In innumerable episodes where small units are involved either in Iraq or Afghanistan, what's the typical find as to how well ammo-ed up the opposition is?

Do they walk around with 3, 4, 5, or a dozen mags on them or more like 1-2 and depend on a hasty retreat/melt into the population for safety?

Curiousity bump.

same...


I would hypothesize that in most conflict it would range from 1-2 to 12+ on average even. maybe more on average, do they take a count when getting a dead one?

I supposing that the average guy in Iraq and Afghanistan has an AK47 and at least one magazine.... maybe 2. It's his birthright. So that's 60 rounds.

If they're insurgents, I suppose they probably grab a couple additional mags. But I've never seen any wearing LBVs or having ammo pouches, so they're just what? carrying them in pockets?

They all look very light weight - next to no equipment or gear, even high in the mountains, 12,000 feet and they're walking around with a blanket, a rifle, a pouch of food, some water....  not a whole lot of stuff to endure for days and days unless they just go without rations for days...

One would think a fire fight with them wouldn't last very long, or conversely, the amount of sustained fire is a sign of their overall strength in numbers...

From an intel perspective, does anyone drop down to the market level to ask about the going rate on ammo? Like we see in the USA with runs on ammo, wouldn't that be a tip off (a localized spike in the going cost of ammo) of impending action (one presumes here that the insurgents buy their stuff locally rather than haul it all in from abroad).

some wear those cheesy NVA chest rigs or copies of them.

most had atleast 4 to 5...Iraqi 4 mg pouch + one in AK...or the 3 mag cheesy Chicom one-+one in AK...occasionaly you'd get one with a drum.....some would tape 2 mags together....as we where leaving we were seeing more and more 4 to 6 mag black chest rigs, velcro mag pouchs....

i saw an IP (not insurgent) with a leather shiny metal studded tac vest that looked like it was used by a dominatrix.

standby for pic.

It depends on the cell and how well they are supplied and financed.

Some just have one mag with 15 rounds. Others come racking out with ten mags full and a well maintained Ak-47

We used to encounter more fighters with a car nearby than anything else.  In the car you would find a handful of mags, but they only carried around 1 or 2 at a time.  If we got one fighter out of a group, the survivors would try to get his weapons/ammo before we did.

Sometimes we would find a dead fighter that was wearing a shitty chest rig.

They usually have a large cache somewhere near where they operate.  We would raid farm houses that had crates full of them.