Lets assume that you are in charge of building an expeditionary brigade for a small(ish) european nation. Brigade is to be available to deploy worldwide, but you at this point only have limited resources for transport, mostly civilian sea transport and a few cargo aircraft. Brigade should be capable of operating independantly or in conjunction with local, EU or NATO forces. Peace keeping and peace enforcing are your two main missions, high-intensity war a distant third. Your Air Force will be contributing two fighter/attacksquadrons and AWACS aircraft,but no refuelers at this point. Also, the government has wishes that the unit should be multinational. €s are limited, but there is considerable political prestige in this project and quite a few funds could be tapped if more countries come onboard this project.
Knock yourselves out!
As missions would be bound to be different, the force should be tailored to different missions but I think the premise is that we need a fixed organization.
Here's my try, vehicles are mainly nominal, they may be substituted)
Brigade HQ
HQ Battalion (Signals, logistics, special forces platoon, recon company)
Airborne Battalion (Pandur 6x6) - Battalion also trained in airborne entry
Marine Battalion (Bv 208) - Battalion trained in amphibious entry
Armored Battalion - (2 coys MICV, eg. CV-90, 2 coys MBT, eg. Leo II)
Each Battalion HQ capable of operating as Battle Group HQ
Artillery Battalion (1 ARCHER btry, 2 ISTAR btrys (UAV, radar etc)
Aviation Battalion (1 heavy lift coy CH-53, 1 UH coy)
Engineer Battalion (Construction Coy, 3 engineer coys)
Brigade HQ 2 - Home Command (not ever deployed)
Now, the organization is an odd mix, but there's a reason for it. Brigade from a small country isn't going to make forced entries, but having a rudimentary "semi-forced" entry capability might be worthwhile for some odd conflict.
Thus Airborne Battalion with Pandurs, which are light and can be lifted with CH-53's (IIRC). Humvees etc won't do, as the vehicle has to offer protection and at least rudimentary combat capabilities. With four companies one should be para trained, the rest helo trained.
Marine Battalion will have Bv-208's, armored amphibious vehicles with excellent cross-country capabilities. Also, IIRC, they're CH-53 compatible.
Armored battalion provides the armored support for heavy force protection and show of force, ultimately direct fire support. Thus tanks and MICV's.
Artillery battalion has one artillery battery with modern wheeled SPA. The most important element for most missions is the ISTAR capability.
HQ Battalions Special Forces platoon is the Brigade Commander's fist, his personal reserve. Recon company should have both unarmored vehicles (for helo lift) and armored vehicles (such as Fennek) for it's use. The logistics component should have modern modular armor trucks, which would give the ability to deploy either in unarmored or uparmored condition depending on conditions in the AO and transportation.
Aviation Battalion should have ability to lift one company of Marine or Airborne battalion with it's vehicles at the time and the capability to insert whole of Special Forces platoon in separate patrol areas at a time. UH should be able to lift small vehicles too.
Engineer organisation may sound very heavy but all the capabilities will be needed. Additionally, some of the forces might be left out for rotation etc.
Brigade HQ 2 - Home Command is a organization which handles all the missions which can be, through use of modern communications, handled better without deployment. Thus, all the payrolls, adminstrative tasks as far as possible etc. will be handled in home, cutting both the workload of the personnel deployed and also cutting the number of REMF's to be deployed.
Home Command gives social support for the dependants of those deployed, handles information etc. Home Command also handles special training prior of rotation units and maintains a separate Center of Lessons Learned. After the mission Home Command handles soldier debriefing and psychological support if necessary. Home Command should be able also to give specialist support for deployed brigade, via provision of translation services (possible via modern telecoms), specialist doctors for consultation etc. In effect, in normal peacekeeping duties this could be used as a "force multiplier" if a patrol could rely not only on translators hired from AO, but also on someone back home. Especially in initial stage of operations this could be crucial. The Home Command should also have a large library (database) with trained librarists, so if the patrol asks "I see a Toyota CRV4, haven't checked one out before, tell me and send me images on how a weapon could be concealed in this vehicle" there could be someone supplying additional information if necessary.
Thus, even a normal patrol would be not only depending on it's own assesments and lessons learned, but could also ask expert support from back home. This kind of "call center" duties could be handled better from someone deployed out of AO, than owerworked company HQ in middle of nowherestan with tired duty officers suffering from diarrhea.
Most importantly, Home Command has a small amount of "own money" which can operate cutting in normal adminstrative red tape to purchase special equipment for troops immediately, whether it's ice cream, duct tape or additional body armor. This Home Command is part of the brigade, not the deploying army organization, as to give it better sense of belonging to the force itself.
And even more importantly, Home Command would not have operational command over troops, but would be there only for support, not to micromanage!
