Editor’s note: This article was originally published in November 2019.
In an ideal world, Thanksgiving is spent at the dining room table, surrounded by beloved family, close friends, and good food. For U.S. service members,
it’s occasionally spent in the shit.
Luckily, U.S. troops are a resourceful bunch, and plenty of service members who have spent time downrange during the holidays have come away
with at least some fond memories — as well as some less-than-ideal tales of dodging mortar rounds on base when they should have been dodging political conversation at the dinner table.
To that end, we asked Task & Purpose readers to share their best stories from celebrating Thanksgiving while deployed — and they came back with the good, the bad, and the ugly of their time downrange.
Here are the stories of mortars, meat, and merriment from T&P readers who spent the holidays downrange. Feel free to share yours in the comments below!
More great stories on Task & Purpose
- The Pentagon must deal with the Oklahoma National Guard vaccine revolt
- This is Daniel Inouye, a one-man wrecking crew and the namesake of the Navy’s newest warship
- They were painted as rogue Green Berets. This is the truth the Pentagon doesn’t want you to hear
- How one airman fixed the Air Force’s night vision problem with a 4-cent chunk of plastic
- US military apologizes for misidentifying the bombs that may have killed dozens of civilians in Syria
- A-10 pilot gets Distinguished Flying Cross for Rip-It-fueled gun-run in Afghanistan
- This is the Army’s plan to keep incompetent leaders from making command sergeant major
Want to write for Task & Purpose? Learn more here and be sure to check out more great stories on our homepage.