Well everyone wants to look like a special forces guru right? Everyone wants to be decked out in Crye precision. And a load carrying system decked out in so many pouches you can carry all the kit you may or may not need. This seems to be the school of thought heading through parts of the armed forces at the moment. Now I'm not saying that looking ally is a crime by any way shape or form because I'm guilty of spending money on kit purely on the Gucci factor alone (my AKU boots I hardly wore in afghan being the best example) I have to add that these boots were not nessecarily meant for infantrymans work, but mainly for jumping out of a blackhawk shooting a high profile insurgent commander and jumping back on the helo within a short period of time. Which if truth be told isn't most people in the armies day to day whilst in afghan.
When I first arrived to my battalion you could spot who the ally call signs were just by the way they looked. Decent webbing,Gucci smock and non issue boots. This is still the trend that continues to this day, but has been supplemented by different role changes attributed by 13 years of continuous campaigning. For example MOLLE kit only came on general standard issue in the British army with the advent of the first generation on osprey body armour. Since then we have seen what can only be described as a MOLLE explosion! For a perfect example of too much MOLLE I'll describe my own osprey armour in afghan, I began the tour with the medic and commanders pouch as they were required as part of our SOP's. Then on the ops panel I had four bungee mag pouches. Some might think that this doesn't sound too bad, but I still had my battle belt holding six more mags and my grenades. And let's not even mention my daysack.
And the stupid thing was that I thought that this was the perfect way to carry my kit. Until major issues such as moving fast, getting into wagons and alike made me decide to make my kit more streamlined and as a result all of my ammunition got pushed to my battle belt. Right now the army is going through its post herrick reappraisal and on the ground is trying to learn the lesson from the ground up and balance leathality and mobility as well as sustainability on the battlefield. Which a few of the old and bold Cold War warriors amongst us call fight light, but is going through the army as project Payne. But that's a subject for another article.
Gladius actual out.
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