diff --git a/org.eclipse.jgit.pgm/resources/org/eclipse/jgit/pgm/internal/CLIText.properties b/org.eclipse.jgit.pgm/resources/org/eclipse/jgit/pgm/internal/CLIText.properties
index 47716149b..2a5a31eba 100644
--- a/org.eclipse.jgit.pgm/resources/org/eclipse/jgit/pgm/internal/CLIText.properties
+++ b/org.eclipse.jgit.pgm/resources/org/eclipse/jgit/pgm/internal/CLIText.properties
@@ -222,6 +222,7 @@ unsupportedOperation=Unsupported operation: {0}
 untrackedFiles=Untracked files:
 updating=Updating {0}..{1}
 usage_Aggressive=This option will cause gc to more aggressively optimize the repository at the expense of taking much more time
+usage_AlwaysFallback=Show uniquely abbreviated commit object as fallback
 usage_bareClone=Make a bare Git repository. That is, instead of creating [DIRECTORY] and placing the administrative files in [DIRECTORY]/.git, make the [DIRECTORY] itself the $GIT_DIR.
 usage_Blame=Show what revision and author last modified each line
 usage_Clean=Remove untracked files from the working tree
diff --git a/org.eclipse.jgit.pgm/src/org/eclipse/jgit/pgm/Describe.java b/org.eclipse.jgit.pgm/src/org/eclipse/jgit/pgm/Describe.java
index 6d7df9767..8a572f44b 100644
--- a/org.eclipse.jgit.pgm/src/org/eclipse/jgit/pgm/Describe.java
+++ b/org.eclipse.jgit.pgm/src/org/eclipse/jgit/pgm/Describe.java
@@ -68,6 +68,9 @@ class Describe extends TextBuiltin {
 	@Option(name = "--tags", usage = "usage_UseTags")
 	private boolean useTags;
 
+	@Option(name = "--always", usage = "usage_AlwaysFallback")
+	private boolean always;
+
 	@Option(name = "--match", usage = "usage_Match", metaVar = "metaVar_pattern")
 	private List<String> patterns = new ArrayList<>();
 
@@ -81,6 +84,7 @@ protected void run() {
 			}
 			cmd.setLong(longDesc);
 			cmd.setTags(useTags);
+			cmd.setAlways(always);
 			cmd.setMatch(patterns.toArray(new String[0]));
 			String result = null;
 			try {