Individual carrying equipment refers to all utensils used by individual soldiers to carry weapons, equipment, and daily necessities. Because the burden of individual soldiers will directly affect their combat effectiveness and endurance capabilities, the world's military powers have always attached great importance to the development of individual soldiers, and constantly changed the way of individual carrying according to ergonomic principles, so that the distribution of the load on the human body is more reasonable. Individual carrying equipment can be divided into two categories: single type and combination type in terms of its function. Military carrying equipment is an indispensable part of individual equipment, and its emergence and development are as long as the history of human war, making people and weapons and equipment form a whole.

    The U.S. military started early in the development and use of individual field carrying equipment, and before World War II, the U.S. military had standard carrying equipment. With the progress of science and technology and the development of weapons and equipment, the U.S. military has made many improvements to individual carriers. The main varieties include M-1945, M-1956, M-1972, XM80 individual carrying equipment, individual integrated combat system and new century individual carrying system.

Combat system

    During the Gulf War, the U.S. military introduced a new type of carrying equipment called the "Individual Integrated Combat System," consisting of a tactical carrying vest and its accompanying combat bag, a grenade carrying vest, and a large field backpack with an inner frame. The whole set of carrying equipment is made of lightweight, high-strength, coated nylon canvas, and the connectors are made of polyoxymethylene plastic with the advantages of dimensional stability, high strength, good wear resistance, and light specific gravity. Its carrying vest has the characteristics of uniform load, rapid ammunition retrieval, good fit, and good camouflage, which can ensure that the vest does not loosen or slip up during intense exercise, making it more comfortable to carry. After training, U.S. soldiers can travel for 4-5 hours using backpacks to carry 59 kilograms of items.

Integrated system

    This system includes a combat load module, a combat backpack, a backpack, a marching backpack, and a survival backpack. The combat load module consists of a vest and a belt, on which it can carry an ammunition bag, individual radio, computer, GPS and antenna; The belt is designed with ammunition pockets and hanging equipment. The marching backpack can be attached to the carrier separately for carrying bulkier gear. Survival backpacks can be used by soldiers to carry supplementary items or oversized equipment, and this carrying system has been equipped since 2000-2003.

Modular system

    This system is more advanced than the integrated carrying system. It consists of a modular carrying sling, a combat backpack and a marching backpack. Due to the use of lightweight materials, the complete system is designed to weigh at least 20% less than current portable systems. The modular carrying sling can be matched with combat uniforms and bulletproof equipment, and can increase the layered armor to protect against small arms, and is also fully in line with the combat use of special operations forces and airborne forces, and has been used since 2003-2004.

    In addition, the armies of Britain, France, Japan, Germany, South Korea, Russia, Austria, Israel, Italy, Singapore and other countries also attach great importance to the research and improvement of carrying equipment, and are equipped with new individual carrying equipment with their own characteristics.

    Individual carrying equipment is developed in coordination with weapons and equipment. In local warfare under modern high-tech conditions, due to the update of weapons and equipment and the change of combat mode, the weapons and equipment carried by individual soldiers have changed greatly, especially for individual carrying equipment. In recent years, militaries around the world have increasingly recognized the important role of individual carriers in modern warfare, and have developed them as the focus of research on individual equipment.

    Our army's research on individual carrying equipment started late. For a long time, the method of backpacking and "separate pieces and hanging separately" has been adopted, which has seriously affected the mobility and flexibility of the troops. In order to meet the needs of modern warfare and the modernization of the army, our army has begun the development and serial development of individual carrying equipment since the 80s.

    The modular combined individual carrier is adapted to the latest development of our army's small arms, and has been successfully developed on the basis of the Type 91 individual carrier. It applies scientific principles such as human efficacy, human aesthetics and camouflage, adopts a modular structure and a combination of "building blocks", and aims to facilitate the carrying of various equipment such as ordnance, munitions, chemical defense, engineers, and sanitation. It can carry firearms, ammunition, optical instruments, gas masks, engineer shovels and other combat training necessities in conjunction with the training kit; The capacity of the backpack can be increased to assemble more military supplies, and automatic rifles, squad machine guns and sniper rifles can be universally used, and its overall design has reached the international level.