As for me I could probably type a couple pages worth, I'm sure most of you have a list as well.

Listerine.

Pinesol
Brasso
Burn pits
Walking by the black water
JP5
Boot polish
A few others that I will keep to myself

When I came back from just about any length deployment on a carrier, my wife would tell me, “all of your stuff needs to be washed; it smells like the ship!”

If I hadn’t been at sea for a bit, I could walk on a carrier and there’s “the smell”.

Diesel fumes

Gunpowder burning on a cool morning. Fort Pickett VA in October for range fire - always best couple of days of the year for me.
Mess hall coffee.

Burning airplane fuel - breathed that schidt in when loading onto the bird i was fixing to jump out of
CLP - cleaned weapons for innumerable HOURS
Kiwi shoe polish - always gotta take care of my boots
Wet nylon webbing - the smell of a parachute harness

Many Thanks for your service to this Great Nation Gentlemen.

The smell on Parris Island SC from that god damn paper mill in Savannah GA when the wind was just right.

Nuoc mam

Jet fuel.
Axle grease.
Boot polish.
Brasso.
Johnson’s Floor Polish.
Cosmoline.
Diesel.
Fine powdered dust and the smell of the bushveld in the dry season.
Field kitchens.
Mortar tubes had their own smell too, a little like old fireworks.

Diesel fumes and crap
Brasso
CLP
That dang cobra or bulldog aftershave we had to lather up with prior to inspections

Camp Pendleton has a very distinct smell. Not a bad one but a plant, or tree or flower that you never forget. If I ever get a whiff back here in the Ozarks of something similar it takes me back for sure.

The smell of the M16 after being fired on the range.

Diesel exhaust, musty canvas, break free, the ammonia smell of the gas puffing from the bolt of the m-16, kiwi, blown up pine trees, and the stank of a platoon returning from two weeks in the field.

Old70

Different dirts especially desert or jungle

Whatever old tarps were treated with

Wood Ammo boxes whatever they were treated with

Axle oil

Dead people and blood

Bat dung and cat piss

The unmistakable stench in the head, of cinder block turds following MREs after days in the field. Every stall would be full with a line out the door.

Jet exhaust
Burnt gunpowder

JP-4, hydraulic fluid, jet exhaust, hot brakes, open sewers, 409 cleaner, garlic, dead fish.
Burning charcoal & cheap perfume.
The above scents and many more remind me of C-130's and Southeast Asia.

Canvas tents and vehicle seats in enclosed vehicles
Boot polish
Kimchee
New wool and mothballs
Old school Rifle Bore Cleaner (still some left in the system when I went in)

I still have the nylon CP tent i spent months in in 1970. When I DEROS'ed I was allowed to bring it home with me as it was torn and had been taken off the books. I had it repaired and treated and I use that same tent almost every September when bow hunting for elk in Colorado. I still have some LBE from those days. While I no longer use the LBE, just looking at them brings back many memories. Mess Hall coffee and jp4 exhaust odors will never leave me. This thread brings back many memories. Thanks to the op for starting it.

Oh yeah, armpit sauce. And all of the above, and more.

Semper Fi.

Being a Corpsman, no smell that would be overly pleasant...

As far as sounds....Tanks, Deuce & a 1/2... Choppers, particularly Hueys since
I served on a medevac crew...generators we used in the MASH unit for power..

Canvas tents from being out in the field, particular serving for a time in a MASH unit.
Pup tents and sleeping bags...

Smell of M16s being shot, and time on the range.. either shooting or being med support..
Sound of shooting M203's 40mm Grenade launcher, or the M79 LAW...and the following
smell of that ..

The good smells coming from the Hospital Chow Hall, or the Redondo Pit at Ft Lewis.

The Smell of Bad Hygiene when working in the Troop Medical Clinic....
and especially underwear and socks that hadn't been changed for a week..
and certain people who didn't bath very often at all.. but that would make me a racist saying that...

add alcohol ( medical type, not booze) to the above cleaning wounds, giving shots
or other procedures....

Pride serving around elite troops.... depression and disgust serving around some of the lazy
grunts in every day units...poor hygiene, laziness etc...

the abuse of the concept of 'discrimination' by those of a certain race...predominantly...

Proud to have served, but not always proud to have served around some of the people
I served around....

Gotta be Kiwi.

Kiwi Parade Gloss
Burning Hexamine (solid fuel, for stoves)

Both smells take me right back.

Moth balls
23699
WTR aviation grease
JP4
Burning JP4
JP8
Burning JP8
Brasso
Kiwi
Canvas tents

damp under ground dirt

If I remember correctly, my buddy John said freshly cut pine wood used to give him the willies.

If you've ever seen Band of Brothers--the shelling at Bastogne-- that's what he was into up north of the Bulge. The Germans were using their 88's to fire into the tops of the pines. He was dug in underneath. There was no escape, because the blast was coming straight down. You had the shells themselves to contend with as well as falling trees and getting skewered from broken limbs.

The other thing that he couldn't stand was freshly fallen leaves. I mentioned recently how he managed to walk into a minefield one day. He spent all afternoon retracing his steps.

John usually got squirrely right after Thanksgiving and would disappear until February. He usually ended up in Mexico, where he'd go and play at being a bad hombre until the demons quit. Then he'd go to Sebring and start catching the races.

JP5

JP (or DFM), Every carrier I served on smelled the same and my cruise trunk, still filled with my kit from my last deployment (2002!) that was cleaned and put away, still smells of it and I miss it.

The smell of jet exhaust and the peculiar smell of my Xcelite nut drivers.

Yep.. The smell of a certain oil brings back the memory of the interior of the two submarines I was on.. It never fails..

C-130 fumes and burn pits. The smell of burning feces in Pakistan.

We visited my BIL and sister down there back in the 70's and I remember the smell of the Spanish moss.

A few of mine..

Av gas
Hydraulic oil
Exhaust from a big radial coming to life..don't get to experience that much anymore.
Lingering humidity after a rain
Rubber smell of aircraft tires
4th of July

Many more but the most prized is the smell of perfume laced letters my then to be wife sent me almost daily for two deployments.

I have always noticed that every country has its own smell and when you get a whiff in your nose, all sorts of emotions flood through your mind in a flash. Egypt always smelled of what I can only describe as burnt camel schitt. It smelled like that everywhere you went. Somalia has the burning trash human misery odor. Afghanistan has that nearly identical smell of Egypt but with that horrible bread they cook everyday.

Maybe it is a continental thing or a culture thing but they all have their signature smell.

My Cambodean wife has a bottle of that in the kitchen right now.

JP-4 (jet fuel ) burning ,

Septic system backing up.

that was the sweet smell of money.

i remember the fumes coming off the duece and halfs at the motor pool.

C-4 burning to heat chow on the rare occasions we could heat chow.
.A funky poncho liner after weeks in the bush.

I loved my poncho liner.


mike r

I'm pretty sure these would be part of my late father's answer. He spent a lot of time in and around PBM's during WWII.

Most of the above, but most especially jet exhaust.

And the cold, sharp smell of pure oxygen in a freshly cleaned oxygen mask. I don't get to smell that one these days, but it's right there in my memory almost 50 years later.

The memory is so strong that I still know we cleaned our masks with benzalkonium chloride, and its faint odor combined with the rubber of the mask and the supposedly odorless oxygen made a very heady combination unavailable anywhere else but a cockpit.

JP-4 burning
The smell inside a 34 after a night med evac
The wet smell after a hard rain
And yeah that unforgettable odor of Nuoc mam,

hot MILL23699 oil and JP5 - It seemed to permeate the jet. Military jets smell like no other airplane.

The smell of a rubber in my O2 mask and those little alcohol wipes we used to clean them out but it never got rid of the rubber smell.

Hot steam on the ship. It powered everything.

I can related to several of these.

In Asia in the '50s it was the smell of benjo ditches. The troops used to say you weren't really a man until you'd gotten drunk and fallen in a benjo ditch.

We also said that if smog was a combination of smoke and fog, the prevailing atmosphere in Taipei was smit. A far cry from what modern Asian cities are today.

Paul

Cmon

Somebody say Aqua Velva or Butchwax

Can't believe someone didn't cite the obvious...

Army helicopters had their own smells too.

All Hueys pretty much smelled alike, which was a different smell from a Blackhawk.

Of course, Medevac 'Hawks in Iraq, had a smell of their own, and it wasnt pleasant.

Many of them. Probably too many to list.

Most of the above, no doubt.

Add hot reciprocating aircraft engine oil.

Vietnam had a smell all it's own, when you get off the airliner at Tan Son Nhut it hits you like a hammer.

The building on the bases over there were all built with a cheap grade of mahogany, it had a peculiar smell.

JetA burning on the tarmac of the airport brings back pleasant memories.

Smell memory is exactly why I opened "Baggy Zero Four" like this...

"It was as if the world had farted in his face. The air that came in through the jetliner’s door hit him like garbage gelatin: smothering hot, with overtones of sewage, dead fish, diesel smoke and jet exhaust. It was Cam Rahn Bay, Republic of Vietnam, and First Lieutenant “Rusty” Naille knew his nose would never forget that first olfactory assault as long as he lived. How long that might be was up for grabs."

Nobody who went there can read that without reacting -- strongly.

diesel fuel and spent shell casings...

The submarine definitely had a smell, wasn't offensive at all, just noticeable. I always assumed it was vaporized diesel fuel that came inboard through the tank vent, but could have been a combination of things. I still have a cruise bag that retains some of that smell, if I need to feel nostalgic I can just put it over my head.

The sea
The smell of the stack when underway
The smell of line (rope to civilians) and of course grease on the wires.
Oh yeah, primer and paint.

I was an unrep sailor

Although I have not tried it, I'm pretty sure if you put a splash of JP-5 in a glass of water and I took a drink from it, it would take me right back to good old CV-61.

That, and Nevr-Dull.