Exhibit:user@Router-1> show route 172.

In Junos OS, understanding the distinction between theRouting Information Base (RIB)and theForwarding Information Base (FIB)is fundamental to analyzing traffic patterns and load-balancing behavior. The RIB (show route) contains all prefixes learned via various protocols, while the FIB (show route forwarding-table) contains only the active next-hops that are actually programmed into the Packet Forwarding Engine (PFE).

According to Juniper Networks technical documentation, the default behavior for Junos OS when encounteringEqual-Cost Multipath (ECMP)routes is to select only a single next-hop from the available candidates in the RIB and install that single path into the FIB. In a default state, even if the show route output displays multiple next-hops for a destination like 172.24.0.0/24, only one would have the active route symbol (>) and only that one would appear in the forwarding table.

In the provided exhibit, the show route output shows two next-hops for 172.24.0.0/24, but only the first one (172.20.0.2) is marked with the>symbol as the active selection. However, the subsequent show route forwarding-table output reveals thatboth next-hops(172.20.0.2 and 172.20.1.2) are currently present in the forwarding table for that same destination. This discrepancy indicates that thedefault load-balancing behavior has been modified (Option B). This modification is typically achieved by creating a routing policy with the action then load-balance per-packet (which actually results in flow-based load balancing) and applying it to the forwarding table via the export statement under [edit routing-options forwarding-table].

Because the forwarding table now contains both next-hops, the router is no longer restricted to a single path. Therefore, therouter will choose both next-hops in the routing table (Option D)for packet forwarding, distributing flows across the two available Gigabit Ethernet interfaces (ge-0/0/2.0 and ge-0/0/3.0). This ensures higher utilized bandwidth and provides redundancy at the data plane level.