Posted by Distiller

That's a topic with a strong cultural angle. Look at Soviet infantry during WW2, or the Viet Cong. Handful of semitchki or rice, kanteen-like thing, gun (or not) with a little bit of ammo. No way any Western troops would run around like that.
Of course we could and we have; just not in recent years. You have to put it in context, if we were fighting in the U.S. against an occupying power we would become the guerrilla army and be able to live off the land the goodwill (or coerced will) of the people to support us.

Don't confuse today's industrial Army with what we could be, Americans are as hard as any other nationality when they need to be.

We go heavy today due to risk adverse leaders and the mindset that if it is available we ought to carry it with us because you never know. In a different scenario the risk adverse leaders would be privates and we wouldn't have the kit to carry with us even we wanted to.