You make an excellent point. The last time i had to resort to a campfire for meal preparation was the result of pump failure on my backpacking stove.

Which raises the issue - How about using the traditional non-pump enabled Sveas or Primuses (Primi?) As I remember, the instructions say to preheat them either with body heat or a separate alcohol priming solution. Of course, we never did that - just sloshed a very tiny bit of white gas into the priming cup and lit'er up.

But would a properly primed Svea be safer than a pump unit? I suppose the greater question is - what is the safest, most fool proof backpacking stove. Of course, safety is relative here, since we are literally playing with fire....