Haiti and better solutions from military?

U.S. "Security Concerns" Could Cost Many Lives in Haiti

Doctor Evan Lyon, of Partners in Health, a medical aid group famous for its heroic efforts in Haiti, referred to "misinformation and rumors ... and racism" concerning security issues.

"We've been circulating throughout the city until 2:00 and 3:00 in the morning every night, evacuating patients, moving materials. There's no UN guards. There's no U.S. military presence. There's no Haitian police presence. And there's also no violence. There is no insecurity."...

Yet Lt. General P.K. Keen, deputy commander of the U.S. Southern Command, reports that there is less violence in Haiti now than there was before the earthquake hit....

To understand the United States government's obsession with "security concerns," we must look at the recent history of Washington's involvement there.......

Aristide's first democratic government was overthrown after just seven months in 1991, by military officers and death squads later discovered to be in the pay of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. Now Aristide wants to return to his country, something that the majority of Haitians have demanded since his overthrow. But the United States does not want him there. And the Preval government, which is completely beholden to Washington, has decided that Aristide's party - the largest in Haiti - will not be allowed to compete in the next elections (originally scheduled for next month).

Washington's fear of democracy in Haiti may explain why the United States is now sending 10,000 troops and prioritizing "security" over other needs.
http://www.zcommunications.org/znet/viewArticle/23694
 
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No, the concern is real.
It might not happen but it might happen.
It might be safe right now but there's no guarantee as to what will follow in two days.
 
George: Yes, I am all too familiar about giving a man a fish and teaching a man to fish. But if that man doesn't have the energy to survive the fishing lesson, give a fish and then teach him. If he doesn't listen, that's his own fault. Make sure you publicize the lesson giving bit a lot. What you don't want to do is keep sending fish.

And as for Chupike's
Originally Posted by Chukpike
Haiti and better solutions from military?

Are there better solutions from the military on Haiti?

There have been a lot of discussion of how the military could do more in Haiti. But it is not the job of the US Military or any other foreign military to occupy a country and enforce their governments values on another sovereign country.(Of course in this case, aid was asked for from the Haitian government).
I think preventing a complete destabilization so close to home would make some kind of military intervention (especially one with the request of the local government) a priority. As for disasters half way around the world and far from the country's interests, from a military standpoint of things, is a different story.

Not according to Perseus. He thinks the US is preventing democracy by sending a occupying force. The US is taking over Haiti for it's oil.:lol:



Using US troops for crowd control and distributing aid is a poor substitute for proper local infrastructure. Unfortunately in the case of Haiti there was no infrastructure for disaster relief in the first place.
It's a poor substitute but it's better than nothing for now.

Yep better than nothing. Although it seems this is what the UN was created for.


The idea that US military troops should be retrained to rebuild civilian infrastructure is ridiculous. The government has all ready spent money to train them for military purposes.
I don't think they should be retrained to rebuild civilian infrastructure but learning how to calm crowds that haven't turned violent is a skill you can take anywhere.
The Indonesian Marines probably didn't have a multi million dollar education course on how to deal with potentially angry crowds through smiles and hand shakes but they managed well enough on the spot. I'd like to imagine that Americans can be just as resourceful.

Not a matter of being resourceful. If the Indonesians have already mastered it, send them at their government expense. That way we could keep glue sniffers like Perseus from accusing the Obama administration of stopping the spread of democracy.


The idea that military troops should be trained for crowd control is equally ridiculous as well as very dangerous. Use of Federal troops in civil disasters is extremely dangerous to the public. Perfect example is Germany in the 1930s.
In a foreign country that has requested help and is in a situation like Haiti, it is not ridiculous. Although not federal, the National Guard helps out during natural disasters. If we think of an individual State as a country, how's it any different from committing a country's troops to a natural disaster?

I have know idea what you are saying here. Do you?
It is obviously different as I all ready explained in the next paragraph. The National Guard helps in US natural disasters and are trained for it. Federal troops do not help out. The National guard was not sent.

You do not get to deal in hypotheticals, since this is not a hypothetical situation.



There is also general ignorance as to how long it takes to recover from an earthquake. Living in Southern California I have a fair idea. It cost billions of dollars to recover from the Northridge quake and it is not all done.
I don't know earthquakes, you're right. But I have seen my fair share of pretty bad floods. Takes a long time. I think the actual sending of aid and troop presence should be long enough only for Haiti to get over the shock.
I'm completely against them staying for another "nation building" attempt.
Perseus thinks the CIA caused the earthquake to give President Obama an excuse for taking over the country.:lol:



In Haiti the cost to recover would be negligible. You don't have any infrastructure to begin with, it costs nothing to replace it. If you are talking about rebuilding peoples private houses, that is not a government responsibility.
Yep. Just enough help to recover from the shock would be a good place to start. How to define that, they don't pay me enough to figure that one out.


There is no need for the military to seek "better solutions" for disaster response. It is not in their operational purpose.
I think any organization should look for better solutions for just about anything.

What if you had either peacekeeping or combat operations in an area and a natural disaster just swacked your theater of operations?

What ifs don't cut it. Given you have a peacekeeping or combat operation happening you keep to your mission. Were you ever really in the service?

In the US, early disaster relief is designed to come from National Guard units.

In short US federal troops are not designed to be the "end all be all, Jack of all trades" this topic indicates they should be.
The military should be designed to be a jack of all trades because you don't know what the next war or crisis will be like. The better your Army is at going from initial unpreparedness (to a situation) to a state of better situational understanding and preparedness, the more adaptive and flexible your Army will be. No one knows what sort of task the President (along with Congress) will assign the military in the coming years and the odds are your Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff won't be telling him that the military doesn't do windows.

Where to begin?

The better your Army is at going from initial unpreparedness (to a situation) to a state of better situational understanding and preparedness, the more adaptive and flexible your Army will be.

This just gets question marks?????????????????????????????????
Apparently armies start unprepared, and the first one prepared wins?

odds are your Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff won't be telling him that the military doesn't do windows.

I would certainly hope he would.;-)

In short let other governments foot the bill.




U.S. "Security Concerns" Could Cost Many Lives in Haiti


http://www.zcommunications.org/znet/viewArticle/23694

I don't think you fly often. You would have too many problems getting past the drug sniffing dogs.:lol:

"Washington's fear of democracy in Haiti may explain why the United States is now sending 10,000 troops and prioritizing "security" over other needs."
There you have it, Obama's adminstration is afraid of Democracy.:D
 
A few points on what could have been done better from the start..

The Haitians could have had an airport with enough fuel to atleast fly the first responders planes out.

The Haitians could have had an Army up and running, that would have negated some of the early security issues.

The Haitians could have had a few days worth of supplies ready for their own inhabbitants stored, they could then have declared marshal law and had bought themself time for the early aid to get delivered.

The Haitians could have had an operational crane to unload ships.

The Haitian police could have secured dropzones for supplies, per a few wishes on here early air drops could have been done.

Good on the world for trying to help a nation that have done surprisingly little to help themselves...

//KJ.
 
I smell a rat and the real purpose of the troops is to quell a revolution which could return Aristide to power
2004 rebellion
For more details on this topic, see 2004 Haitian rebellion.
After a violent rebellion in 2004, Aristide was forced out of Haiti. Aristide stated that France and the U.S. had a role in what he termed "a kidnapping" that took him from Haiti to South Africa via the Central African Republic.[17]

Under Aristide's leadership, his party implemented many major reforms. These included greatly increasing access to health care and education for the general population, increasing adult literacy, increased protections for those accused of crimes, improved training for judges, prohibiting human trafficking, disbanding the Haitian military, which had primarily been used against the Haitian people, improved human rights and political freedoms, doubled the minimum wage, instituted land reform and assistance to small farmers, provided boat construction training to fishermen, established a food distribution network to provide low cost food to the poor at below market prices, built low cost housing, and attempted to reduce the level of government corruption.[18]

On December 16, 2009, several thousand protesters marched through Port-au-Prince calling for Aristide's return to Haiti, and protesting the exclusion of Aristide's populist Fanmi Lavalas party from upcoming elections.[46]

no doubt disbanding of the military and low cost housing will be used against him!
 
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hey Perseus in Haitian creole "occupy" can mean both to help and to oppress (it has a dual meaning). i think the international community is doing the former,
and anyway i think organizing an earth quake is a little extreme (not to mention far fetched) way to stop a revolution...
 
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I think preventing a complete destabilization so close to home would make some kind of military intervention (especially one with the request of the local government) a priority. As for disasters half way around the world and far from the country's interests, from a military standpoint of things, is a different story.


Not according to Perseus. He thinks the US is preventing democracy by sending a occupying force. The US is taking over Haiti for it's oil.:lol:

I don't really care about those silly conspiracy theories.

It's a poor substitute but it's better than nothing for now.

Yep better than nothing. Although it seems this is what the UN was created for.

Yeah, but the UN peacekeeping presence there just got smashed.

I don't think they should be retrained to rebuild civilian infrastructure but learning how to calm crowds that haven't turned violent is a skill you can take anywhere.
The Indonesian Marines probably didn't have a multi million dollar education course on how to deal with potentially angry crowds through smiles and hand shakes but they managed well enough on the spot. I'd like to imagine that Americans can be just as resourceful.

Not a matter of being resourceful. If the Indonesians have already mastered it, send them at their government expense. That way we could keep glue sniffers like Perseus from accusing the Obama administration of stopping the spread of democracy.

It's half way around the world for Indonesia. If something like this happened really close to their country and the Malaysian and Singaporean militiaries didn't have jurisdiction their Marines probably would deploy.

In a foreign country that has requested help and is in a situation like Haiti, it is not ridiculous. Although not federal, the National Guard helps out during natural disasters. If we think of an individual State as a country, how's it any different from committing a country's troops to a natural disaster?

I have know idea what you are saying here. Do you?
It is obviously different as I all ready explained in the next paragraph. The National Guard helps in US natural disasters and are trained for it. Federal troops do not help out. The National guard was not sent.

The federal troops were no doubt chosen because they could deploy overseas much faster than the National Guard could. The units involved seem to be the "rapid deployment" kind (Marines, Airborne). Having these units replaced by NG might be a good idea but might be too expensive.


What if you had either peacekeeping or combat operations in an area and a natural disaster just swacked your theater of operations?

What ifs don't cut it. Given you have a peacekeeping or combat operation happening you keep to your mission. Were you ever really in the service?

Ignoring your attempt to troll, I'd say having a disaster of that magnitude could severely disrupt, if not halt temporarily, peacekeeping or combat operations. The UN Peacekeeping presence there was paralyzed when their leadership was knocked out, not to mention other casualties sustained and a situation that had changed completely overnight. You can't always take that same force that's been hammered with losses by a natural disaster and expect it to complete the mission as it is. You may need to send additional forces to get operations running before the enemy can get theirs up again. I'd say federal troops can learn from the experience of going to Haiti. Though personally with all their rotations in and out of Iraq and Afghanistan, I hoped they could stay at home.

The military should be designed to be a jack of all trades because you don't know what the next war or crisis will be like. The better your Army is at going from initial unpreparedness (to a situation) to a state of better situational understanding and preparedness, the more adaptive and flexible your Army will be. No one knows what sort of task the President (along with Congress) will assign the military in the coming years and the odds are your Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff won't be telling him that the military doesn't do windows.

Where to begin?

The better your Army is at going from initial unpreparedness (to a situation) to a state of better situational understanding and preparedness, the more adaptive and flexible your Army will be.

This just gets question marks?????????????????????????????????
Apparently armies start unprepared, and the first one prepared wins?

Do you have trouble comprehending English? When Armies go to war, often they don't realize how the nature of warfare has changed. In WWI, commanders initially thought horse based cavalry charges were still relevant. They were wrong. In WWII, urban warfare and jungle warfare were surprises as well. In Korea, Chinese human waves and guerilla tactics involving movement by night was the surprise. Vietnam, I guess requires no real explanation. Iraqi Freedom, insurgencies, IEDs. Just where did I say they'd be guaranteed to win? But it would certainly increase your chances of winning.

odds are your Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff won't be telling him that the military doesn't do windows.

I would certainly hope he would.:wink:

But I wouldn't count on it.

Hopefully they bulldoze the whole city and build a modern city in its place.

I think bulldozing is all the international community needs to do. The Haitians need to build.
 
The Puerto Rican Air National Guard and National Guard are both in play The Air Guard is flying transports into DR and Haiti and the Army Guard is off loading and unloading.

The National Guard is not a better option regardless of what Perseus may think safe in is little armchair pointing the finger.

Their response time is extended because they are not on alert.

The regions closets may not have the necessary TO&E for this type of mission. Or they be deployed to other ares already.

The National Guard when Federalized relies on the regular establishment for it's heavy lift capability and logistics.

While the NG is trained in crowd control as part of it's State Misson so are the 82nd and the 22nd MEU most combat units are.

Some folks need to wrap their head around two things.

1. The US sent the forces and assets that were ready and necessary and had the greastest ability to reach the area quickly.

2. The National Guard was not one of those assets.

The Vinson ran out of supplies because she was underway already and did not port to take on on humanitarin aid, the aid she distributed was from her stores
 
1. The US sent the forces and assets that were ready and necessary and had the greastest ability to reach the area quickly.

2. The National Guard was not one of those assets.

I agree.
I really couldn't say for anti-riot training of NG or 82nd and USMC because I don't know how much of it they get.
 
The National Guard is not a better option regardless of what Perseus may think safe in is little armchair pointing the finger.

Innocent on this point, never mentioned National Guard, although probably guilty on just about everything else!
 
coughcoughAfghanistancoughcough


Don't know about Astan never been there, but were they dropping in our near an Urban area? IMO if drop into Haiti into an unsecured DZ the chances of the aid actually making it to where it needs to be are slim to none.
 
I have had pretty extensive training on crowd control and dealing with riots. With that being said I think that is a MP thing. I noticed while going through the schooling that the guys in my unit were too agressive most of the time. Our MP instructors were getting pissed. Put a riot shield in a grunts hand and he will be using that thing like a Spartan in the movie 300.
 
I have had pretty extensive training on crowd control and dealing with riots. With that being said I think that is a MP thing. I noticed while going through the schooling that the guys in my unit were too agressive most of the time. Our MP instructors were getting pissed. Put a riot shield in a grunts hand and he will be using that thing like a Spartan in the movie 300.

Granted, but that comes under command control. Rapid deployment are trained in the subject including less lethal weapons, but C&C is crucial.
 
I have had pretty extensive training on crowd control and dealing with riots. With that being said I think that is a MP thing. I noticed while going through the schooling that the guys in my unit were too agressive most of the time. Our MP instructors were getting pissed. Put a riot shield in a grunts hand and he will be using that thing like a Spartan in the movie 300.

For situations like these there won't be enough MPs to go around. As for the 300 thing... funny but I think those folks need to get their discipline in check.
The US Army must be real nice. If we pissed off our instructors, we'd spend the morning balancing on our two feet and the top of our heads and enjoy the afternoon duck walking and doing other equally painful sh*t all over the parade ground. Oh yeah, and your commanding officer will get a few new assh0les torn in him by the training unit's CO which means the fun and games aren't over when you return to base at the end of the instruction period.
If the task given to you is to keep a potentially hostile crowd at bay without provoking it and you provoke it, you have failed to carry out your orders satisfactorily.
You're a grunt? Well good for you. Glad to hear your guys wasted tax payer money fooling around when you guys should have been paying attention getting your crowd control knowledge squared away. The 21st century grunt has to be smart. If we want to just kill people, I have bad news, the Air Force can do that faster with fewer friendly casualties so you'd be out of a job.

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Haiti and better solutions from military?

Are there better solutions from the military on Haiti?

There have been a lot of discussion of how the military could do more in Haiti. But it is not the job of the US Military or any other foreign military to occupy a country and enforce their governments values on another sovereign country.(Of course in this case, aid was asked for from the Haitian government).

Well you can't have it both ways, what are so many doing there? Now putting politics aside and assuming they are there for a humanitarian purpose, perhaps you are saying it is the job of the military just to secure areas. However, the military should have the matériel and management expertise at logistics and supply which is the problem here. What I am saying is that the military don't seem to be set up for Ad Hoc situations, they are used to planning in advance.

Things need to be prepared in advance for potential earthquakes now in the potential disaster areas waiting to happen.

I still don't see any solutions for a quick response. I suggested parachuting either paratroops to secure areas, then drops with multiple small items over a very large unsecured area, such as the outskirts of cities. Everyone thinks this will cause panic, stampeding, crushing, injury. So what wouldn't? Why has everyone not been crushed against the airport fence or the hospitals rushed or the aid workers mobbed?
 
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Why does military involvement have to be a conspiracy? I bet the military was there to help, if anything. And as a former VFF/EMT I guarantee you gentlemen if I go into a place to help and there are unfriendly elements hanging around, I sure as hell want some kind of a security force there! Not everyone is welcome to help in a crisis and others see it as a way to get rich.

Keep in mind you don't see that kind of hostility as much in first world nations when they have a disaster.
 
I think after Iraq and Afghanistan, the last thing the American government wants to do is get involved with another nation building project. There is no conspiracy. STFU.
 
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