By W.E. Linde
NATIONAL TRAINING CENTER — Based on lessons learned from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the Pentagon unveiled a newly-overhauled Meals Ready to Eat (MRE) concept intended to fuel soldiers in future conflicts. The new Meals Ready to Absorb (MRA) replace the often scarcely digestible MRE food with what most combat forces want anyway: tobacco, caffeine, and jalapeno-cheddar spread.
“There were some favorites in the old MREs, to be sure,” said Col. Nathan “Marlboro” Franks, who led the Pentagon’s evaluation of logistics and sustainment operations for the conflicts in the Middle East. “But for every Chicken Cavatelli, there was a Jambalaya. Disgusting. So we decided to really dig into the MRE experience and see what it was that people really liked about it. The answer? Jalapeño-cheese spread and Tabasco sauce. That’s it.”
But as Franks noted, a military can’t function on cheese spread and pepper sauce alone. What was missing?
“Cigarettes,” wheezed Thomas Winston, a civil…
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