Framerate is smooth as silk. No issues, no stuttering, nothing. As stated before, it's not particularly pretty, but it does capture a beautiful scope and if you play at around half-zoom, so units appear in their chip stacks, then you really get a feel for what the devs were going for. And it works wonderfully.
Load times, no issue. A load time before the main menu, then I think a tiny one at the mode select...then everything else seems hidden behind the cinematics, which is brilliant. I was astounded when, within a cutscene, my British attache officer pointed to a map, and then BAM, we were in. So, no issues there.