How to fight in the brutal cold

Soldiers with the US Army’s 11th Airborne Division filing through the snow and ice before boarding a Chinook helicopter during night exercises. — Kenny Holston/The New York Times

THE soldiers heaved the 135kg plastic sleds down the hallway of their headquarters building.

Packed inside were the things they would need to survive when the temperature at their Alaska training area plunged to “40 below zero or colder”.