Fast Food In Iraq

Surprisingly, fast food in Iraq is available on most military bases. Civilians and military personnel can eat at Pizza Hut, McDonald's, Burger King, Subway, KFC, and Jim Bean Coffee, depending on what base you are on.

A few Middle Eastern bases have pastry and coffee shops and some sit-down restaurants as well. The bases in Kuwait have all of the above places but they serve no pork at any of them.

When I was at Camp Warhorse in Baqubah, there were not any types of quick food eateries. All of our food came from the Defac and the PX. I was there from January 2004 through July 2005. I do not know if they finally put in some of these American restaurants.

Imagine my surprise when I was sent to Al Asad and saw that they had yummy food shops from back home, just like they have on bases in Baghdad. I was excited!

This is what I call "Starbucks" wanna be. Notice they have one flavor.

This picture below is of our kitchen in Kabul. The guys tried hard but they were not very good cooks. Most of the food they got was already cooked so they were preheating it which meant it was left-overs to begin with. Then when they did get something good they would over cook it.

Good fast food in Iraq in the middle of a war zone is like a miracle to us. It is comforting to have American treats like burgers and fries or a pizza here with us. We are stuck on base so it is great to be able to eat somewhere besides the Defac (dining facility.)

TQ did not have any fast food in Iraq. The defac food there is great, but the troops and civilians need a break every once in a while. The commander there will not allow it. I was told by an AAFES employee that the reason the commander did not allow fast food was it caused apathy.

I would like to see the study on that one.

When I go home on R and R, the first place I like to hit is McDonald's. They have one at the Dubai Airport. It used to take some time to get your food but since they opened the new Dubai Terminal three, traffic has decreased.

One of the enjoyable things about going to Camp Speichier was getting some fast food in Iraq. When you do not have something is when you start to find out how addicted you are.

We had some good meetings around a Whopper or Pizza.

At our base in Kabul we did not have any fast food. We would have to come with an excuse to go to Camp Phoenix to get something different to eat other than the stuff they fed us in our defac.

Camp Phoenix in Kabul had Sub-way, Pizza Hut and Dairy Queen. The first time I got to go they would not let me on the base. They said my id card was not any good. They were a new unit just arriving.

It was eleven months later when I got to go again. This time I did not even have to show my ID card. It was the same unit so I am sure they were focusing more on getting ready to go home.

This picture below is the PX at Camp Gibson. This PX is ran by a company from Switzerland called Supreme. A small store with a high price. The high prices were caused by transportation cost of shipping stuff from Europe to Pakistan and then to Kabul. Several months ago, Supreme had a convoy attacked. They lost 38 trucks.

Update May 2010

Well is looks like Fast Food in Iraq I mean Afghanistan will soon be history according to the article below. I can see both sides of the issue but hopefully fast food at Kandahar and Bagram will somehow win in the end.

"The U.S. military has long had the Taliban in its cross hairs, but it's recently set its sights on another target in Afghanistan - the Whopper.

Fast food joints like Burger King, Pizza Hut and T.G.I. Friday's have given soldiers at military bases throughout the country a taste of home during their combat tours. But those days are numbered, according to a Reuters report.

'This is a war zone -- not an amusement park' Command Sgt. Maj. Michael Hall blogged earlier this year.

'Supplying nonessential luxuries to big bases like Bagram and Kandahar makes it harder to get essential items to combat outposts and forward operating bases, where troops who are in the fight each day need.'

There are other cuts in the works. Orange Julius, Dairy Queen and Military Car Sales are on the way out and Hall said there would be fewer canned and bottled goods coming into the country, as well cutbacks on first-run movies and other entertainment.

According to Reuters, some soldiers aren't happy about the cuts. But until the chains' contracts expire, there's still time to get one last order of fries.

We will keep you posted on how this turns out.

Thank you for your visit.

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