Forrest Gump: What's on the helmet in Vietnam?

That bottle is mosquito repellent ointment.

By the way, in fact, during the Vietnam War, the things hung on the helmets of American troops were actually messy, and most of them were small things that were convenient to take in combat. Different occupations and different arms hang different things.

Take the US Army and Marine Corps as examples: rifleman, the most common ones are hanging 1~2 magazine, ointment applied to face and so on. Machine gunners usually carry short bullet chains (very short, usually no more than 20 rounds) for the last battle, mosquito repellent, and so on. Grenade hand, mosquito repellent, 40mmM79 Grenade and so on. These are because different occupations have different clothes.

But generally speaking, most people bring mosquito repellent, spades (representing death), amulets, cigarettes and so on. At that time, the military discipline management was strict, and their helmets were all equipped with helmet cover fixing belts (belts for hanging things on helmets), which were not allowed to be smeared. In this respect, the Marine Corps is very loose. They give out helmet covers, but they don't give out straps. So many soldiers cut the inner belt of the car into traps to hang things on their helmets. Of course, their helmets are also painted with messy things, including nicknames, anti-war slogans, slang and so on.