Nick Turse on the Military-Gastronomic Complex

That long Labor Day weekend, traditionally a time of rest, lies ahead. It marks the end of this summer's not-so-silly season, a few days when Tomdispatch shuts down and everyone who can light a barbeque or visit that favorite end-of-summer vacation restaurant is likely to do so. Nick Turse plans to put in a pit stop at a Massachusett's backyard for a little chicken on the grill. In the meantime, as the resident writer of Tomdispatch's Rummy Watch and its main student of the military-industrial complex, he's beginning a new sometime-series -- a kind of military fun-in-the-sun – on the good life, Pentagon-style. Here, he explores how an army on the move (and I don't mean in Iraq) has been filling its stomach (on your tax dollars). Bon Appétit! I'm off to fry a fish or two. Back in September. Tom Engelhardt Editor-at-Large{mosgoogle right}

Patriotic Pork
The Army Eats Out
By Nick Turse

When you think of food and the U.S. Army, what do you picture? Long chow lines with a grunt serving up chipped beef on toast (aka "shit on a shingle")? A lowly private peeling potatoes on KP duty? Unidentifiable slop in a mess hall? Semi-inedible C-rations or palate-numbing Meals-Ready-to-Eat (MREs)? Well think again, my friend.

These days, the Army loves to eat out. Hell, who doesn't? No messy preparation. No dishes to clean up. No fuss, no muss. Not a chip of beef in sight. And, best of all, the tab's being picked up by somebody else. Of course, when the Army goes out to eat, that somebody else turns out to be you and me. And when it's on us, it's no longer an Army of One. Judging by the Pentagon's own accounting, our Army (not to mention the Air Force, Navy, and Marines) has been very hungry and feeding in herds. So where, you might ask, do Army men and women head off to when they nosh in an official capacity; how many taxpayer dollars are they spending; and what, exactly, are they eating?

Patriotic Pork

It turns out that the Army has definite gastronomic likes and dislikes. Some ethnic foods aren't even on the table. Due to the arcane nature of the Pentagon's accounting system, it is almost impossible to know for sure, but the tally on many Asian cuisines (although not Asian bases) appears to be:

Vietnamese restaurants:    0
Thai restaurants:          0
Indian restaurants:     0
Japanese restaurants:      0

And don't even ask about Afghan food!

But while it's a no-go on sushi, cooked fish is another matter entirely. In 2004, for instance, the Army spent over $5,000 at Chic-A-D's Cajun Chicken & Catfish Restaurant in Winnsboro, Louisiana. While five grand probably buys a lot of catfish, it apparently failed to sate the Army's voracious appetite for these bottom-feeders, because that same year the Army also dropped $6,500 at Capt'n Morgan's Steak & Catfish Restaurant in Diberville, Mississippi.

Since, as Napoleon once observed, an army marches on its stomach, the U.S. Army cannot live on catfish alone. Sandwiches are, apparently, also a must as the Army plunked down $13,845 at a Quiznos Classic Subs in Louisiana.

Army stomachs also couldn't seem to get enough of the fine food Arkansas has to offer and so significant sums were dropped at such "Natural State" restaurants as: Rodeo Cafe ($3,485); Molly's Diner ($5,400); Annie's Family Restaurant ($8,996); and the Crispy Taco Mexican Grill ($19,283), among other establishments.

But Arkansas was only a drop in the proverbial bucket (of fried chicken, no doubt). Army folks also sampled the fare at numerous other eateries across the country, including:

Copper Mill Restaurant (Logan, UT)        $10,878
Bristol Bar & Grille (Louisville, KY)        $5,026
Englewood Cafe (Independence, MO)        $5,026
Pericos Mexican Restaurant (Covington, TN)      $4,050
Big Mama's Kitchen (Fayette, AL)        $3,705
Timber Lodge Steakhouse (Sioux Falls, SD)      $2,544

While the military obviously likes its catfish and Mexican food, what it evidently loves best is barbeque. In fact, from Shotgun's Bar-B-Que Restaurant in Texas and Bo's Pit Bar-B-Que in Missouri to the Pig N' Whistle in Tennessee and Longhorn Barbecue in Washington State, the military has sampled barbeque all over the U.S. -- at least thirteen BBQ joints in all in 2004 when it shelled out at least $164,828 to grease those Army fingers.

While your hard-earned cash was turned into barbequed wings and ribs, the military seems not to have plunked down a cent of your tax dollars at a single vegetarian joint. And yet while vegetarian and Asian food seem not to be at the top of anyone's list --despite the $3,555 dropped at the Chinese Inn in Poplarville, Mississippi-- the military wasn't completely gastronomically unadventurous. In their travels abroad, Army officials did manage to sample foreign cuisine -- supping at, among other places: Restaurant Schinvelderhoeve in the Netherlands for $2,133 and Restaurante El Escudo Sociedad in Guatemala where the military dropped an astounding $82,291 in 2004 (perhaps while discussing human rights over the odd beer or two with their Guatemalan counterparts).

But going abroad to eat is the exception to the rule for the U.S. military. Most of the time, it's red meat in appropriately red states, although home-style comfort food is also a fave. In fact, in 2004, the Army reportedly paid Shoney's, a purveyor of such eats as country-fried steak, chili-cheese fries, and their signature "Half-o-Pound" (a huge "chopped beef patty" adorned with "golden-fried onion rings"), over $82,000. Just don't ask anyone to go over the top or parachute into action while that Half-o-Pound is settling.

In the July 2005 issue of Harper's Magazine, journalist Ken Silverstein decried "The Great American Pork Barrel" and noted that, through the magic of "earmarks" (local pork projects tucked inside federal budgets), some $100,000 was allocated in November 2004 for "goat-meat research in Texas." With a logic that might escape all but those best versed in the government's hide-the-pork hijinks, the goat-meat project was slipped into the Foreign Operations bill. But the Pentagon has that kind of pork barrel beaten by a country(-fried) mile. After all, it's got honest-to-goodness pork, miles of it slathered in barbeque sauce, clogging the military budget like so many arteries. $82,000 at Shoneys. $165,000 to various barbeque restaurants nationwide. And over $154,000 handed to the Secret Garden Café in Loma Linda, California!