KUWAIT: The British army in Kuwait has opened its doors to the press for the first time to reveal the unit at the heart - or stomach - of Britain's military preparations for war against Iraq: the force's catering unit.
In a break with convention, it was not British troops or tanks of the 44,000-strong force assembling in the Gulf but the army's kitchen that was on parade, after the MOD was inundated with calls from squaddies' mothers worried at how British grub compared with the American steaks and occasional Burger King outlets on offer to US troops.
The demonstration of British culinary skills in the desert was emphatic. Standing like a marquis at the village fête among the scores of camps being built in the military exclusion zone in northern Kuwait to accommodate arriving troops, the vast tented kitchen of the 6th supply regiment, 102nd Brigade, feeds 3,000 of the 8,000 British troops currently in Kuwait.
Inside, a team of 62 army cooks from units stationed in and around Camp Coyote work around the clock preparing supper and breakfast: on tonight's menu, pasta carbonara, poured from huge vats into containers to be driven out to the waiting troops.
"It's unique," said Maj Larry Downs, in charge of operations at the kitchen.
"You might have been expecting something austere and barren here in the desert, but as you can see this kitchen is pretty Gucci when it comes to field catering. This is the first time we have done field cooking on this scale."
Over the past 14 days, 8,000 kilos of beef and lamb, 16,800 kilos of chicken and 6,720 tins of baked beans have been opened.
One of the cooks checking the readiness of his pasta said, "I've seen what the Americans eat and our food is a lot better. They are often popping their heads in here to have a look at how we're doing things."
At the other end of the sprawling Camp Coyote, along a dirt track known as the Mall, soldiers from the 23rd pioneer regiment of the Royal Logistics Corps savoured the smells emanating from the steaming containers.
"Its better than my wife's cooking," said one soldier, who wished to remain anonymous.
But as the soldiers from the regiment tucked into their evening meal in the large Bedouin-style mess-hall tent, their thoughts soon turned to the impending war with Iraq.
"We think about it all the time," said Warrant Officer Carl Head, from Milton Keynes. "All we've been hearing about is anti-war demonstrations back home and why we shouldn't go to war.
"I know the public is sensible enough to make a distinction between the our duty and work of politicians, but we'd like to see a politician stand up and tell everyone that we're here and why we're here."