alt.loading

NATO MUltimedia

Italian and American soldiers swap rations

Publication date
Country
Themes
Filming date
Location
Type
Format
Version
Language

Warm pizza in a packet? And a toothbrush for every meal. US and Italian paratroopers swap rations.

Synopsis

Every army in NATO has its own field ration. While perhaps not the height of culinary expression, these rations give soldiers the calories they need to power through a hard day in the field. From Ally to Ally, their contents differ in small, interesting ways.

Watch a US and Italian paratrooper swap their ration packs while on exercise in Italy. From warm pizza in a packet to ravioli in a can and toothbrushes, these soldiers may be from different continents but they find common ground in condiments.

Filmed during joint airborne operations, about 800 paratroopers from the US Army’s 173rd Airborne Brigade, the Italian Army’s 4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment and the German Army’s 26th Airborne Regiment performed several jumps over a drop zone in northern Italy.

Transcript

TRANSCRIPT (AUDIO AND TEXT ON SCREEN)

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

So I have a present for you.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

Okay, I’m excited.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

I have an Italian ration kit to exchange if you want.

GRAPHIC: Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

Oh, I'd love to.
I also have something for you as well.
It's our pizza slice cheese version of the MRE for the American.

GRAPHIC: Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

Oh, perfect.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

So there you go. Let’s see.

— TEXT ON SCREEN —

RATIONS SWAP

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—


GRAPHIC: US SINGLE MEAL

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
So here we have pizza slice cheese.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

Oh, it will be interesting.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

So with American MREs,
we have a kind of a water-based system
to heat them up.


Yes, it comes with
handy instructions here.

What you’re going to do
is we’re going to take our water, and it doesn't have to be hot.

So we're going to go in here and we're going to fill it up to the black lines on the bottom. But the water reacts with the heater inside.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

I typically wait about three minutes for it to heat up.
But we can honestly, this one,
it's kind of exploding.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

I'm quite surprised.
I have another conception of pizza.

GRAPHIC: PIZZA SLICE

Okay.

It's like a toast. Okay.
We try.

Okay.
We can survive with this.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

You can survive with it.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

Instead of pizza I prefer to call it like toast.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

Like toast? Yep.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

Good.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
INTERVIEWER

Another bite, no?

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

No thank you, I appreciate it.

Okay, here we have a cracker.

GRAPHIC: PEANUT BUTTER & CRACKERS

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

Oh, chunky peanut butter. I like a lot.

I spread like that.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

How universal is it that everybody loves the peanut butter and crackers.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

Good. I like

Oh, this is spicy.

GRAPHIC: JALAPENO CASHEWS

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

Yeah, that's the jalapeno cashews I think.
They're pretty good.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

After that I need a lot of water.

Some sauce.
I drink like this?

GRAPHIC: APPLE SAUCE

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

Yeah, you just peel open
the top and then you can just...

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

Oh, it’s like a jam.

For breakfast, it could be good.

Thank you very much.

Here is the 24-hour combat ration.
I will show you, there are three boxes.
One is for breakfast, one is for lunch
and the last one is for supper.

GRAPHIC: ITALIAN 24HR RATION

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

Perfect. Okay, let's see what’s in here.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

Here we have the breakfast
and then you can open like this.
And there are a lot of accessories inside

For brushing teeth.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

Oh, my gosh. Okay.
it comes with three toothbrushes
and a teeny tiny toothpaste.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

Napkin with some disposable spoon.
You have something to sanitise the water.
You have salt.
Instant coffee.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

Oh, nice.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

You have a milk condensate.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

Oh, wow, okay.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

Chocolate.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

Oh, my gosh. There’s a lot.


—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

Something for your teeth to clean.

And here is, we have
a little stuff to use it to make the other cans
that are inside the other box hot, warm, hot.

For lunch, here we have
these cans with the typical ravioli
‘al ragù’ [with Bolognese sauce].
That is the Italian main dish, in general.
And of course, to eat like that,
cold, is not good.
But if you make it warm.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

Yeah.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

You can put it like that.

GRAPHIC: RAVIOLI WITH BOLOGNESE SAUCE


—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

It's actually pretty good.


It tastes, I don't know if
you ever had minestrone soup?

But the sauce kind of tastes like that.
And then...I don't know.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

If you like the lunch more than the dinner
then you can change.
For example, here.
Soup.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

Oh nice.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

With beans and pasta.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

That sounds actually really good.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

And then we have chicken.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

The chicken in jelly?

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

And another bar.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

Okay, let's do the chicken in jelly.

GRAPHIC: CHICKEN IN JELLY

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

It's not bad. It's just...
it's like a weird consistency, a weird texture especially in jelly. But it’s not that bad.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

This is Macedonia [fruit salad], the mix of fruit.


—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Lt Mika Andrews, 173rd Airborne Brigade, US Army

I'll try it out.

GRAPHIC: FRUIT SALAD

It kind of throws me back to when I go to school, when I used to go to school or high school and my mom would pack me lunches and she either give me like the apple sauces

or the little plastic cups with all the fruits in them.

But I really like the fruit cup.

I really like the fact that it comes with the candies and the toothbrush and toothpaste.

That's pretty cool. I really enjoyed it.

I like how much stuff you got with it.

I think in terms of how easy it is to carry around probably like a five,

but just like overall experience,
I'd say about seven or eight too.

I really liked the ravioli. I didn't like the chicken and the meat in the jelly.

—SOUNDBITE IN ENGLISH—
Fabio,
4th Alpini Paratroopers Regiment, Italian Army

I understand.

Eight. Eight because in general when you go out
there, it’s quite good to not have so many
things to carry. Exactly.

At the end you don’t need to survive with this for a lot of years but just for a short period.

So I think it's quite good.

Thank you.

END
Music
Surreptitious Behaviour by Frank Sarkissian
Awkward moment instrumental by Davoli
Molto Bene instrumental by Durst
Two peas in a pod instrumental by Sarkissian
Usage rights
This media asset is free for editorial broadcast, print, online and radio use. It is restricted for use for other purposes.
Reference
NATO908398
ID
2052