In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

297 25. Haiti 2010 The Way It Works The relief of Haiti provides as good a snapshot as any operation of the workings of the air force portion of the American national air mobility system after nearly a century of development and twenty years of a warlike operational tempo. To be sure, the Air Mobility Command (AMC) and the transport and aerial tanker units assigned to overseas joint combatant commands are trained, organized, and equipped for war. But they more frequently lay down their aluminum bridges of support units and aircraft to send relief to people stricken by natural and man-made disasters than for war. These humanitarian relief “global reach lay downs” often are to places visited only rarely by American transports, if at all. Most are small operations involving handfuls of aircraft sorties. The Haitian relief effort, in contrast, involved thousands of sorties moving thousands of people and tens of thousands of tons of cargo. To save lives, the U.S. Air Force (USAF) committed personnel and resources from all over the world. Their success made the Haitian relief effort an exemplar of the elements of American air mobility capabilities and practices. A Heaving of the Earth in an Unfortunate Place It would be hard to identify a nation less prepared to handle a major earthquake . Two centuries as a “slave colony” and two more centuries of independence characterized by kleptocratic governments, external exploitation, and overpopulation had left Haiti in deep poverty, unstable politically, and a basket case ecologically. With nine million people crammed into 10,714 square miles, Haiti is one of the most densely populated countries in the world. Most Haitians live on less than $2 per day, while the elite 1 percent of them own over half of the nation’s wealth. Corruption in the country is rapacious. Beset by deforestation and erosion, Haiti’s agricultural sector cannot feed the country. So poor is the country that many of its schools, medical institutions, and infrastructure and food programs exist only through the largesse of outside donor organizations and governments. Thus, when the earth heaved at 4:53 p.m. on January 12, 2010, Haiti transi- Haiti 2010 298 tioned from an international welfare case to a prostrate nation in dire need of outside help. Thousands of occupied buildings in the capital of Port-au-Prince collapsed, killing over 200,000 people immediately and injuring over a million . Hundreds of government officials and workers were among the dead, as were members of international aid organizations. The UN Mission alone lost ninety-six workers, including its head of mission, Mr. Hédi Annabi. The city’s port also was damaged heavily. Only the single runway of Toussaint L’Ouverture International Airport was available immediately as a gateway for relief assistance . But its control tower was unserviceable, and its parking ramp could handle only eight to ten aircraft at a time. So by the morning of the 14th, the flow of aircraft coming into the airport from all directions quickly overwhelmed its traffic pattern and ground infrastructure. Even as it began, the relief airlift was in danger of clogging to a halt. Mobilization Disaster mitigation efforts are routine elements of the domestic responsibilities and foreign affairs of the United States. As a result, the civil and military elements of the United States are practiced in such operations and supported by an array of planning and control organizations, logistical capabilities, and an extensive body of laws, directives, regulations, and other publications to guide their efforts. Thus, America’s mobilization to help Haiti was more or less a matter of routine, despite its unique features of scale and location. Many arms of the government began preparations as soon as news of the disaster hit the wires. The official relief effort began when Ambassador Kenneth H. Merten at Port-au-Prince formally called for help. As the lead agency for the response, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) promptly alerted the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) that its capabilities would be needed and then directed its own Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance (OFDA) to activate its Response Management Team and command center . On the January 13, President Barack Obama pledged an “aggressive effort” to save lives in response to the “especially cruel and incomprehensible disaster” that had struck a neighboring state.1 By the time he spoke, an OFDA disaster assistance response team (DART) was en route to Port-au-Prince and expected to arrive at 1615 and...

Share