Quote Originally Posted by Fuchs View Post
I have a 50's book written by a team led by a WW2 GHQ officer. He wrote after the war that soldiers must never be weighed down again.
His unrealistic demand was for a 10 kg weight limit.
Was that an all up weight including personal weapon?

Then he went on to devise what equipment would be necessary and I guessed that incl. clothes at abut 20 kg and it was just the basic personal equipment.
Well if he could not get near his own target load then his original target was indeed unrealistic... unless he based the 10kgs on a load which would marginally impair mobility and movement of individual soldiers.

It's a choice between the devil and the deep blue sea. There's not much to be gained by optimisation, and playing around with a mix of light and heavy infantry (weight-wise) isn't going to succeed due to political and bureaucratic dynamics.
The question to ask at each point is "what is the mission?"

Remember (maybe you do from another discussion about patrolling) where the question I asked was what was/is the aim of wandering around in the open areas of Helmand where the TB can initiate contact at long ranges if your patrol does not walk into a prearranged IED field? Here they talk about:

They’ll be trying to dominate some ground, ‘show presence’ and maybe win a few hearts and minds.
Aimless stuff, actually surprised the casualties have been so low. Must be something to do with the third grade enemy with poor shooting skills.

You apply a specific load table or equipment table for the specific type of operation. If you (as patrol commander) play the what if game then eventually you get to a chronic overload level. I do understand that there appears to be more top down load enforcement (like for body armour) which to an extent lets battalion, company and platoon officers off the hook.

Has it not reached the point where patrols are tasked on missions they have no chance of attaining?

In case of doubt, delegate the decision to company level (with the power to delegate it further) and never criticise your well-trained company leaders for a wrong load of their troops.
You must be joking. In this risk averse world that is not going to happen. Some would suggest that company level leaders are not of the required competence and training to receive this degree of delegation of authority.