US GI Collapsible 2-Quart Canteen, Unissued

A handy US GI rectangular collapsible canteen. Lightweight, spacious, and very packable when empty. Completely unused, so here’s an awesome water bottle at a nice price. Made in the USA.

History

The history of the US military square canteens began in the groovy ‘60s. The first version was developed for the Special Forces fighting in the Vietnam War in 1966. It was a very floppy transparent vinyl thingy where the cap was located in the middle of one of the sides of the square. It wasn't a huge success since the seams had a tendency to become well-ventilated. A very similar olive green canteen to this one we’re selling was taken into test use in 1967. Unlike the first version, it turned out to be so good that it was accepted into use in 1968 and went into full-scale production in 1969. In 1991, a desert tan version was taken into use for the Gulf War.

We don’t know when this batch we got was manufactured, but our strong guess is somewhere in the 2000s. At least they are not from the 1960s, so you can use them without any purification rituals.

Features

This is an olive drab soft canteen where the cap is located in a corner of the square. The idea is to have the cap peek out of the corner of the pouch. As the name says, you can fit two quarts of liquid inside, which is a bit under 1.9 liters. These have been made with two kinds of caps: the traditional screw-on cap and the M1 cap that's used with a drinking tube. This batch seems to only come with the traditional cap seen in the pics. The plastic is BPA-free.

These DON’T come with the canteen pouch, and at the time of the writing, we don’t have the official US 2 Qt canteen pouch in our selection. However, the large Dutch MOLE general-purpose pouch is a very good match. Our own large general-purpose pouch can also be used, but it is somewhat larger than the canteen.

Use

This is a very handy water bottle for all sorts of military and outdoor use. Almost fill a few of these with water and freeze, and they will also keep your bigger cooler cool. Just don’t fill them to the brim because water expands when frozen. If you get an M1 cap for your canteen, you can use it together with a gas mask to train for chemical warfare. Since this is milsurp, we cannot recommend these for real chemical warfare, though.

Size info

The measurements are c. 175 x 175 x 75 mm (6.6" x 6.9" x 3") plus the neck and cap. The inside diameter of the mouthpiece is 22 mm (0.87"). These can be folded when empty, so they are very packable. The weight when empty is c. 120 grams (4.25 oz) .

Condition

Unissued US military surplus. These are in perfect condition, with no warehouse dirt or anything. In other words, an excellent deal.