Comment Re:May I suggest (Score 1) 334
Modern infantry tactics are all about suppressive fire. Which you can't do with a bolt action rifle. There's a reason everyone uses assault rifles. I would be shocked if the reason this is just happening now isn't just a combination of neglect and lack of funds.
Beyond that, soldiers do carry more stuff. Depending on the situation, a US soldier may have 120-150 pounds ("Emergency Approach March") to carry plus body armor and rifle. There's simply more useful gear than there used to be. Everyone complains about it, but nobody wants to get rid of anything. Soldiers would like to ditch the armor, but they're not allowed to because their commanders don't want to explain to grieving widows (and the press) why Joe wasn't wearing his armor when he got shot.
It's probably even worse in Northern Canada, since you'd have all sorts of extra stuff to deal with the cold.
So yeah, you shave off pounds where you can. Not only is a modern assault rifle lighter than an Enfield (I own one - holding that sucker level from a standing position gets old really fast), more importantly the ammo is much lighter.