At the same time though, paratroopers and pathfinders become more attractive. You usually dont have room for them because youre forced to get so many infantry squads. With the officer potentially arriving as the 3rd purchased unit, paratrooper builds might be less awkward.
That's definitely true, but wouldn't rangers be more ideal? They come in a better doctrine and are just as good as para except for more open maps where the 30 cal paras do better. I'll probably still use Airborne after but having two less relevant abilities hurts the doctrine.
Dream is comin true
Finally a USF where u make other decisions than just which rifle squad should u put the BAR on. 

Lets admit it, the AA HT and Pack Howie half tech are blatantly a better option than an M20 and Stuart, but other than that, its gonna make than faction way more interesting.
Well the Stuart now has potential to be a decent unit since it finally has a nondoc suppression platform so USF wont be swamped by infantry going Capt tier anymore its also cheaper and comes out earlier now. I agree the AA HT Pack Howie might be a bit strong but also the m20 did get buffs and got a pretty big manpower cost buff so it might start coming back.
Also the Grenade upgrade finally got a price decrease.