I have been wondering for a few days where the hell all the medical supplies and help have been. Members of the media who are in Haiti have been pointing out the shortage of medical staff and medicine for days.

It was quite a thing when Dr. Gupta and his staff had to take over running a hospital because all the doctors and nurses left. Thank goodness, he was there.
I have never seen such devastation in my life. Those poor people. It will take 10 years to get rid of the rubble.

Agreed tbsa. Certainly during CNNs coverage – which has been very good indeed – has included multiple comments and discussions about the lack of materiel arriving where needed, etc. Anderson Cooper asked last night whether rescue was going to areas where the well off and foreigners were likely to be rather than to where the most Haitians were.

It’s such a chaotic situation and it really is impossible to judge from a distance – I suspect it’s also hard to get a full view for reporters on the scene – but when MSF for example complains, I take that seriously.

That was haunting …

Thanks for the info, Siun. Any idea how much aid might be getting in by sea?

Damn! Why is it always guns, no butter?

Exporting our Security State mindset even when we’re trying to help is costing lives. I just can’t stand it.

I’m never sure what I think of Greg Palast’s work – often on the money but often also so partisan I feel uneasy – but his piece on Haiti was disturbing. I’ll link here for folks to give it a read: http://www.gregpalast.com/the-right-testicle-of-hell-history-of-a-haitian-holocaust/

From the call this afternoon, it sounds like virtually no aid is getting in via sea yet. The port was destroyed. One US Southern Command ship (hope I have that right!) is there and beginning to rebuild enough capacity to get items flowing there.

Nodding … I’ve been going back and forth in my own thoughts the past few days on this. On the one hand, military forces often have capacity for logistics that is hard to come by on the scale needed otherwise …at the same time, the role of the US military in Haiti has been messy and the overall militarization of our involvement outside our borders is so disturbing.

On the call today, the official word was that Haitian police and UN forces would lead on security and it was good to hear positive mention of the role of the Brazilian forces but the buildup of media references to security concerns makes me anxious.

I just read the Greg Palast piece. U.S. failed to provide food and water due to the lack of security. It seems like we’ve reached a point where our government can do nothing well.

WAPO

After the complaint from Doctors Without Borders, its hospital plane was given clearance to land around 3 p.m. Sunday. An Air Force official said the military had 67 civilian flights trying to arrive Saturday, and turned away only three.

Then let the goddamn Cubans do it.

You’re right but I suppose some security is necessary because the people are starving and many could be injured or die due to pushing and shoving for food and water. It’s a difficult balance to reach.

and @ Siun:

I don’t think it’s so much that the government can’t do anything well, but that the priorities are fouled up.

I mean why isn’t it that we could deliver some water along with the marines to distribute it for instance? Won’t one squad of Marines do as far as providing security for a hospital? And on and on….

Thanks Raven,

This is the second MSF flight – one was diverted, this was the one that was mentioned on the WH call but had not yet landed. I contacted MSF to try to get news but they are clearly swamped. Good to know that one got permission to land so aid reaches people faster.

I believe I read that the Cubans got 400 medical personnel in within a day or so … they have very good emergency response teams due to their hurricane history.

If they had gotten the nessecities there earlier perhaps there wouldn’t have been a need to worry about security. These people are literally starving and thirsting to death. Most of the people in Haiti secure food for themselves on a day to day basis.
This whole thing is breaking my heart.

So the best thing to do it to try to second guess the people that are busting their asses actually doing something. I’m sorry this is just another bitch fest, I’ll go away.

I don’t blame the boots on the ground, I blame the suits here at home.

The people on the ground are not the individuals making decisions.

I think most are doing the best they can under incredible disadvantage. With 300,000 homeless, I wouldn’t know where to begin. What do you do with that many people?

How did the Israelis get set up so fast?

Be certain they have enough drinking water first, food and shelter, second and third. Easy to prioritize, much harder to implement.

We, the US, are a nation governed by a presidency that is subservient to the military. Eisenhower, after doing nothing about it for almost eight years, on his last day saw fit to give us warning of the MIC (military-industrial complex). How could we take him seriously, when he did not take it seriously during his two-term presidency!

Too late now! So many of our citizens are veterans who have been indoctrinated by their military experience and the veterans’ organizations; so much of our media are controlled by corporations that also have ties to the military; so many of our jobs come from the hundreds of billions budgetted for “defense” that trying to restore civilian control of our foreign policy and our way of life is an almost impossible task. The ties between the corporate world and the military are accelerating as tasks that used to be performed by soldiers are now contracted to corporations, Xe (formerly Blackwater), for example.

This is a martial country, and it does not matter what the task may be. The military will come first in line, and everyone else will wait – for real health-care (not the phony insurance-care before the Congress) and for all the other needs of our civilian society.

It was interesting on the press call today that all of the press was hesitant to raise criticisms of the current aid effort. And it is unclear whether criticism is warranted. I personally feel quite torn on that.

At the same time, it certainly seems that more aid should be reaching more people faster … I saw a mention somewhere about the UN saying they would be able to provide food to 1 million in need in two weeks which is great but sounds way too late.

Disaster care always involves horrible tradeoffs – not everyone can be saved and lots of dreadful decisions need to be made to help the most possible.

I do think we need to be watchful and raise questions though – as mentioned above, many of those questions are being raised on CNN for example. And advocating for the best possible response – and changes like debt cancellation are ways we can advocate for those in need.

I saw Anderson Cooper at the airport for days wondering aloud why the food, water, and medicine was still sitting at the airport despite it being in the country for days.

I don’t know … here are two IDF youtubes about the effort:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NdplDDY9M

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tENp7Nj7ya0

They certainly were fast and seem effective.

There’s obviously an issue of logistics and the problem of supplies not reaching the places they need to be, but people need to understand that the situation in Haiti is literally a catastrophe. It’s a hell on earth right now. There are hundreds of different groups and interests with various resources and various specific goals trying to intervene to help. Meanwhile, there are thousands, THOUSANDS of individual Haitian citizens and families whose only operational thought in the face of this disaster is how to survive. Part of the problem with delivery of relief is just how difficult it is getting hundreds of thousands of different objectives to align in such a way that goals can actually be met. The US military is there because lack of food and water can potentially cause riots and looting, and hoarding of delivered resources by certain groups. Security IS important in the context of the relief effort, because in as desperate a situation as this, a starving Haitian is probably desperate enough to kill somebody for some food and water. The hundreds of different organizations in the ground all REALLY need to realize the ultimate goal, and that’s to get relief to every single Haitian that needs it. This is no time for political grandstanding or bickering when the lives of so many of the most vulnerable are at stake.

And as a side note, we absolutely need to demand debt relief for Haiti. It’s entirely linked to why Haiti has such miserable and inadequate infrastructure and social structure.

One of the reasons I wonder is because I heard a reporter saying he didn’t understand why the military was saying the roads were not passable because they were in cars driving all over. And from what I can tell, I’ve watched alot of the coverage that seems true. There are reporters all over the place.

They were evidently prepared. I can’t understand why the U.S. always seems to be unprepared to respond quickly to natural disasters. We’ve had lots of practice.

From the diary I put up 2 days ago that never got much exposure.

If our cowering military delays much longer to begin major distribution of food and water the chance of violence fulfilling their prophecies will develop. I suppose when the primary goal is to train the men to kill it is not considered a good idea to teach them much about human nature. If they had begun even a trickle of supplies as soon as they had one of those monstrous vehicles; to deliver them the people would have been reassured that more would soon be coming and more likely to be patient. Withholding goods sitting on the ground it until a division of Marines arrives just incites anger. The longer it goes on the less trust and the more grasping and hoarding there will be.

I am struck with the image, really a meme, the white man’s fear of oppressed and suffering black people. No pacts with the devil. It was our white ancestors who through enabling slavery so long have endowed us with paranoia and terror.

Can one imagine a similar reaction to the devastation of a city such as Denver? I don’t think so.

There was more than a taint of it in the response to Katrina. This is blatant.

Then there is the politics of 2010. Another possible source of the slowdown, I fear has, so far been little noted by the media and mentioned with sullenness indirectly by some of the organizations involved in the aid mission. That is just days ago President Obama turned the leadership of international aid missions back to the State Department’s USAID. After the earthquake he specifically named them to head the US mission to Haiti.

Now we all know the military and Cheney’s friends are not that fond of President Obama. And they think their warriors know all about how to run countries, better than any civilian. One can only hope they are not playing passive aggressive to USAID with the lives of these wonderful people of Haiti.

Hearing Col Elton today describe how they got the airfield up and running – and how fast – was really impressive. And he said they had no security problems at all …

The Right Testicle of Hell: History of a Haitian Holocaust

by Greg Palast http://smirkingchimp.com/thread/26127

“12. What Papa and Baby didn’t run off with, the IMF finished off through its “austerity” plans. An austerity plan is a form of voodoo orchestrated by economists zomby-fied by an irrational belief that cutting government services will somehow help a nation prosper.

13. In 1991, five years after the murderous Baby fled, Haitians elected a priest, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who resisted the IMF’s austerity diktats. Within months, the military, to the applause of Papa George HW Bush, deposed him. History repeats itself, first as tragedy, then as farce. The farce was George W. Bush. In 2004, after the priest Aristide was re-elected President, he was kidnapped and removed again, to the applause of Baby Bush.

14. Haiti was once a wealthy nation, the wealthiest in the hemisphere, worth more, wrote Voltaire in the 18th century, than that rocky, cold colony known as New England. Haiti’s wealth was in black gold: slaves. But then the slaves rebelled – and have been paying for it ever since.”

It seems that we cannot help ourselves–we dump on everything our country does. Everything. Progressives, liberals, conservatives and teabaggers alike–we just can’t say ANYTHING good about our country. I said to myself right after the earthquake occurred, “well, we will jump into help, and within a couple of days, we will start criticizing every aspect of our own operation.” It’s pretty sick.

I recall after Katrina there was some talk about how many members of the National Guard, and their equipment were unavailable as a result of being deployed in Iraq.

I wonder if something similar could be a factor now, that our military is currently configured to sustain operations on the opposite side of the globe and that some resources which might help them operate more efficiently are unavailable in this hemisphere.

Yes. And it seems obvious that immediate delivery of life saving supplies would do more than anything else could to improve the security situation. On TV. I heard our Secretary of War (as he likes to style himself) state that he would not allow air lifts due to ‘riots’. I do not like to pull the race card out of the deck at the drop of a hat but I could not imagine white folks in a foreign capital being left to die because of imagined ‘riots.’ And yes, the whole damn thing is heart breaking.

If the operation does things like failing to deliver supplies that would pacify the situation on the ground, does it deserve criticism for THAT failing?

I’m not going to fault the entire relief effort, but there’s a lot going on in Haiti right now, and all it takes to take things from tragedy to pandemonium is a few small bad choices by the people that are there to alleviate the problem.

We need to get medical care to wounded and injured Haitians. We need to get them nutritious food, and clean water. We need to get them out of the elements so they don’t die from sleeping outside at night. And we need to get it ALL done as soon as possible, whatever it takes.

You can’t run a relief effort in incrementalism, crises don’t work the same way as governments. If you’re not doing it all, you’re not doing enough.

You’d be surprised at what would be allowed for ‘white people’ in a riot. The military isn’t going to care what color the person coming at them with blood in their eyes is, they’re going to do whatever they can to stop them. Granted, airlifting IS a good idea, but in times of crisis the potential for waves of the miserable and afflicted charging toward limited resources as a matter of survival is possible. If the Secretary doesn’t want airlifts because of riots, he should airlift strategically, perhaps with a contingent of marines and dispersement personnel to keep the situation stable.

Our military is configured to clear and hold not to be compassionate, In fact they are configured to be paranoid killers..

They have been great at controlling and holding the airport against no opposition.. They are an institution that is totally inept and not fitted for relief work.

They haven’t done that well in conducting violent war either. I think their leadership is cowardly and over polticized also.

lunacy.

The troops being used are the 82nd Airborne who have just returned from Aghanistan … See Steve Hynd’s post here for more:

http://www.newshoggers.com/blog/2010/01/haiti-turns-out-to-be-the-something-else-for-overstrained-military.html#trackback

During the Katrina/Engineering Crisis the high water vehicles were found to be in the desert in Iraq.

Read slowly what I said.

The US military are trained to destroy property and people. Just the opposite of what they are being expected to do in Haiti. They may have the hubris to believe that they know how to run a country. Not surprisingly they have not in the past 50 years shown much ability to do that.

They should get out of the way and let the professional aid people land their airplanes.

So does that excuse all the false claims of rioting and delays in even removing the corpses from the streets of New Orleans?

slowly read my answer. you’ve no idea of how the US military is trained.

your statement that US troops are nothing other than paranoid killers is l u n a c y

Gulf Coast, just the wrong gulf.

You are correct, they are more than paranoid killers. They’re doing a smash-up job defending the airport there against an insurgency.

Hell no. Blackwater was patroling in boats in my parents’ neighborhood within 24 hours of the levee breach. Fuckery.

LOL

I needed that.

Did your parents lose their home? A friend and his family fled but lost their home and all their possessions in Chalmette.

Hope your folks are doing okay now.

I’ve been giving money to ShelterBox, which provides containers, each with a tent, sleeping pads and blankets, a stove, cooking and eating utensils, some hand tools, and water purification tablets. For ten people.

(The Great Orange Satan has funded 67 of them already, at a thousand dollars each.)

Read slowly!
This is what I said.

Our military is configured to clear and hold not to be compassionate, In fact they are configured to be paranoid killers.

I also in # 40 said”

They may have the hubris to believe that they know how to run a country. Not surprisingly they have not in the past 50 years shown much ability to do that.

They should get out of the way and let the professional aid people land their airplanes.

So I guess you thought the response to Katrina was a “heck of a job” as well. People can’t wait 5 days for life saving medicine, food and water. Good lawd.

Yes, they lost their home. They were with us in Sac and we yelled at the tv for three weeks. We cried every night when my dad said the blessing. They moved to MS and hated it. They are back in New Orleans now but are confused because they are old and had their life turned upside down. They cannot find anything in the house because they are slipping cognitively. The army corp of engineers is responsible for the pain caused by the flood. It was not katrina.

I hate what my country did to my hometown.

rant over for now.

I am profoundly disappointed that the media, especially the internet media did not fully cover, and many times ignore Senegal’s offer to Haitian refugees. If true this is a landmark effort crossing religious lines for one country to step forward and help another.

This should be lead news to see that in this day and age there is hope for humanity and humanitarian efforts. Please encourage others to recognize efforts that may transcend politics and greed.

Thanks for the info, sounds like an excellent way to help.

But I must say what is happening now in Haiti is so much more horrible. It feels unexplainable like when someone close to you dies. It is a tragic mystery.

I cannot write about it well. Sorry.

To all. I apologize for letting my tone get so acidic. I am upset and let the frustration get to me. I am an old, very old, Grady Hospital Doc. When I heard the US military refused to let the Doctors without Borders land and off load their inflatable hospitals it really stung.

I certainly have never been involved in anything of this magnitude but sometimes Grady’s ER used to look like Iwo Jima on Saturday night. I have had various weapons on me or fall out of a patient’s cloths while treating them.. Had a colleague shot to death. But you know you take care of them any way. I feel these are my people I find myself wanting to be dropped into the middle of Port au Prince but Hell they would be taking me our on a gurney in a day.

I am also a dedicated pacifist who believes in non-violent disobedience as an effective way of protest.

So I know from more than one perspective what it is like to put yourself out there without guns or Kevlar body armor. I do respect the young men and women in the military ranks who are recruited to do things many will feel guilt for the rest of their lives.but do it because they love their country and people like me in it.

I know they love to have humanitarian missions because it represents the best of us. My bet the ranks would be on the streets in Port au Prince right now but it is their politically and ideologically corrupted leadership that at the best thirsts for overwhelming power to do violence before they will act..

Again forgive the acidity. I will take a break now.

I am so glad your folks at least got to go home. I can say no more to one who knows that suffering first hand better than I could imagine.

Know I was at the tv ranting about Katrina for days. also.

Don’t worry. It is ok. Being in a rotten mood is appropriate.

Best wishes for your parents. Mine spent the last 40-50 years of their lives in the same place. I can’t imagine how they’d have managed if they’d been forced to relocate late in life.

Part of me wants to go back and take care of them. I don’t think they are ready for that.

I helped my dad a lot. Actually quit working to look after my mom for her last five years. Glad I was able to do it, actually a lot of quality time and good memories.

I didn’t have to move across the country though and we’d been close all my life, so I knew she could put up with me. :-)

Rush Limbaugh and his crowd were complaining that the US military has become “Meals on Wheels.” Rather than complete coordination with MSF and all the other entities on the ground, the US military is asserting control and even flying a drone over Haiti. The drone has not delivered any water yet.

you could sit here and quote Al Jazeera criticizing the US Military, or you could get off your ass and help.

This message and the appalling comments that follow it show how far this formerly great site has fallen.

Not one of you is doing shit. NOt one of you has a clue how to land planes on a broken airstrip. Not one of you has an idea how to organize logistics for the largest humanitarin crisis in the history of the western hemisphere. Not one of you has a freaking CLUE what you are writing about.

How could the Israelis have gotten set uyp so quickly, you ask? BECAUSE THEY BROUGHT IN ONE OR TWO TEAMS ON ONE OR TWO PLANES, and some American kid on an aircraft carrier cleared airspace for them to do so.

Meanwhile, the 82d Airborne fed 40,000 people in a park in Port au Prince today.

What did you do?

actually, humanitarian assistance is one of the core missions of the US Marine Corps.

***as moderator***

disagree with the message but do not attack the messenger

when the message is “the American military are intentionally killing Haitians because they are paranoid killing machines” you can damn well bet I will attack the messenger.

We need to get medical care to wounded and injured Haitians. We need to get them nutritious food, and clean water. We need to get them out of the elements so they don’t die from sleeping outside at night. And we need to get it ALL done as soon as possible, whatever it takes.

Pretty much exactly backwards.

Water, then shelter, then medical care, then food. that’s the way it works.

here’s what the drone is doing, snarky one.

http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/blogs/defense/index.jsp?plckController=Blog&plckBlogPage=BlogViewPost&newspaperUserId=27ec4a53-dcc8-42d0-bd3a-01329aef79a7&plckPostId=Blog%3a27ec4a53-dcc8-42d0-bd3a-01329aef79a7Post%3a297f878f-4b3e-4888-9b55-9f2587cae9bf&plckScript=blogScript&plckElementId=blogDest

Juan Cole has some thoughts on Haiti:

“My essay is up at NPR on why Wall Street should tithe its bonuses to Haiti as an act of propitiation and a recognition that a lot of this money was generated by their use of low-interest public funds for triage.

The only thing I’d add is that the bonuses of the six biggest banks are now estimated to come in at $150 billion. Ten percent of that would be two years worth of Haiti’s gdp.

With great wealth comes great responsibility. An economically flourishing Haiti would not only help the Caribbean but also help the American Deep South economically.

Contrary to Gordon Gekko, greed is not good. Growth and development and self-realization are good.

And, the history of Western neocolonial exploitation of the place calls out for redemption.”

http://www.juancole.com/

Hey, Drfrank – fewer elbows. They will last you longer.

actually, humanitarian assistance is one of the core missions of the US Marine Corps.

They are also trying to push former militaries to teach little children in the public schools.

Can you give us a link to any proof that they do ether well?

I have no doubt they want to do good things but the military perspective simply is not applicable to civilian societies.

I understand you are upset with some of the comments, don’t pretend you know what we did or didn’t do to help from here in the states.

If your mission is to win a war you better have paranoid killing machines. Why would that be an insult?
No one said the Marines are “intentionally” killing Haitians. But the ineptitude in getting food and water is resulting in deaths. Or one hopes it is ineptitude and not because of leadership’s politics or turf wars.

but it’s okay to pretend from here that we know just what’s being done or not over there

well, my father is a “former military” what those of us who love our country call “veterans” and he taught very well for 35 years before he retired.

Again, I ask you, what have YOU done?

I will withdraw my comment that “none of you” is doing anything. My ire is particularly directed at talkingdick.

I’m watching CNN right now, people who ARE there. THEY are still wondering where the WATER is. I don’t have to pretend just pay attention.

keep digging that hole.

ok, [sorry macaquerman, misunderstood your post] how would you distribute water to a backward country where 3.5 million people are in desperate need, in a situation that happened without warning (unlike Katrina), where the airport has one airstrip and 20 ramps for aircraft (unlike New Orleans), where the hardest hit area is over 200 miles of open water away from the nearest American city (again, unlike New Orleans), where the roads in from the Dominican Republic are mountain tracks of questionable stability and the only port with offloading cranes was completely destroyed. Exactly how would you deliver that aid?

THey could deliver aid to 350,000 people, which would be a monumental accomplishment, and 90% of the victims wouldn’t have seen a drop of water. Do you understand that?

Would you have them drop pallets on people? Do you understand that as soon as the people see a plane dropping supplies, they will run under the site and be crushed? Do you get that?

Or are you just going to be happy snarking away on a formerly liberal website?

Has CNN gotten any answers about where the water is from the Haitian government? Who does CNN ask?

In New Orleans, there were maybe 50,000 people left in that city, and the Bush Administration took 5 days to get relief in from a neighboring state with the aid of a fully functioning massive municipal airport.

your willingness to criticize your own country in a mission as self-evidently good as it is self-evidently necessary as this one speaks volumes.

you would have to be a regular here on the siunday night funny farm to understand why I asked that question.

They have asked the military, reps from the government other aid groups. The aid groups themselves are starting to complain as well according to reporters. The reports are that roads are not passable, (although reporters seem to be driving everywhere), there isn’t enough security (they are having trouble getting the planes with the other soldiers on the ground) The ports and air drops are obviously not an option.
Look, I’m not trying to say no one is trying to get these people water or things they need, but after 6 days I was hoping it would get better. These poor people have nothing and lots more who survived the earthquake are going to die because of it.

And if you were a regular here on sunday night you would know I am not. Do you feel bigger now?

we all hope for the best, but Haiti isn’t an easy place, in any sense.
and sadly, given Haiti’s infrastructure and climate, there’s got to be a multi-tiered approach to the relief effort. this is a haven for disease and if 100,000 or more people don’t die because of that, it’ll only be because things went very right.

(TV reporters aren’t going to be driving large, heavily-laden trucks)

that wasn’t for or about you. I don’t know why you would think it was.

What a super program – thanks for sharing the link!

Actually, I suspect in a week or so we will be reasonably proud of what our military services can do. Obviously I have been watching the CNN/MSNBC coverage — and for a mix, listening to the BBC reports and I think we need to appreciate the scope of this problem. Katrina involved evacuation post storm of about 50 thousand persons from NO — I am now seeing estimates that 200 thousand are dead, 40% of all buildings in the Capital totally destroyed, another 30% likely to be condemned and bulldozed, with that part of the city too poor to have cement houses, but instead in rough built tin and stick constructs, ironically the only part of the city not totally destroyed with the houses killing the residents. Today CNN got out on the Penisula SW of the city, and in those cities estimates are more than 90% was destroyed. They were close to the epicenter.

On the first day someone took a teleillustrator and diagramed the probable approach the military would take to the mission. More or less they approach it as they would an invasion. They build up their manpower and supplies, including their heavy lift machines, and then they will break out along the main roads, clear rubble in the roads, and establish major distribution centers along them as they move forward. Around each supply depot, they will establish security, then identify some combination of local officials and NGO’s that can be relied upon to distribute. What is then likely to happen is that the homeless will congregate around these depots — and in a few days, it is there they will establish temporary tent camps. I notice that Denmark and Sweden received a request for 50 thousand tents the UN and other agencies have in storage there, and they were being packed into SAS Jets for delivery as early as the middle of next week. The tent information fits in nicely with the theory of “move out” described earlier this week on the teleillustrator. (I am still reading the Danish Press daily because I am following the attempted murder of the Cartoonist, Kurt Westergaard.) The Danes did tents in Kosovo too.

They want to decentralize for lots of reasons — at least one, to avoid epidemic water born disease. They have to establish elementary sanitation to avoid this — Oxfam is the NGO to watch, as they specialize in water purification and sewage. Combine the large water purification systems the Military is moving in (at least twelve that can supply water for 40 thousand daily are either in or coming in), with Oxfam’s technical expertise in running the systems and distribution, and you will see the makings of decentralized encampments.

As we watch this, we need to comprehend that they need to depopulate the city of all the now homeless who have no reason to be there. They need to bulldoze everything that is contaminated, and will not stand safely. They will need to remove the rubble completely, and then plan how to rebuild on a temp and later permanent basis. You can’t leave damaged ruins standing, as they will eventually collapse, and kill more people. Some of the ruins still standing will need to be blasted.

Triage is never pretty — but that is what is going on now. We need to understand it, and understand all the moving parts. Not much has been said yet about trauma — but a good many Haitians are going to have PTSD in a few weeks as they absorb the new normal — their city is gone, and they will be, for the forseeable future, living in tent cities. I assume that the UN will be doing camp security, the US Military security outside the camps, keeping the lifelines of supply running, and the Haitian Police probably will patrol the cities. The NGO’s will be organized in clusters to do their speciality, with the medical teams pretty much assigned to particular camps, or perhaps a few speciality centers. For the next few months or so, the big medical problem will be to prevent epidemic disease. Remember, Haiti has lots of HIV/AIDS, It has drug resistant TB, the kids are not immunized against flu or measles, etc., many have not had basic shots as Haiti has no public health system at all, and invests nothing in disease prevention. Preventing another hundred thousand deaths means doing the Public Health Thing big time. (To put it mildly, George W. Bush in the loving hands of Bill Clinton is about to get a huge lesson in the virtues of “Nation Building” and “big government” and Public Health.) That Partnership is going to be most interesting — Clinton knows this stuff cold. By the way, Chelsea quit her McKensize job and is at Columbia getting a Masters in Public Health Degree. I suspect she plans to work with Bill on some of his Foundation Projects, or work with Bill Gates, Clinton and Warren Buffett on their joint foundation work.) Watch Georgie Learn!!!

It is going to be fascinating watching all this spin out.

My apologies to you. The comment was directly after the question you asked me.

absolutely no problem. I appreciate someone with more class than I usually can muster.

The concern – at least to my mind – is that both reporters on CNN and multiple reports in other media – and statements on the Medecins Sans Frontieres website suggest that there are problems with the coordination of delivery of aid.

When even the UN’s World Food Program, which is one of the prime NGOs that the US is channeling food through, says that priorities need to be improved, we need to pay attention.

We can ignore those reports or we can raise them and ask that we all do better.

I think we owe it to the Haitian people to ask questions and ask that they receive the best possible care in the shortest time.

And I don’t see that as a hit on the troops sent to Haiti – most of whom are supposed to be on dwell time having just returned from Afghanistan – but we are all out of other troops to use.

Just read Palast’s screed.

People who ask why China and Russia and Iceland could get disaster relief teams in the air so quickly when we could not must just be conveniently ignoring the fact that search and rescue teams from several US minicipalities and states were in Haiti within hours of the earthquake.

Comparing the logistics of getting one team on one plane to getting food and aid and YES, security, for an entire nation through one airport is ridiculous.

And General Honore should STFU.

AIRPORTS AND AIRSPACE

The airfield is open for 24/7 operations and has a 100-aircraft per day capacity, this is an increase from yesterday’s 60 aircraft per day capacity.
The airport has received more than 600 short tons of supplies.
USAF air traffic control and airfield management personnel continue to manage air operations at the airport with approval of the Government of Haiti.
There are 30 military helicopters providing relief to the people of Haiti.
These helicopters are operating out of nine landing zones, including five drop-off points.
SAFETY

Approximately 5,800 military personnel on the ground or afloat.
Approximately 7,500 additional military personnel are expected to arrive by 1/18.
More than 1,000 personnel from the 82nd Airborne Division arrived in Haiti on 1/16.
HEALTH

More than 250 HHS medical personnel have arrived in Haiti.
2 planeloads of medicine, medical equipment and supplies from HHS have arrived in Haiti with a third expected to arrive today.
3,840 hygiene kits taken from USAID stockpiles in Miami have arrived.
The USNS Comfort is currently underway and expected to arrive on 1/20 with 600 medical personal on board.
EVACUATION AND RESCUES

As of 0900 a total of 1,760 American citizens have been airlifted out of Haiti.
USAID/DART reported that a U.S. Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) team had rescued an additional three individuals at the Caribbean Market.
As of 0900, US USAR teams have rescued 26 individuals.
There are currently six US USAR teams operating in Haiti along with 21 international USAR teams from around the world. US teams are based out of Fairfax VA, Los Angeles CA, Miami FL (two teams), New York NY and Virginia Beach VA.
Each USAR team includes approximately 70 team members.
FOOD AND WATER

U.S. military aircraft have airlifted 130,000 humanitarian daily rations and more than 70,000 bottles of water to Port-au-Prince.
Three water purification units are operational and can supply 180,000 liters per day.
USS Carl Vinson continues to provide potable water production.
U.S. military aircraft will continue to support the delivery of an additional 600,000 daily rations over the next several days.
Six additional water purification units are scheduled to arrive in the coming days from USAID stockpiles in Dubai. Each unit provides 1000,000 liters of safe drinking water serving 10,000 people per day.
12,000 water containers have arrived from Miami.
Yesterday, the U.N. World Food Program distributed high-energy biscuits to a total of 50,000 people.
The World Food Program Port-au-Prince metropolitan areas schools feeding program is now serving hot meals to 50,000 affected people.

ask all the questions you will. who’s in charge of Haiti and why aren’t you addressing your questions toward them?
isn’t the US trying to direct efforts because no one can or will?

and the last little swipe about us being out of troops is an obviously important and serious question from you, is it not Siun?
we should have planned our military allocation around this, of course.

Look at this, actual journalism:

http://www.prdailysun.com/index.php?page=news.article&id=1263539267

The “occupying the airport” that you so cynically complain about is actually part of planning for the delivery of aid over the long term.

Whoever used the word triage above is exactly right. Some people are going to die in the short term so that hundreds of thousands more don’t die in the long term. It’s horrible. But it’s reality.

“What a super program – thanks for sharing the link!”

I think the shelterbox program is way way overpriced. Look — the UN is going to furnish strong tents for free. The Red Cross provides free cooking equipment to each family once they are established in a camp, and a food supply for cooking is established. There was a thing on CNN today where they unpacked the package each family will receive once they are in a camp with sanitation. All this stuff is in UN warehouses around the world, and the key thing is to move it in as it is needed.

If people want to contribute to something other than the big NGO’s, I would suggest waiting a time, and looking to see what special smaller programs emerge. I’ve been checking regularly to see what AFSC plans to do, (American Friends Service Committee). They had a clinic in Rural Haiti they just recently turned over to Haitian management specialized in working with the Handicapped — and it looks as if they are again pointing that way. Back during the Vietnam War AFSC sent specialists to Vietnam to teach local people to make high quality Prosthetic arms and legs from materials scavanged from downed warplanes (titanium fighter plane skin for instance) — the ultimate symbolic swords into plowshares project. After the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan ended, they helped support the now Expert Vietnamese Prosthetic Makers work in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Looks like there will be a market for the same skills in Haiti now. After Vietnam you could support one custom leg for a little more than a hundred dollars. So just pay attention to what projects various groups pick up on, and invest wisely.

sorry sonny…not interested in your video games.

yeah, aerial surveillance is such a bad idea in a situation where nobody knows what the heck is going on and communications infrastructure is, at best, practically nonexistent.

By the way, that’s sarcasm.

yeah, I guess aerial maps of the damage to help direct aid is a game.

good for you, why not run along now.

I owe you one.

Apparently they put a Global Hawk over Haiti. It is one specifically designed to track Hurricanes. It is considerably larger than weapons carrying drones. They are running communications off it, as well as doing mapping. The Global Hawk has very long duration capability, flies very high outside the air traffic lanes.

How cute, “snarky”…you finally found a little friend. Still acting like a disruptive child who needs attention, even regarding this terrible situation. My friendly advice: Get yourself out of the basement, and use your fast typing skills for some good.

not interested in your advice. get gone.

don’t make me put on my moderator hat folks

you go back upstairs and have fun, officer S. we’re done here.

You don’t have to ask anybody here what they’ve done personally. Don’t assume that people sit on their “asses” because they have a different point of view. I’ll tell you that I coordinated donations to MSF totaling thousands more than what the US government has pledged per capita (33 cents per person). The same MSF organization on the ground when the earthquake hit and the same one barred from landing in Haiti and now driving its additional clinic and personnel from the Dominican (that’s worth the outcry). There are millions (not just commenters here) who feel that things should be going faster through the airport to allow water deliveries and more hands to dig under the rubble (it’s now over for this window). Knowing military personnel like I do, I disagree that they meant any harm and know that they all want to help. The main critique is that It’s the top brass and the civilian leadership in the WH that need to coordinate better. Your technical analysis was very good in many areas.

Thanks for the advice. Glad someone is always moderating. Cheers.

my pleasure

Lord knows we all want to feel pride in something right now. I should know it is not a good time to try to make the larger point in challenge to the double speak the conflates the violence of war making with peacemaking.

Here you go:

Cruise ships still find a Haitian berth
Luxury liners are still docking at private beaches near Haiti’s devastated earthquake zone for holidaymakers to enjoy the water

Thank you for this and all your posts and sorry I didn’t read them earlier to defend them. It’s comforting to know that many passengers felt it was strange to play in the water off Haiti. Ironic that the big ship made it in. Cheers.

So here we go comparing the response to Katrina to the response to the Haiti disaster. I think there is very limited evidence that we are botching Haiti like we botched Katrina. And, by the way, Haiti is not an American possession…

We should do the best job we can as a nation to help the Haitians, knowing that people will continue to die because of the conditions there–not because we have screwed up. The depth of cynicism among many people who have posted here about our competence and our ability to make a difference is very discouraging. There is a difference between constructive criticism and destructive negativism.