9 C-Ration Habits That Made No Sense (Until You Learn Why)

By 1969, the Army's own supply history says, more than ninety percent of the meals it served in Vietnam were hot. The rifleman in the hills ate a great many of the others — cold, out of a can, for weeks at a time. And some of those cans were older than the war. Nine rules grunts made up for themselves, counted down: read the date on the can, turn the case upside down, trade the ham and lima beans, save the fruit, never eat the apricots (ask the Marines at Cua Viet), never lose your P-38, bring your own hot sauce, eat when you can — and the one rule every good outfit kept. The opening scene at a landing zone near Bong Son, and the scene on the ridge, are composites drawn from many accounts. Every other story is attributed to the man who told it or the record that holds it. What was the meal you could never get rid of? What did you trade for peaches and pound cake? Do you still have your P-38? And if you were the one at home — did you ever mail a bottle of hot sauce to Vietnam? Unit and year if you want. One line is enough. Chapters 0:00 The meals that were not hot 0:23 A landing zone near Bong Son, 1966 1:09 #9 Read the date on the can 3:43 #8 Turn the case upside down 5:34 #7 Trade the ham and lima beans 7:23 #6 Save the fruit 8:56 You, on the ridge 10:05 #5 Never eat the apricots 11:58 #4 Never lose your P-38 14:21 #3 Bring your own hot sauce 16:23 #2 Eat when you can 18:13 #1 Share it 20:11 Back to Bong Son 21:21 Your turn Sources Lt. Gen. Joseph M. Heiser Jr., Logistic Support (Vietnam Studies, U.S. Army Center of Military History, 1974), ch. VIII "Subsistence" U.S. Army Natick Laboratories, TR-82/013 "Summary of Operational Rations" (1982) Popper, Smits, Meiselman et al., "Eating in Combat: A Survey of How Much and What Foods U.S. Marines Eat in Action," Natick TR-85/010 (1984) Frederick M. Drake, "Improved Ration Heater and Fuel Tablet," U.S. Army Land Warfare Laboratory TM 71-02 (1971) Renita Foster, "The best Army invention ever," army.mil (2009); "Does An Army Travel on its Stomach," army.mil (2007) S.Sgt. Bob Donner, "Taste for Apricots Canned at Cua Viet," Stars and Stripes (1968) — 1st Amphibian Tractor Battalion Associated Press (2009) — Col. Henry A. Moak Jr. and the 1969 pound cake Library of Congress Veterans History Project — Darwin C. Edwards (25th Infantry Division); Roger B. Hedges (Navy corpsman, 2/4 Marines) MG (Ret.) Robert H. Scales, "Peaches and Pound Cake," The American Legion Magazine (2010) Phil Gioia, "Gourmet Grunts, 1968–70," HistoryNet / Armchair General (2013) Gregory G. Abati, Thou Shall Not Kill (2014) — BLT 2/26 Marines Rutgers Oral History Archives — Dennis Brodkin (2/35 Artillery); Bryant Mitchell (25th Infantry Division MP) Bob Brewin, Nextgov (2012) — the "John Wayne" can opener; Robert L. Ordóñez, When I Was a Boy (1997) McIlhenny Co., The Charlie Ration Cookbook, or No Food Is Too Good for the Man Up Front (1966); Smithsonian NMAH blog (2015) Ron Copeland, Sons of the Greatest Generation (2016); Eraldo Lucero, Echoes of a Distant Past (2012) Wisconsin Veterans Museum oral history — Louis McNair (173rd Airborne) Roger S. Hayes, On Point (2000); John J. Culbertson, Operation Tuscaloosa (1997) U.S. Army (army.mil) — 1LT Paul Baerman's Christmas tree, 1969; USMC photographs — LCpl R. C. Cullars (1967), "Ham and Eggs for Joe" (1969) Archival photographs and film: U.S. National Archives (NARA), U.S. Army (The Big Picture: "Logistics in Vietnam"), U.S. Marine Corps History Division and U.S. Department of Defense; public domain or credited to USMC History Division; copies via Wikimedia Commons and the Internet Archive.