are invited to use it rather than obliged to ratify it.
The document is explicit about how much room a National Authority has. Its water-resistant clothing chapter states plainly that "NA may choose to apply other test methods and/or to define other pass/fail criteria" than the ones it recommends (clause 2.1), and the mechanical strength requirements repeat the same point: "As mechanical strength has an implication on weight and price, NA may decide to apply other requirements" (clause 2.8.3(c)). AEP-2333 reaches a manufacturer only when a National Authority's own tender or contract selects specific thresholds and test methods from it. Outside that contract, it functions as a shared reference nations draw on when writing their own procurement specifications, not a requirement in itself.
The document works through combat clothing by environment. Chapter 1 sets out the general Combat Clothing System: a "mix-and-match" layered system whose garments can be added or removed by activity and temperature (clause 1.6), with camouflage requirements matched to the background's infra-red reflectance, colour and luminance (clause 1.5), and a table of sixteen properties every candidate garment is measured against, including breathability, water resistance, thermal insulation, ultraviolet protection at a minimum factor of UPF 30, wear resistance (with a stated minimum service life of six to eight months of military use) and functionality. Chapter 2 covers water-resistant clothing, Chapter 3 tropical field clothing, and Chapter 4 extreme cold weather clothing across a range the document defines as "temperature variations between +10 °C and -50 °C" before wind-chill (clause 4.3). Chapter 1 states directly that the general Combat Clothing System "does not cover specialist clothing such as clothing for Armoured Fighting Vehicle crewmen etc." (clause 1.3(d)).
Chapter 2's water-resistant clothing tables are typical of how the document works: recommended thresholds for water penetration on fabric, cross seams and the whole garment, water-vapour resistance, mechanical strength (breaking load, tear strength, abrasion cycles), dimensional change (not exceeding plus-or-minus 3 percent after five wash or dry-cleaning cycles, clause 2.8.4) and resistance to delamination, each tested new and after specified wash, dry-cleaning, flex and contamination pre-treatments. The test methods named are almost all civil textile standards obtained from their own publishers, chiefly ISO (ISO 811, ISO 4920, ISO 11092, ISO 13935-2, ISO 12947-2, ISO 4674-1, ISO 1421, ISO 3175-2, ISO 9865, ISO 6330, ISO 5077, ISO 7854) with DIN 53359 and EN 14360 alongside them. Tropical field clothing (Chapter 3) has to protect "to enable use in a UV index 11+ environment" (clause 3.4(d)) while staying lightweight, air-permeable and fast-drying. Extreme cold weather clothing (Chapter 4) is a multi-layer system, underwear, middle layer, outer garment, mittens, headgear and eye protection, each with its own characteristics, referencing ISO 11079 for assessing cold stress and required clothing insulation.
Chapter 5 addresses flame resistant clothing for both dismounted soldiers and mounted personnel such as combat vehicle crews and helicopter crews (clause 5.3), against threats from burning fuel, exploding ammunition, vehicle penetration and improvised explosive devices. Outer-layer fabric should self-extinguish when tested to ISO 15025 or ASTM D6413 (clause 5.8(b)(1)), and complete garments should be tested by instrumented manikin to ISO 13506 or ASTM F1930 with a 3-second flame-exposure threshold and a 5-second objective, after which "the predicted burn injury (2nd and 3rd degree) should not exceed 35% of the manikin body area" (clause 5.8(b)(3)). Thermal shrinkage measured to ISO 17493 "should not exceed 10%" (clause 5.8(b)(4)). Design details such as covering fasteners, keeping metal off the skin, and tucking layers into each other are specified to limit chimney effects and skin exposure at the neck, wrists and ankles.
Chapter 6 is a separate discipline from the performance tables: guidance on running user evaluations of clothing and equipment before large-scale fielding. It describes four types of trial (laboratory, controlled field, uncontrolled field and operational, clause 6.5) suited to different project stages, and requires linking any evaluation to a Statement of Requirements through a Pattern of Analysis (clause 6.8). Trials involving people need ethics review: "Typically ethical reviews shall occur prior to the beginning of any field trial, and usually involve the collection of informed consent from trial participants" (clause 6.6(b)). Sampling ranges from five to ten hand-selected users per size category for a fitting trial up to twenty to thirty for a broader human-factors trial (clause 6.7(c)). Annex A, the revised 1992 ACCP-01, supplies the underlying science: a four-stage evaluation programme and the equations used to predict a clothing ensemble's thermal resistance, water-vapour resistance and effect on the wearer, including a note that the commonly used Pandolf load-carriage equation "under-predicts the metabolic rate of contemporary military load carriage" (Annex A, paragraph 9.8).
AEP-2333 names no accredited certification body and no NATO-run scheme for certifying combat clothing against it. Compliance is checked by whichever National Authority is procuring the clothing, against the test methods and pass/fail thresholds that authority has chosen from the document, since both clause 2.1 and clause 2.8.3(c) let it substitute its own. A reviewer working from this document should expect to see test reports for each individual property in Table 2, not a single blanket compliance statement, and should expect the specific thresholds actually in force to be named in the contract rather than assumed from the AEP itself.
AEP-2333 is an operational and technical publication: the work it describes happens in garment design, textile testing laboratories and troop-trial fieldwork, not in software. What ComplyTrain supports is the paper trail around that work. Concretely, that means holding the specific test reports and laboratory certificates a National Authority's contract calls for, organised against each property in Table 2 rather than as loose files; documenting which of AEP-2333's recommended test methods and pass/fail thresholds a given contract actually invokes, since the document lets the National Authority substitute its own; and keeping the troop-trial paperwork Chapter 6 calls for, such as ethics-committee sign-off, safety-committee records and administrative orders, organised and auditable ahead of a review.
ComplyTrain does not run hydrostatic-head, Martindale abrasion, sweating hot-plate or instrumented-manikin tests, does not conduct troop trials, and does not certify a garment or a company against AEP-2333, because no such certification exists to hold. The applicable tier and the standards that come with it are set by the contract and the customer's quality clause, not by us. If you want to see what sits alongside AEP-2333 in a given programme, the standards explorer is the place to start, and we are glad to talk through what evidencing this kind of technical publication actually involves.
Tell us how you need to work with AEP-2333 and what you need from it. We will come back to you about what ComplyTrain can do.
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Not by itself. It is covered by STANREC 2333, a NATO recommendation rather than a ratified agreement, and the document itself lets a National Authority choose other test methods or pass/fail criteria than the ones it recommends (clause 2.1). It becomes a real obligation only when a specific tender or contract writes its thresholds in.
STANREC 2333 is the NATO Standardization Recommendation that a nation formally adopts; AEP-2333 is the technical document underneath it that actually contains the performance criteria, test methods and troop-trial guidance.
No. The document names no accredited certification body and no NATO-run certification scheme. Compliance is checked by the procuring National Authority against the criteria it has chosen, not certified by an outside body.
Mostly established civil textile and protective-clothing standards obtained from their own publishers, chiefly ISO (including ISO 811, ISO 11092, ISO 9920, ISO 11079, ISO 11612, ISO 13506, ISO 15025 and ISO 17493), with some ASTM, EN and DIN methods for flame and heat testing.
Only for flame and heat protection. Chapter 5 explicitly covers mounted personnel such as combat vehicle crews and helicopter crews alongside dismounted soldiers, but the general Combat Clothing System defined in Chapter 1 states that it "does not cover specialist clothing such as clothing for Armoured Fighting Vehicle crewmen etc."
Edition A, Version 1, promulgated in December 2021. It replaced the former STANAG 4364 (waterproof clothing), the former STANAG 4573 (arctic clothing) and the 1992 edition of ACCP-01 (heat transfer and evaluation of clothing, now Annex A).
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