Still Bad Security?

Question

Anyone remember what Taking point was back in the old days?
I seem to recall that meant going just slightly ahead of the Patrol , not traveling the patrol route all night and then sending
out the troops ,that would have been a deadly mistake , and still is , I am not saying that those who do go on clearing patrols fail to do their jobs , I`m sure they are all good at their jobs , I am just curious as to why the route clearing guys are so far ahead of the convoy to allow pop and drops in the first place. I think priority should be given to the job of securing the route . And this would also require strict attention to the distance between the convoy and the engineers doing the clearing. I would personnaly stay close enough to "POP" those pop and dropers , And hopefully no murder charges !!
Oh , One individual called me an old timer ------- Hey i am still around to ask questions . Will you be???

Answer 1

Because there are too many convoys. The IED sweeps typically follow a racetrack pattern where the are responsible for an area but do not escort individual convoys.

BTW - the effectiveness of IED attacks are greatly overstated by the news media.