Tsunami Relief: The Real Story
Several months ago, we linked to a new blog by a group of career Foreign Service officers, called Diplomad. Diplomad provides sharp, knowledgeable commentary. It turns out that one of the site's contributors is stationed in one of the countries hit by the tsunami (I don't think he's said which one). His regard for the U.N. disaster relief effort is, shall we say, muted:
Well, we're heading into Day 7 of the Asian quake/tsunami crisis. And the UN relief effort? Nowhere to be seen except at some meetings and on CNN and BBC as talking heads. In this corner of the Far Abroad, it's Yanks and Aussies doing the hard, sweaty work of saving lives.
Check out this interview (on the UN's official website) with SecGen Annan and Under SecGen Egeland shows,
Mr. Egeland: Our main problems now are in northern Sumatra and Aceh. <...> In Aceh, today 50 trucks of relief supplies are arriving. <...> Tomorrow, we will have eight full airplanes arriving. I discussed today with Washington whether we can draw on some assets on their side, after consultations with the Indonesian Government, to set up what we call an "air-freight handling centre" in Aceh.
Tomorrow, we will have to set up a camp for relief workers - 90 of them - which is fully self-contained, with kitchen, food, lodging, everything, because they have nowhere to stay and we don't want them to be an additional burden on the people there.
I provided this to some USAID colleagues working in Indonesia and their heads nearly exploded. The first paragraph is quite simply a lie. The UN is taking credit for things that hard-working, street savvy USAID folks have done. It was USAID working with their amazing network of local contacts who scrounged up trucks, drivers, and fuel; organized the convoy and sent it off to deliver critical supplies. A UN "air-freight handling centre" in Aceh? Bull! It's the Aussies and the Yanks who are running the air ops into Aceh. We have people working and sleeping on the tarmac in Aceh, surrounded by bugs, mud, stench and death, who every day bring in the US and Aussie C-130s and the US choppers; unload, load, send them off. We have no fancy aid workers' retreat -- notice the priorities of the UN? People are dying and what's the first thing the UN wants to do? Set up "a camp for relief workers" one that would be "fully self-contained, with kitchen, food, lodging, everything."
The UN is a sham.
There's lots more; check it out, and return to Diplomad for ongoing coverage. It will be interesting to see what happens when the U.N. people actually show up.
The use of te Abe Lincoln to "make water" is kind of stupid. The area neediong water is bigger tthan te US and canada combined.
Id have a batch of treatment plants that make 20 gpm and try to chopper these into the centers of needy population. WAter is very critical and getting a measly 400000 gal per day shipped around is underwhelming.
The ones in the Survival rafts are used to keep thousands of sailors afloat and alive in case they need to abandon ship. Personally, I don't think they should be used though.My take on this was that the US efforts didnt really get organized until Friday 12/31.
too many dept heads are leaving and the govt was on a holiday staaffing.
Im not saying tthat many countries wont step up and get rolling but , at least for te US, nobody was home, and counting on the administraation is less than satisfying.
those poor victims need clean water medicine, food,
In this case, time is critical to life or death. and its not like the victimss are in a single area.
I fully admit I do not know how to use the QUOTE system here
Thanks be with you from a gracious and humble ignoramus. :wink:
rykehaven wrote:I fully admit I do not know how to use the QUOTE system here
If you want to put someone's entire reply in a single quote, just click on the 'quote' button that's located in the upper right hand corner of every post. A 'post a reply' window will automatically open up, and you can post your reply to the remark you just quoted (as I did in this reply, with your post quoted above).
If you want to dissect a post into parts, and reply to the individual parts (like you were attempting to do), you should cut the whole post you want to dissect, and paste it in a 'post a reply' window. With the whole post there, you just click and drag your mouse to highlight the part you want to quote, then click on the 'quote' button located above the dialog box. Repeat this procedure, placing your replies in between the quotes.
Hope that helps.
Quote:The use of te Abe Lincoln to "make water" is kind of stupid. The area neediong water is bigger tthan te US and canada combined.
It's not at all clear to me that it is "stupid". The area is large, I agree, but the entire area has not been destroyed by the Tsunami. More importantly, because this is an archipelagic region, and Indonesia is more than 200 million strong, the population is extremely condensed in a very sall area, particularly in urbanized areas. The Abe doesn't have the capability to spread its resources over the region, and nobody said it would. But it DOES have the capability to provide relief to millions in a population dense center like Aceh.
BTW, the Abe's capabilities go far beyond "make water". They include a fully equipped hospital, supply logistics, search and rescue, communications, on site observation, and more. It wouldn't surprise me if the Abe has becomes an HQ of the relief effort.
Quote:Id have a batch of treatment plants that make 20 gpm and try to chopper these into the centers of needy population. WAter is very critical and getting a measly 400000 gal per day shipped around is underwhelming.
I have no idea where you would get those on such short notice, unless you mean the hundreds of portable water purification devices in the Abe Battlegroup.
And a person can survive on a half gallon of water a day easily, so a quick calculation surmises that 400,000 gallons will save a lot of lives. I don't find it underwhelming at all.
Quote:My take on this was that the US efforts didnt really get organized until Friday 12/31.
too many dept heads are leaving and the govt was on a holiday staaffing.
i'm not sure if the US got organized on 12/31. It seems like an arbitrary date of your choosing, but if they did, was this such a scandal to get organized? Also, I would rather look at the results rather than the process.
Quote:Im not saying tthat many countries wont step up and get rolling but , at least for te US, nobody was home, and counting on the administraation is less than satisfying.
I think this is a little self-righteous of you.
Quote:those poor victims need clean water medicine, food,
In this case, time is critical to life or death. and its not like the victimss are in a single area.
Many people's hearts bleed for them. You're not the only one who's concerned. Please ease up and try to allow us some credit, OK?
As for the time factor? Yes, though water is the most time-restrictive commodity. It is heavy to transport, which is why ferrying it by chopper is a bad idea. In fact it is far more common, feasible, for us to ferry in empty containers. Rain is a plus in this region, but you have to deal with shelter and possible landslides and other complications. I don't think it will be too much of a problem in an urban area though.
A person can survive weeks without food, but can go only so long without water. Furthermore, many of the relief supplies are dehydrated for better, compact, and lighter transport, and obviously require water infusion content. The only reasonable approach, and on such short notice, is to bring in water supplies through truck from surviving and nearby supplies, or - as is happening now, use the US Navy's water producing facilities. Finding a wharf, a suitable conduit to tie up to, is the real question. Circumstances vary, and so will technique. For example, you can simply run hoses from the "risers" of US warships down to the anchorage (if it's deep enough for the ship to enter) or down to the pier.
Hi Ryke and welcome to the forum.
I think the problem AGAIN, was a lack of leadership. The original offer of $15 million in aid was a complete joke and an insult to the rest of the world. We should have been the LEAD in this tragedy, and being the one and only superpower, we have a humanitarian right to do so. Then I had to listen to the president say the UN official "needed to check his facts" and tried to defend his initial petty offer. It was an absolute joke and a disgrace.
As for the UN, again they are the leaders of the relief effort. THey started airlifting supplies on the 29th and they are continuing to do so.
You need to look at both sides of the argument, the sites you visit daily are propaganda machines put out by the RNC to brainwash people. Articles such as you posted, only look at one side of the story, distort the facts and present an acute point of view.
You really need to go to the horses mouth to find out what is going on.
This is a horrible situation and now it appears there may be upwards of 500K dead since there have been entire villages wiped out. We need to help and help fast.
)
Quote:You need to look at both sides of the argument, the sites you visit daily are propaganda machines put out by the RNC to brainwash people. Articles such as you posted, only look at one side of the story, distort the facts and present an acute point of view.
I do take both sides, Thank you, sir. I find your characterization of the situation wanting, and your characterization of me insulting.
Quote:You really need to go to the horses mouth to find out what is going on.
rykehaven
I'm finding what you have to say interesting, but could you clear something up for me, please? You may have explained this already, but if you did, I'm sorry, missed it. But I'd like to know where/how you've gained your opinions of the UN & it's relief efforts. It sounds as though you've been in places where it's been required, but in what capacity? And, in regard to the information you're passing on here, apart the blogs you're supplying, what other (perhaps personal?) sources of information do you have? Maybe this sound sceptical or suspicious, but I like to know exactly where alternative information is coming from. Otherwise it's hard to know what to make of it.
I'm sorry!
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