Military personnel could find lab-grown meat in their ration packages as Pentagon chiefs look for ways to reduce their impact on climate change.
Bioengineering company BioMADE came up with the idea after receiving $500 million in funding from the Department of Defense to reduce its carbon footprint.
But his plan to roll out “cell-based meat” has left a bad taste in the mouths of veterans who have accused Pentagon bosses of treating frontline soldiers like “lab rats.”
“The job of the military is forward defense, alliance, solidarity and deterrence, and that’s it,” said former US Navy Seal Rob O’Neill.
‘Everything else is bullshit. “This is typical Washington DC nonsense.”
Former Marine Lt. Col. Stuart Scheller, who was court-martialed for his complaints about the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, said service members were already “just surviving.”
‘Cell-based meat’, grown in a laboratory from animal cells fed with chemicals, and first authorized for sale to the public last year.
Military chiefs have found the fight against climate change at the top of their inboxes under President Biden, who has deemed it a “national security priority.”
“It is a matter of national security and we must treat it as such,” Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in 2021.
And officials have focused on artificial meat as “one of the most immediate, politically feasible and high-impact ways to do this,” according to the department’s deputy assistant secretary, Matt Spence.
The sale for consumption of lab-grown meat was not legalized until last year, and veterans warned that soldiers are tired of being used for experiments with unproven technology.
“There are a lot of active reserve guard members who are still a little tired of the COVID vaccine and are not very willing to be part of the new experiment,” a 22-year-old former Navy Seal told the newspaper. . Caller.
More than 8,400 service men and women resigned to avoid facing a mandatory injection of Covid-19 vaccines, and the Army has reduced its enlistment goal by 10,000 this year as the military suffers its biggest recruiting crisis in decades.
The United States now has its smallest military in 80 years and veterans warned that the situation is unlikely to improve with the prospect of eating what BioMADE calls “nutrient-dense rations” produced “through fermentation processes.”
The US military has already reduced its enlistment target by 10,000 this year, as the military suffers its biggest recruiting crisis in decades.
Former US Special Forces member Martin Bailey said it would be unethical to impose the “experimental meat product” on active service members.
“I think the government should focus on allowing the military to protect our nation from enemies, internal and external, at times, but you know, that’s what the military is for,” said former US Special Forces member Martin Bailey.
They are not there to be experimental lab rats.
“You know, why doesn’t the government feed experimental meat products that you don’t even know what it is? Why doesn’t it feed that to, say, homeless people?”
‘Well, there’s a reason they don’t, because that would be completely unethical. So why is it ethical to shove it down our military service members’ throats?
Marine Lt. Col. Stuart Scheller, who was court-martialed over his complaints about the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, said the plan was symptomatic of a military with misplaced priorities.
“It appears that until the new leadership of the Department of Defense builds a winning force, service members will continue to survive on scraps,” he added.
The National Cattlemen’s Association waded into the dispute when news of the plan broke last week, calling it “scandalous.”
“American troops deserve to be served the same healthy, natural meat, not the same ultra-processed, lab-grown protein cooked in a chemical-filled bioreactor,” said Vice President Ethan Lane.
“The Department of Defense is spending millions of taxpayer dollars to feed our heroes like lab rats.”
Former Missouri governor and former Navy SEAL Eric Greitens called the idea “the height of woke nonsense.”
“The purpose of the military is to win our wars and kill our enemies,” he added.
It’s such a stupid idea that in any normal world it would be considered a joke.
“When you add nonsense like this to the debacle in Afghanistan and the policy of kicking people out of the military for refusing the experimental COVID-19 vaccine, you begin to understand why the military is facing a massive recruiting crisis.”
But studies have identified the US military as the largest institutional emitter of greenhouse gases on the planet.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, pictured with President Joe Biden, has said that climate “is a national security issue and we must treat it as such.”
Former Missouri governor and former Navy SEAL Eric Greitens called the idea “the height of woke nonsense”: “In any sane world, it would be considered a joke.”
The Department of Defense estimated its own emissions at 51 million tons of CO2 in 2021, an amount equivalent to that produced by Sweden.
A group of researchers said last year that the US military owes at least $106 billion in reparations to countries affected by climate change.
But O’Neill said military leaders risk forgetting about America’s biggest threats.
“They are wasting their time with nonsense,” he said.
“It’s a shame that we’re going to find out the hard way who our real enemies are, since, you know, I don’t think China, Russia and Iran are worried about lab-grown meat.
‘They are worried about taking over the world. And we are not.
