Moving anything you’d see in a light infantry or sapper platoon by bike wouldn’t be that hard- LBE with an engineer slung rifle or a couple LAWS or an LMG strapped to the frame wouldn’t be bad. I’m not sure about long distance movement with a ruck holding an approach march load- seems like it would be pretty unsafe and might need a baggage wagon.

81-82mm mortars, MMG/HMG, and atgm launchers might need a trailer or a dedicated cart. One other possibility is a “Dutch style” or tricycle style cargo bike for these items. USAFE and USAREUR used these in the Cold War for parts and stockage distribution in logistics nodes, so maybe there’s a source of supply there.

Bike Trailer
 

Good find, Homer. Thanks.

To haul bulky, heavy equipment like light crew-served weapons, ammo and such, a trailer like the one pictured below would probably work. Here's a pic of a Swedish one, made by Husqvarna. I've also seen pics of a Swiss two-wheeled bike trailer.

You bet-

Looking at the weight capacities/space on the trailers and some old photos, it looks like you could probably fit a Mk19 or .50 cal on a group of three- one for the gun mounted in it’s pintle/cradle and maybe a spare barrel; one for the tripod, T&E, and sights; and one for ammo, plus a can or two on the other trailers. That gives you a three man gun team carrying a couple hundred rounds of ammo with a squad leader riding on a bike it hour a trailer to enable pulling ahead to scout emplacements. An AT team could be as easy as two bikes with a gunner carrying an Carl Gustaf/RPG or (gulp) Dragon and an ammo bearer carrying additional rounds in panniers or slung from the rider/frame; alternatively they could have a trailer(s) to carry additional rounds or resupply from the trains.


The below article is about e-bikes, but could be a prototype for regular cycle ops as well as long as your bear in mind the physical demands:

https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-elec.../31865559.html

I did some reading on the Viet Minh/NVA bicycle transport units. In most cases, the bikes were actually pushed by a pair of porters walking alongside while the frames themselves were modified to hold the weight of the load. Effectively this turned the bicycle into a form of cart. This more than doubled the load from just over a hundred pounds to over 400 pounds. Apparently most of the modification was done with saws and bamboo.

It’s not really cycle infantry, but I wonder if “pack bikes” like these may turn up as vehicles in a civilian caravan or be used for logistics in some resource poor cantonments?

Well, they wouldn't need fuel, would they?

Second photo down:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/in-pictures-40555454
I am guessing pre-World War One?

"1914 Royal Enfield Bicycle Ambulance WW1".
https://onlinebicyclemuseum.co.uk/ww...cle-ambulance/

2013:
https://news.wfsu.org/2013-08-13/in-...est-ambulances

Great find re that bike ambulance, Brit. I reckon that would be a common- perhaps the most common- way to medevac casualties c. 2000.

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Bicycle Infantry
 

Some Honved (Hungarian Army) units attached to the Mobile Corps which took place in Barbarossa were bicycle Infantry if my memory is correct. Did Switzerland completely do away with bicycle troops recently?

In T2K bicycle troops would certainly make sense.

https://www.cyclinguk.org/sites/defa...tretcherv2.png

This was the photo I was trying to find. I wonder what else you could carry instead? :)

Some other commercial versions:
https://www.babboecargobike.com/cargo-bikes
https://www.babboepro.com/us/pro-delivery-bikes
https://www.amsterdam-bicycle.com/pr...y/cargo-bikes/