The 504th Infantry Regiment Headquarters and Headquarters Company organizational flash and Airborne background trimming (better known as an oval) were both approved on 8 July 1992. It is worn on the maroon beret that is authorized for personnel in units designated as Airborne, regardless of the wearer’s Airborne-related qualifications.
Officers wear their non-subdued insignia of grade centered on the flash (Generals’ stars are permitted to overlap the stars beyond the flash), while NCOs and Junior Enlisted Soldiers wear their Distinctive Unit Insignia or Regimental Distinctive Insignia if their unit has no DUI. Exceptions to these rules for insignia placement are delineated in DA PAM 670-1, paragraph 19–21(c)2.
Ovals are called Airborne background trimming because they are worn beneath Air Assault or Parachutist badges, but only when the wearer who has earned those qualifications is serving in a unit that is designated as Airborne or Air Assault. The main portion of the badge (i.e., excluding the star or star and wreath found on Senior and Master Parachutist badges) is centered on the oval, with the border of the trimming or the top of star/star and wreath being used for measurements to determine badge placement. The two items count as a single item toward the maximum number of allowable badges on a uniform.
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The 504th Infantry Regiment was constituted 24 February 1942 as the 504th Parachute Infantry and activated on 1 May 1942 at Fort Benning, Georgia (redesignated as Fort Moore in October 2023) and subsequently assigned to the 82nd Airborne Division. During World War II, the unit took part in seven campaigns, earning an Arrowhead device for taking part in three Assault landings, including the first-ever Airborne assault during the invasion of Sicily and an Airborne drop during the controversial Operation Market Garden. The Regiment’s outstanding service and its tenacity when facing daunting odds was rewarded with three Presidential Unit Citations and several foreign military decorations, including the Military Order of William (Degree of the Knight of the Fourth Class), a Netherlands Orange Lanyard, two citations in the Order of the Day of the Belgian Army, and a Belgian Fourragere 1940.
Redesignated as the 504th Airborne Infantry in 1947, the Regiment was relieved from assignment to the 82nd Airborne Division and subsequently reorganized and redesignated as the 504th Infantry ten years later. Over the next three decades, it took part in two Armed Forces Expeditions (Dominican Republic and Panama) and in two campaigns of the Persian Gulf War of 1990-1991. Though it was withdrawn from the Combat Arms Regimental System and reorganized under the U.S. Army Regimental System I 1987, it was not given its current designation until 2005.
The Regiment’s HHC and its subordinate Battalions have deployed to Afghanistan and Iraq on numerous occasions since the launch of the War on Terrorism, and their courage and dedication to mission has been recognized with four Meritorious Unit Commendations and an impressive four Valorous Unit Awards, the most recent for its service in 2012 in support of Operation Enduring Freedom in the Ghazni Province of Afghanistan.
As of June 2021, the 504th Infantry Regiment, HQ and HQ Company and its two active Battalions are still assigned to the 1st Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division and are listed as “Parachute Infantry Regiment.”