Army Mess Kits Views

General Goods

In the years prior to World War II, two factors influenced the design of the U.S. Army's M-1926, M-1932, and M-1942 mess kits. First, unlike most other armies of the day, the U.S. mess kit was designed to serve men queuing in feeding lines and served in unit formations from large garrison-type field kitchens when not in actual daily combat operations. Secondly, U.S. soldiers in the field were never expected to either forage or to completely cook their rations, even in daily combat or frontline service. Instead, when not used as a serving tray for company-size or larger units, the mess kit was used to re-heat pre-measured servings of the canned Reserve Ration. After 1938, it was used for the new C-ration, a canned combat ration with several menu precooked or dried food items. (Today, though canned and dried combat rations have further evolved into the MRE, these can now be self-heated, and thus only a containment tray is required for most units).

During World War II, both the German and Japanese Imperial Army used mess kits that were similar in some ways, and different in others. In storage, their dimension were similar to the American mess kit's storage dimension; however, instead of splitting along the length of the side, they were split along the width, around two-thirds of the body, creating a pot with handle and a cup.

The Japanese Army enlisted men's mess kit, or Han gou differed from other armies' mess kits in several respects. No attempt was made to conform the Han gou to the Japanese one-liter M-94 oval water bottle, which was larger than that issued to the armies of some other nations. The Han gou consisted of a kidney-shaped, brown-painted, oval-bottom, heavy-gauge aluminum rice cooker pot with lid, containing a soup pot, lid, and tray which stored inside the pot. All of the lids also doubled as serving trays for side dishes of pickled vegetables or other items.[1] With its thick-gauge aluminum construction and individual serving trays, the Han gou was ideal for cooking rice, fish, stews, and vegetables (frequently obtained from local sources).[2] A simplified model, the Ro, was introduced later in the war, which lacked the soup pot insert.

The Japanese army issued a mess kit called a han gou, which contained many of the same components of other mess kits. However, while traditional American mess kits contained a cigarette to boost troop morale, Japanese mess kits contained sake or beer. The tin boxes used for Japanese army mess kits were generally painted olive drab, like most mess kits of their day. The Japanese mess kit has been replaced by the Meal: Ready to Eat (MRE), similar to MREs American troops use. However, the contents of Japanese MREs reflect a traditional Japanese diet.