The Taste of War: Book Review

The Taste of War: World War II and the Battle for Food (2012), Lizzie Collingham.

Chapter 1: Introduction: War and Food. Some 20 million people died of starvation, malnutrition, and its associated diseases. Britain had a history of feeding its population using free trade and importing large quantities of food. Hitler looked to Eastern Europe and beyond for food to make Germany self-sufficient in food and other resources. Japan had similar ideas, concentrating on China. China increased consumption of meat, importing huge amounts of soybeans. More of the world depended on trade for their food.

Food shortages among troops and civilians affected morale in World War I, helping push toward Germany’s surrender in 1918. Hitler planned to exterminate by starvation multiple targeted groups, particularly diverting Ukrainian grain (feeding the Soviet Union). The plan was to murder up to 100 million people. A million Russians died of starvation in the siege of Leningrad, most Polish Jews in Warsaw died of starvation, add over two million Soviet prisoners. Starvation was used in Greece, Poland, France, Belgium, Holland, and more. Some one million German prisoners in the USSR also died of starvation. The Japanese takeover resulting in millions of Asians dying of starvation. Food processing techniques improved in the US, especially to condense food for shipment.

“Securing a food supply became a central preoccupation for the governments of all the countries drawn into the conflict. Growing, transporting, and distributing food took up resources. … America possessed sufficient resources to rise to the challenge and devised and implemented new agricultural techniques. … Luxury foods fell by the wayside” (p. 8). There was a shift from raising livestock to grains and potatoes. The Germans, Soviets, and Japanese treated soldiers and civilians as expendable, with a cavalier attitude about food supplies. Some 60% of 1.74 million Japanese military deaths were starvation. Soviet civilian death related to starvation were probably 2-3 million. People planted lots of potatoes: “which became the food of war.”

Part 1: Food-An Engine of War. The basic causes for WWII: the rise of fascism, WWI surrender and Versailles Treaty, and instability of the Great Depression. But what about food? Germany did poorly, with limits on world trade, which was dominated by the US and UK. German and Japanese farm inefficiencies were issues leading to right-wing militants. They wanted to be leading nations. “Food was an engine not only of war but also of German and Japanese atrocities” (p. 17).

Chapter 2: Germany’s Quest for Empire. Historically the rural poor ate gruel and mush of grains and lentils. Success meant more meat, pork for Germans, mutton and beef for Britain. Wheat for export were important for the US, Argentina, and Russia. Then the luxuries of sugar, tea, and more. German protective tariffs aided farmers, but made food more expensive, resulting in more rye bread, plus less meat and milk. During WWI British and American blockades cut off imports into Germany resulting in food shortages. Some 750,000 Germans died of malnutrition. The troops also were poorly fed.

Hitler became obsessed with the food supply and hatred for the British blockade, but it was eastern Europeans who would starve. Food and fodder were about half of German imports between wars. Germany should have been integrated into the world economy and focus on manufacturing. Instead, their farm economy was too large but inefficient. Tariffs during the Great Depression made the food situation worse. The Nazi focus became self-sufficiency. The focus on farmers resulted in their vote for the Nazi party leading to Hitler’s rise. Under Hitler, Nazi Germany grew potatoes, sugar beets, cabbage, and rye, making Germany 83% self-sufficient in 1939.

Food shortages were Hitler’s obsession for Lebensraum (living space): “It is a battle for food, a battle for the basis of life, for the raw materials the earth offers” (p. 30). Nazis saw agriculture in the east as needed to win the war. That included the Soviet Union. Nazi SA Herbert Backe developed the Hunger Plan to mass murder Slavs, plus remove “useless” Jews from Poland—part of “nutritional freedom.” Hitler invaded Poland in September 1939, then conquered Denmark, Norway, Holland, Belgium, and France by June 1940, but stalled over Britain.

Hitler turned to the USSR, a big resource base if the needs of the people were ignored. Attacks began in June 1941, the Geneal Plan for the East. First, shut the flow of food from Ukraine into Russia. Bache though 30 million would be starved to death, a war of annihilation. Following the army, a mobile task force murdered “Bolsheviks, the intelligentsia, and Jews” (p. 39). Fourteen million were to be used as slaves. Some 70 million would be deported, in part to Siberia. There were German communities throughout the USSR and Eastern Europe. Slavic communities were rounded up and deported to labor camps. Poor Germans were resettled in these areas; however, they weren’t given the proper equipment, seeds, and other essentials. They also dealt with the irate local Slaves. Most of the Nazi plans were never implemented.

Mussolini turned to African colonies and beyond, including Ethiopia, Somalia, and Eritrea.

Chapter 3: Japan’s Quest for Empire.

Japan had a Plan for the Settlement of One Million Households in Manchuria. “The critical problems of population and foodstuffs seem all without solution. The only avenue is boldly open up Manchuria and Mongolia” (p. 49). The rise of the right wing planned the seizure of Manchuria in 1931, then war with Nationalist China in 1937. Japan, lacking in primary resources, wanted to be a maritime empire. Japanese farmland was controlled by rich landlords. Tenant farmers lacked resources to modernize, but there was a rising demand for rice as population increased. Food was imported from Formosa and Korea.

Japan faced economic issues with the Great Depression, with the prime minister assassinated and parliament replaced by military leaders. Land ownership was restructured. Japan attacked Manchukuo in 1932 and set up a puppet state to move farmers to bigger plots, expected to be more efficient. The idea was to move a million farmers, about 20% of the Japanese farm population to China. The resettled farmers used Chinese labor and grew rice and soy as cash crops. The resettled Japanese farmers either starved or were killed by the Soviets in 1945. Some 80,000 died, the remaining 140,000 repatriated to Japan.

The Japanese invaded China in 1937-8, which included the Rape of Nanking. As their resources of weapons and oil were running out, the Japanese high command thought they could take south-east Asia and their rich resources, then signed the Tripartite Pact with Germany and Italy. Japan invaded French Indochina, and the US cut off their oil supplies. The Japanese decided to attack the US, expecting them to negotiate immediately.

Part II; The Battle for Food. War meant increased search for food, from growing less during the Great Depression to war-footing agriculture requiring much more food. Imports were reduced by German submarines and British blockages. Britain needed 10-15 merchant marine ships arriving daily, bringing in 68 million tons of imports, 22 million of which were food.

There were specific food needs across the colonies, like Burmese rice in India and Ceylon. Other products were overproduced like American grains, Latin American coffee, and African cocoa. Free markets were abandoned. Decisions were made on who would suffer. Germany planned for vast food shipments to the military and German civilians. Potatoes were grown in private gardens. Farming was still primitive even in the US and Germany (lacking electricity, running water, sewage disposal). Little mechanized farming and lack of pesticides and fertilizers, plus fuel shortages. Chemical fertilizers would compete with munitions. The black market became a major source of food in many countries.

Chinese farmers faced starvation before the war, growing on small, inefficient plots and in the 1930s some 3 million Chinese died of starvation (p. 72).

Chapter 4: American Boom. America was big with vast resources and ability to produce food, plus the fighting was in the Old World. Modernization had started during the New Deal allowing the US to feed its troops and civilians throughout the war, plus other countries. The war did limit its export market, but aided by FDR’s lend-lease program to Britain and later to the USSR and China. During the war schoolkids and German prisoners were used to pick farm products, then Mexican workers. Japanese-American farmers were treated horribly and placed in internment camps.

The US was still able to produce farm equipment like tractors and combines during the war. Rural electrification expanded farm efficiency. Then hybrid seeds and selective breeding of livestock, increasing farm productivity, perhaps by 30%. New Deal subsidies favored agribusiness over small farmers. Frozen food output doubled during the war; vegetables by 91% including potatoes, carrots, onions, sweet potatoes, cabbage, beets, and tomatoes, much of which were dehydrated for the military. American soy became a main ingredient in British sausage. Soy was used in animal feed as well as in many processed foods like bread, biscuits, breakfast cereals, soups, and processed meat.

Chapter 5: Feeding Britain. Britain was dependent on imports of wheat and other foods. During the war the government stressed growing wheat and potatoes. Farmers generally benefited from the war due to generous pricing. Subsidies were given to keep food prices reasonable. Farming increased wheat and potato production and reduced livestock. Farm tech improved including more mechanization like tractors and expanding fertilizers, hybrid seeds, and pesticides. Some 80,000 land girls did farm labor. There were agriculture committees “which mixed an anachronistic feudalism with war socialism” (p. 95).

Considerable frozen and canned meats, dried eggs, and dried milk, fruit, fats, and oils came from the US. Iceland provided fish. Australia had mutton dehydration factories. Much of Australian food was diverted to the US in the Pacific. Australia also exported tons of cheese to Britain. Deboning beef was a US Army space-saving device. Dehydration and canning also reduce bulk. Argentina produced corned beef for Britain. “Condensing food was the key to keeping Britain fed” (p. 101).

Chapter 6: The Battle of the Atlantic. At the war’s start in Britain there was a lack of merchant shipping, mismanagement at the ports, a poor rail system, and U-boats, meaning falling imports, dropping from 68 million tons to 26 million tons in 1941, a disaster for Britain. The British navy provided little protection. Hitler was focused on France and invading the Soviet Union, limiting U-boat production. When he came to power Churchill got the docks running, promoted goodwill with Roosevelt resulting in the lend-lease program, which included repairing British ships at American ports. Rising employment in America because of the war, resulting in American farmers growing more including livestock production and better food.

By 1942-3 U-boat production increased, resulting in more sinking of merchant shipping. America and Britain decided to invade North Africa (Operation Torch), where Britain had a major presence. There was priority to sending soldiers and military supplies. The attack started in November 1942, beginning in Morocco and Algeria. Then the US started shipping through lend-lease to Russia.

American ship building increased rapidly under Henry Kaiser, using mass production techniques he learned in the auto business. The Liberty ships used a standard design with prefabricated parts. By 1943, three ships a day were completed at 18 shipyards. Radar was a new weapon, making U-boats vulnerable, which were attacked by sea and air. The Allies also decoded the Ultra-machine. D-Day finally happened on June 6, 1944. Throughout the American military ate well, as did civilians. “In the closing years of the war it became increasingly clear that a severe shortage threatened the world once the war was over” (p. 118).

Chapter 7: Mobilizing the British Empire. “The war intensified the exploitative nature of colonialism. Britain had bases in Egypt and India. The US used Australia and New Zealand as their Pacific base. … Starvation peaked with the arrival of drought in many areas in 1942 and there was famine in northern Nigeria and Tanganyika” (p. 121). Both Italy and Germany using General Rommel attacked British bases in Africa. Anglo-Americans landed in Morocco and Algeria in November 1942, while Montgomery stopped Rommel at El Alamein.

There were food riots in the British camps in the Middle East including Tehran, Beirut, and Damascus, after poor wheat harvests in 1941. In Egypt rice was grown in place of cotton. Corn was grown in Rhodesia. Africa became a source of resources after Japan captured much of Southeast Asia. Food scarcity led to massive famine in Bengal during 1943-4, with probably 1.5 million deaths. The Indian government didn’t come to their aid. Japan conquered Bruma in 1942, cutting off part of the Indian rice supply. Ghandi called for Indian independence. Only wheat and millet were available, and Indians found them indigestible. Churchill refused to provide help. Traders may have held considerable rice for their own profit and famine spread. Other provinces eventually provided rice, after a new Viceroy was installed (Viscount Wavell).

Chapter 8: Feeding Germany. Remembering the loss in World War I with food shortages an important factor, Hitler and the Nazis planned the takeover of eastern Europe basically as a slave labor camp to feed the military and German civilians. That included the plan to starve millions of Slavs and Jews.

“The Battle of Production in agriculture had been matched by a campaign to suppress consumption and divert consumers towards home-grown foods. … German farmers managed to maintain production remarkably well even though the war dragged on for five and a half years. … Much of the labor was made up of workers forcibly brought into the Reich from the occupied territories” (p. 155). One problem was the difficulty raising pigs and potatoes, favored by Germans. As the war dragged on, it consumed increasing abouts of German resources, like farm equipment and fertilizers. Women often took over for the men going off to war. In 1939 100 thousand Polish prisoners sent to farm in Prussia, the Ukranians were added, some 1.3 million in total, then French and 1.2 million Soviet prisoners. Many German farmers treated them well. Small farmers were mainly self-sufficient, also producing mainly for the black market. Germans were eating less by 1943, including 60% less meat.

Countries attacked were plundered rather than planning for a long-term supply base, predicated on a quick victory. As food problems continued the policy became to starve the occupied territories even more.

Greece was an early German victim, made worse by a British blockade. It produced cash crops of olive oil, tobacco, and currants, and imported wheat and other grains. By January 1942, the death rate was 2,000 a day. Fortunately, wheat and other foods started to flow into Greece early in 1942. Greece was liberated in 1944, but half a million Greeks died of starvation and related diseases. Belgium did better by using the black market, where farmers channeled food to the black market. German occupiers in France enjoyed fine cuisine. Thousands of French POWs were shipped to work on German farms. French agriculture declined as expected.

Mussolini was overthrown in 1943, and Germans occupied the country. Italian foods worsened during the war. US troops were shocked by the emaciated people they liberated in Naples. Danish farmers grew products most like in Germany including beef, pork, bacon, and milk. The Dutch did poorly, and thousands died. The Germans again depended on plunder rather than reorganizing farming.

Chapter 9: Germany Exports Hunger to the East. “Early in 1941 Hitler, Goring, and Backe (who became Minister of Food) all set their sights on the Soviet Union as the solution to Germany’s food shortages … set out in the Hunger Plan—Backe’s scheme to divert food from the towns of the occupied Soviet Union … to feed the Wehrmacht [about 9.5 million]. … The Hunger Plan of 1941 stated that the war can only be continued if the entire Wehrmacht is fed from Russia in the third year of the war” (p. 180). It was expected that Russia would be defeated in two or three months. There were food shortages in Germany by 1941. The Soviets were still fighting and had moved much of their resources into Siberia. The Germans bogged down, unable to capture Moscow or Leningrad. A million people died in the siege of Leningrad. Bread was made of millet, barley, chestnuts, and animal fodder called lupine. The roads were poor and moving equipment and supplies including food were difficult, increased by autumn rain and winter snow. German tanks and trucks stopped working.

Many Ukranians considered the Germans liberators, after Stalin had collectivized and killed by starvation some 7 million during the 1930s. Jews and other were rounded up and killed. The remainder were used to provide food for Germans. The same practices happened as Germans moved into Russia. The Hunger Plan was poorly implemented. Killing, torture, and starvation happened, but not systematically to the long-term advantage of Germans. This policy increased the partisans and townspeople fled to rural areas where the black market was common. At least a million Soviet prisoners died of starvation, as did thousands of civilians. The number of Soviet prisoner deaths continued up to many millions.

It's not unreasonable to say that the Holocaust in Poland started in 1939, with executions, starvation, and deportation to “death camps like Treblinka. Jews in the Warsaw ghetto even ate cattle rectums to stay alive, which were ground and sold as minced meat. The death toll was about 100,000.  

Chapter 10: Soviet Collapse. “The Soviet Union entered the war with its agricultural sector in a wretched state of disrepair. The politics of the preceding decades had caused endless disruptions” (p. 219). The Kulaks, modestly richer than other farmers, were sent to the gulag. Ukraine objected to collectivization was starved as Stalin requisitions most of their food, starving to death some 7 million as output declined. By 1945 over 90% of farming was done by women. Farmers grew some of their own food and sold it in local markets

Chapter 11: Japan’s Journey Towards Starvation. “Japan’s need for food imports was to prove one of its gravest weaknesses, and its inability to bring food into the home islands led to a steadily worsening food crisis in its cities during the last two years of the war” (p. 228). Particularly important were Manchurian soy and rice from Korea and Formosa. Fish and squid were also important. As conquerors the Japanese treated subject nations poorly, driving farmers into the countryside and subsistence farming. Rice was concentrated in lower Burma, Siam, and southern Vietnam. The Japanese military took all the vehicles, making food transport difficult. When invading they killed off many people and turned indigenous people to slave laborers, creating famine. They made regions self-sufficient banning movement of food, making conditions worse. During the war, hundreds of thousands of prisoners died, mainly by starvation.

Chapter 12: China Divided. “Although a deep divide ran between the communists and the Nationalists, they made an uneasy alliance in 1936 in order to form a united front against their common enemy, the Japanese. Chaing Kai-shek, head of the Nationalist government, became FDR’s ally. However, his governance was incompetent and corrupt, and unpopular with the Chinese people. He abandoned Nanjing when attacked by Japan. Farming during the war turned to potatoes, wheat, peanuts, and rape seed. They received US airlifts of food and war materials, especially from 1943-5. The soldiers were so bad many were murdered by their countrymen. Some 2 million Nationalist soldiers and 15 million civilians died fighting the Japanese, primarily through starvation. The communists under Mao were better and could feed themselves. Mao’s forces defeated the Nationalists after the war and founded the People’s Republic of China in 1949, generally with the support of the peasants.

“The Second World War effectively dismantled peasant societies in the US, western Europe, and Japan” (p. 254).

Part III: The Politics of Food. “All combatant nations introduced rationing during the war. … Rationing systems also embodied ideas about entitlement [with the] military receiving food as a first priority. … The Soviet Union was probably the combatant with the least food per capita. … The US, Britain and Japan shared the problem that all the principal avenues of advance lay over water. … An American infantry division of between 10,000 and 13,000 men needed 32 tons of shipping to move to Britain. … The most frugal of all the armies was the Japanese. They required fewer arms and less equipment, and the principle of self-sufficiency was paramount” (p. 269).  

Chapter 13: Japan—Starving for the Emperor. “The Japanese military went from being one of the best fed armed forces in the world to a state of miserable starvation” (p. 273). New recruits were subject to brutal training, focusing on self-discipline and willpower, eventually to using kamikaze pilots. The Meiji emperor beginning in the 1870s pushed western science and engineering, including modernizing the Japanese military, and a high-protein British diet of bread, biscuits, salted meat, and beans. “Japanese servicemen were introduced to curries and stews, stir-fry, wheat noodles, port cutlets, pan-fried chicken and breaded meats” (p. 276). The health of the population was encouraged through government efforts beginning in the 1920s, including potatoes and lard.

The war with China in the 1930s reduced quality foods to the general population and a farm labor shortage as rural workers joined the military. The average civilian daily calories were 2,200, with soldiers receiving about 4,000. This fell over time. Japanese soldiers carried food in his rucksack, but rice tended to spoil on the Pacific islands. Japan did have stunning success first in China and then attacking Burma and into India. Japanese food shortages were initially solved as British soldiers abandoned their food when retreating (called “Churchill’s rations”). “If food is not enough, get it from the enemy. … The Japanese captured Rangoon in March 1942. Here they discovered storehouses crammed with whisky, canned food, coffee, cocoa, milk, butter, cheese, corned beef, jam, and cigarettes” (p. 283).

Japan took over Pacific islands with indigenous, subsistence farmers, not likely to feed the Japanese soldiers. Rabaul on New Britain became the Japanese forward supply base. The US used submarine warfare which Japan was unprepared for, with 285 merchant ships sunk by the end of 1942, also leaving Japanese troops across the Pacific shut off from supplies. US Marines attacked Guadalcanal in the Solomons in August 1942, with Japanese facing slaughter when attacking machine gun positions (5,000 lost in combat), then death by starvation (15,000 lost). The remaining 13,000 Japanese were evacuated in January 1943.

The battle of the Coral Sea in May 1942 prevented a Japanese attack on Port Moresby in New Guinea. They started from the north and suffered from malnutrition and tropical diseases including malaria and dysentery. Admiral Nimitz captured only islands of strategic interest. The majority of Japanese either died of starvation or committed suicide.

The Japanese starved with their attack in Burma, while the British and Indian troops got parachute drops of food and equipment. Nearly 500,000 Japanese died in the Philippines. Probably a million of the 1.74 million Japanese military died between 1941-1945, of which over a million starved or died of related diseases. In Japan, people were expected to be independent, and children were put to work in industry. “The government set up dining halls where workers received a thin porridge garnished with potato fragments, a radish leaf, a bit of snail, or a few grains of rice” (p. 308). Their substitute flour could include acorns, sweet potato vines, and mulberry leaves. The Allied forces used naval blockade, mines, and bombing of the Japanese mainland. The civilian population was subject to tuberculosis, beriberi, and other diseases. The Japanese still expected the US to negotiate, threatening to inflict casualties on invasion forces. The Allies required unconditional surrender. The US relied on atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Japan surrendered on August 15, 1945.

Chapter 14: The Soviet Union—Fighting on Empty. “For every Britain or American that died as a result of the war, 85 Soviet citizens lost their lives” (p. 317). The Japanese lost 7, and the Germans 20. Some 28-30 million Soviets died, probably 70% civilians. The Soviets were unprepared. This was after Stalin killed millions through his brutal actions in the 1920s-30s. Add poor harvests and famine resulted. Soldiers beginning with training were treated horribly, including inadequate, poor food.

After 1941, when the Soviets lost 4.5 million and much of their fertile land, they focused on feeding 12-13 million men in the military. “Meals for the front-line troops consisted of kascha (porridge) for breakfast, borscht (soup) for lunch, and bread and cucumber pickle for supper. The Red Army field kitchens were elementary, producing meals out of buckwheat, dried fish, potatoes, and as much fat as possible. … The soldiers lived in zemlyanki, which were holes in the ground boarded up with wooden planks and roofed with turf” (p. 319). Chaos was the rule. There was vodka to drink. Corruption made living harder, with corrupt officials selling food on the black market.

Soviet leaders ate well. “Breakfast at the Kremlin consisted of eggs, stewed meat, white bread, and tea with sugar and biscuits. At Kremlin banquets caviar, fish and meat were all washed down with liberal quantities of vodka, wine, and cognac” (p. 333). The elites shopped at closed stores which stocked bacon, canned goods, butter, sugar, flour, salt pork—all brought in from the US—as well as Soviet fish, fowl, smoked fish, vegetables, vodka, wine, cigarettes” (p. 333). It was similar at nearby party headquarters during the Leningrad siege.

In 1942 Soviet armament factories were working, provided weapons and ammunition and Stalin appointed more competent generals. “The Red Army first matched and then overtook the Wehrmacht in terms of firepower” (p. 335). This effectiveness in weapons did not cross over to food to the public which remained inadequate. It was up to the individuals to fend for themselves, like growing potatoes. Potatoes could be the only meals, varying only as boiled, fried, roasted, potato pancakes, or potato soup. Health problems included ulcers, gastritis, typhus, and dysentery.

The siege of Stalingrad resulted in Russian troops foraging in cellars and eating horses and dogs. The Germans also were starving. German General Paulus surrendered to the Russians.   

Substantial resources came from the US through lend/lease by 1943. Food was about 14% of the total tonnage, but much of it was concentrated like dehydrated vegetables and eggs, canned meat (lots of spam), dried fruits and nuts.

The Red Army chased the Germans back to Germany. “Confronted with the comparative wealth, even of wartime Germany, the Soviets were at a loss to understand why the Germans had invaded the Soviet Union” (p. 341).

Chapter 15: Germany and Britain—Two Approaches to Entitlement. “Throughout the war, average consumption of calories in Britain and Germany ranged between an adequate 2,500 to 3,000 calories” (p. 348). Britain tried to maintain “equality of sacrifice,” while Germany tried for efficiency for the “German Arian population,” with a second tier for non-Aryans. There were potato shortages as early as 1941. The quality of bread gradually deteriorated. The German system broke down in the last few months of the war. The eastern front was a disaster.

During the Great Depression of the 1930s unemployment rose, particularly in coal, textiles, and shipbuilding, creating pockets of poverty. This caused a decline in “protective foods” like milk, fruit, and vegetables. The German (Nazi) focus was on industrialization and rearmament rather than diet. Foreign workers were brought in and fed only watery soup and Russian bread (made of rye, sugar beet waste, and straw. “Whole meal” bread was encouraged for the urban population. Germans invented “quark” in the 1920s, with yoghurt and cream cheese. Poor-quality meats were slow cooked and served in casseroles. Rationing was started in Germany in 1939, just before attacking Poland. Black market activities increased by farmers, food processors, and food retailers. There was considerable corruption among the top officials.

Concentration camps were considered as a source of labor in 1942. The Armaments Supply Co. invented a sausage made from waste products of cellulose (but filled with bacteria), flavored to smell live liver sausage and called “eastern food.” The result was stomach disorders and increasing deaths. Western European prisoners were protected by the Geneva Convention. Enlisted men could be worked 12 hours a day and fed watery vegetable soup, with sauerkraut, potatoes, and black bread.

Britain started rationing butter, bacon, and sugar at the start of 1940. “In 1943 it became compulsory for all firms employing more than 250 people to set up a canteen. Working men’s canteens served double the meat allowance permitted in an ordinary restaurant” (p. 363). Generally, the food was adequate but monotonous. There was a rural pie scheme to deliver meat pies to rural areas. Because food supplies were erratic, it was difficult to distribute fairly. Manufacturing productivity was increased if women laborers doing night work were given a meal, but productivity fell if only tea breaks were used. 

Chapter 16: The British Empire—War as Welfare. “The dominant story told about rationing in Britain between 1939 and 1945 is a heroic tale of a government seizing the opportunity presented by war to improve the nutritional lot of working people. It has also … when the British people were at their healthiest. … In the field the British empire’s troops were still reliant on an innutritious diet of bully beef (corned beef) and biscuits (described as cream crackers and dog biscuits), just as they had been during the First World War” (p. 384). The poor diet caused vitamin deficiencies. Military food gradually improved and was not a major source of military discontent by 1943.  Medical officers started considering what the soldiers should be eating rather than what was available. That was the situation in 1940.

Then the government appointed a scientific committee to consider nutrition, what to produce and eat. Bread was the staple food, then the need for protective foods, including animal protein. “Wholemeal” bread was made available in 1940 to increase nutrition but sold poorly (because people preferred white bread). The government had to outlaw white bread in 1942. Victory gardens were encouraged, with potatoes probably the most successful (onions for example grew poorly). More job opportunities and higher wages increased purchasing power (including food). School lunches and dinners also were increased, including milk. After the war, a Labour government was voted in, constructing a “fairer society.”

In Egypt during the war, it started with bully beef and biscuits, with tinned fruit from South Africa later added. Potato growing was encouraged. Then margarine, bacon and oatmeal, and onions. Later boxed meals included “tinned steak and kidney puddings, steam pudding, soup, chocolate, sweets and English cigarettes and tobacco” (p. 405). It was worse in the tropics where vitamin deficiencies were common and could lead to malaria. Common items were tinned meat, salt, biscuit, tea, sugar, and dried milk, later increased to include tinned vegetables, porridge and peas. Bakeries were improved, producing rolls and other baked goods. In India British troops received bread, beef, milk, vegetables, potatoes, onions, salt, sugar, and tea. Indian troops were fed less, usually rice or wheat, lentils, potatoes, and ghee, sugar, and salt. Meat restrictions led to serving goat meat.

Chapter 17: The United States—Out of Depression and into Abundance. “American soldiers were the best fed in the world during the Second World War. As the only country to experience an agricultural as well as an industrial boom, the US was able to meet the food requirements of its 11.5 million servicemen with ease” (p. 415). “Every meal contained meat, and each serviceman ate a gargantuan 234 pounds per year, just under double the 140 pounds per head for civilians. This was the main cause of red meat shortages in American butcher shops” (p. 434).

Field rations started as B rations which contained three different sorts of meat, four vegetables, a dessert and canned fruit or fruit juice in the five pounds of food allocated to each man for a day” (p. 436). Troops invaded North Africa in November 1942 had C rations, each five pounds with three tins, with beef stew, pork and beans, meat hash, plus biscuits, coffee, and sugar. Later, it was K ration with 3,000 calories in three meals: veal at breakfast, Spam for lunch, and sausage for dinner, plus fruit bar, crackers, cheese, bouillon cube, malt-dextrose tablets (usually dried barley), and lemon crystal to put in water. Hot meals were much better when available.

The US went from depression to boom. That included a rise in wages, with a parallel increase in food consumption including meat, dairy, fruit, and vegetables (protective foods). There were 20 million Victory Gardens. With rising wages and rationing of consumer goods and gasoline, food was the one category to spend on. Even with abundance, there was rationing by 1943 including sweets, sugar, coffee, butter, cheese, canned goods, frozen and dried foods, and red meat. American industry outproduced the Axis powers (some 2/3rds of Allied military equipment. Farm production increased 50% per capita during the war.

Coca-Cola was a big beneficiary and became the main supplier of sodas for the military. That encouraged sales in America and across the world where Americans were stationed. There was racial unrest in many war-producing centers, plus Harlem rioting when discovered they were paying more for food.

New Deal food relief programs were used to off-load farm surpluses and maintain farm incomes. School kitchens received considerable food aid. School aid homogenized the American diet and continued after the war.  

Part IV: The Aftermath. Chapter 18: A Hungry World. “The aftermath of the Second World War was a hungry world” (p. 467). Japanese at the end of the war ate rice gruel and wheat bran. After their surrender 100,000 starved to death. Hunger became critical in Germany after their surrender in May 1945, divided into four zones, with the four powers (US, Britain, France, and Soviets) unable to reconcile what to allow in Germany including its damaged farm sector. There was homelessness and hospitals filled with hunger-related patients.

Eastern Europe, much of Asia, and around the British empire, chaos and mismanagement of the food supply were common, like rice production in Asia. Some 7 million Chinese faced starvation in 1946. The Soviets depended on potatoes and wild grasses. Perhaps two million died. Things were worse when lend-lease ended in September 1945. Britain did not have the foreign exchange resources to import much food. The US had a healthy economy and had almost two-thirds of industrial production and high productivity levels, including in agriculture. Coke continued to do great. US CARE packages were sent to Europe and later Japan.

Chapter 19. A World of Plenty. To make matters worse, a drought hit much of the world in 1946. The US had a banner year, basically the only country in the world. US policy was based on a conflict between self-interest and altruism, with the disruption of anti-communism and McCarthyism. The UN Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) was established in 1943 to help allied countries. The US had difficulty meeting the needs of UNRRA in 1945. Herbert Hoover visited 30 countries in 1946 and urged America to give more food. The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) was founded in 1945. The push was for farm productivity across the world. As the clear victor, the US set the agenda, and food became a weapon in the Cold War. Success usually meant the continuation of democracy over communism. One approach was the Marshall Plan for US aid to Europe which started in 1948, mainly food, fuel, and equipment.

Australia had food surpluses. Wartime science advances increased food productivity over time, then the Green Revolution of the 1960s increased food production in the Third World (but with added problems like pollution). The US and Europe put up barriers to the Third World like on sugar. The Soviet Union became a superpower although the agricultural sector remained run-down, using production to increase military arms. The poor quality of consumer goods and food shortages remained. The Chinese Communist Party took over the mainland in 1949, then practiced “land reform” that killed a million or so in 1949-50. There were communal farms and common dining halls. The Party took quotas often leaving the farmers starving, probably up to 30 million peasants died.

The agriculture revolution started in the US and spread to the rest of the developed world, with farm machinery plants, chemical fertilizers, DDT for pest control, herbicides, and livestock breeding. Livestock went to feeding lots. Much of this was made public by Rachel Carson’s 1962 Silent Spring, emphasizing the long-term destruction of the land and environment. Processed foods techniques increased, with soy and corn starch common ingredients. One result was the fast-food industry and the popularity of junk food. The amount of money spent on food decreased from 33% in the 1930s to 13% in the 1980s. The net result was an abundance of unhealthy food choices.

British rationing didn’t end until 1954. The sales of Coca-Cola and Spam increased around the world. In Japan US assistance was mainly on food, including wheat which increased bread use. Eastern Europe wanted the western consumption style after 1989. Consumerism increased in China. Plenty of people are still hungry, especially in sub-Saharan Africa and south-east Asia.