Infantry section design considerations

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Fantasy force designs are almost a hobby to some people with interest in military affairs. I did very largely resist this albeit I did a couple to bring some points across.Today I'll do another one, at the very basic level: The Infantry section (squad).

I will mention some factors that influence this small unit designing first.

1. Vehicle capacity. Infantry fighting vehicle: Dismount elements in mechanised infantry/Panzergrenadiere have to fit into their battlefield transport vehicles, often seven dismounts. Car size: A commandeered 4x4 car would usually fit no more than four men, albeit five would be possible if they store their kit in the trunk (=low readiness) or if it's considered tolerable for one to sit in the open trunk.
   
2. Buddy principle: Two infantrymen form a buddy team, watching each other, supporting each other psychologically, cross-loading (especially in two-men machinegun teams or anti-tank teams),  leapfrog alternatingly and much more. Furthermore, section leaders have a reduced workload when they only have to deal with buddy teams instead of individuals. Buddy teams may cut the need for intrasquad radios (and their battery supply) by half.
   
3. Fireteam/Trupp: The concept of a three to four men group smaller than a section; as scouting or manoeuvre element. Quasi-permanent fireteams have usually a heterogeneous armament.
   
4. Firepower categories
• aimed single shots,
• bursts (=machinegun or "automatic rifle" job) for suppressive effect, into suspected target locating behind concealment or against fleeting targets (important: ability to sustain bursts despite need to reload or deal with hot barrel)
  
• high explosive projection (throwing range or longer, includes some anti-tank capability
  
5. Ability to continue mission after taking a casualty or more (depends on behaviour; section of six may be incapacitated and obsessed with casualty evacuation after taking one leg shot, but the not injured men might also just continue the mission, with grey zone in between). Rule of thumb would be that you need two men to evacuate one severely wounded man.
6. Platoon-like ambitions: The huge U.S. Marines infantry squads are more like small platoons.
7. Ease of leadership Big sections are difficult to lead; command span at higher levels is often limited to three or four.
   
8. Ability to exploit microterrain: Big sections have difficulty to find enough concealment/stay undetected long enough. More men = more opportunities to make mistakes that endanger the whole section. Scouting detachments are 2-3 men for this reason.
   
9. Ability to keep functioning if not all nominal members of the section are available for a mission. Sections are commonly reduced in size by lack of replacements, soldiers being away, injuries, sickness and many more reasons. Units should probably have supernumerarii (excess personnel) to cope with this, but one might also expect that a section remains capable with less than nominal head count.
10. Head count demands for certain basic capability missions such as 24 hrs picket duty.
11. Considerations of 24/7 360° security effort (difficult to pull off with a strength of two heads, for example).
12. Ability to carry extra stuff, especially mission-specific add-on stuff that's not basic equipment (an example being heavy anti-MBT weapons).
    

So here's a section design that could fit:

5-7 men headcount: 1 section leader + 2 buddy teams (2 grenadiers + 2 automatic riflemen, variable: mixed buddy teams or homogenous buddy teams) + optional buddy team (2 riflemen)

1. Vehicle size: Would fit into IFVs (albeit I could not care less about that)
   
2. Buddy principle: In use except for the section leader (unless the section is at even headcount).
3. Fireteam is not used, although a badly weakened section could end up at fireteam strength.
   
4. Firepower categories: Two aimed shot&HE projection members plus two burst firepower projection members in core team of five, optional buddy team usually adds more single shot firepower and especially more carrying capacity (more munitions for bursts and HE). Burst fire alternates between the two automatic riflemen.
   
5. Ability to continue missions after taking a casualty: Buddy of the buddy team is default carer for a wounded member. Drag to safety, carry to treatment with a combat medic (not section member).
6. Platoon-like ambitions: That's what platoons are for.
7. Ease of leadership: Buddy principle used to reduce the span of command of the section leader to three. 
8. Ability to exploit microterrain: Seven is more able to do so than eight or more, obviously.
   
9. Ability to keep functioning: Section of seven can make do with five (an ability that is a product of doctrine, equipment & training).
10. Head count demands for basic capability missions: Five suffices usually.
    
11. Considerations of security effort: Five suffices.
12. Ability to carry extra stuff: Whole optional buddy team available as porters, for their basic equipment is minimised.
    

What's "unusual" in this section design? It takes self-discipline to plan for two riflemen without much basic equipment load (other than rifle/carbine and its munitions). 'Normal' force design would not have that at all.

Weaknesses of this section design:

• There's no wizardry, so you cannot have huge firepower such as two medium/universal machineguns plus multi-shot automatic grenade launcher plus section commando mortar plus anti-MBT weapon in such a small section. I understand many people would prefer to replace one automatic riflemen with a real machinegunner. That's doable by temporarily allotting an actual machinegun if the headcount is at least six (else it's IMO too much weight unless it's about trench defence). It would even be possible to use two temporarily allotted machineguns in trench defence (because trench defence is least sensitive to heavy burdens).
• No strongly penetrating & long distance accurate 'designated marksman rifle'. Automatic rifle/assault rifle/carbine use the same magazines and munition. The addition of a different calibre would cause headaches. The use of a powerful calibre by the whole squad means excessive weight = less agile = less survivable outside of trench fights
  
• The "grenadiers" would be the ones assaulting a building with demolition charges and hand grenades or lead a trench-clearing action, thus getting more typically close with the enemy than the automatic riflemen. Getting close means sights should be optimal for close up, not optimised for long distances. The automatic riflemen would have their weapons shot hot (and thus inaccurate) often, so cannot really deliver accurate single shots at long (in this case 200+ m) distances. The section leader must not reduce himself to tunnel vision. So who is going to be red dot sight user (optimal for short distances), who is going to be magnifying sight user (tunnel vision if more than 1.5x, optimal for long distances*)?
  

 

The inspiration to go for 5-7 was actually a book on Panzergrenadiere in WW2, in which the author recalled that the nominally larger sections quickly shrank to 5-7 members and then remained at that strength for quite a while.Sections larger than seven would be too difficult to lead, experienced section leaders would even leave men behind rather than going into battle with a bigger section than seven.**

So next time you see a section design discussion (such as about whether a new combat transport vehicle should have seating for seven or eight dismounts), you have (I presume) a couple more ways to judge the opinions brought forward.

related:

youtube.com/watch?v=2s_rowtboNI&list=PLwb1pjLd3hpLpFiEUJiSL4F7Q295HxoQ7

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

*: Magnifying sights are also very helpful for identification purposes, but identifying hostiles or friendlies would be the section leader's job. He has the binoculas that the sectionneeds for picket duty and calling in fire support anyway. The section leader controls the section firepower and has a lot of demanding special tasks like this one.

**: I never saw this claim corroborated elsewhere, though. Source "Die Panzergrenadiere" F.M. von Senger und Etterlin, J.F: Lehmans Verlag, 1961, page 102

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