Haitian Invasion.

On January 12th a magnitude 7 earthquake struck Haiti. Apart killing a now confirmed 70,000 people it created one of the largest humanitarian crisis' ever seen. Although the entire worlds response has been immense the relief effort has been led by the United States who have dispatched it's military to in effect stage a full scale invasion of Haiti.

Rather then being something sinister this has been done for one pure and simple reason. Contrary to popular belief wars are not normally won or lost on who's got the best weapons or who can kill the most people. Instead they're won by the army who can best keep large numbers of their soldiers supplied with food, water, shelter and ammunition. It was Nazi Germany's failure to do this that lost them the battle of Stalingrad and ultimately the second world war. It was also the Viet Congs ability to keep the Ho Chi Min trail open that cost the USA the Vietnam war. Therefore moving large amounts of supplies over vast distances very quickly is something that the military is very good at and the best ones excel at.

Although it was without doubt the best thing to do for the Haitians America's decision to send in its military has led to tensions within the international relief effort. Far from being noble concerns for Haiti's independence most of these objections have been raised by nations who are worried that it will overshadow their own attempts to secure regional influence. These objections are now sadly starting to cause problems with the aid effort. As previously mentioned Port-au-Prince airport is seriously overloaded with the demand for landing slots massively exceeding the capacity of the airport. This has become the backdrop for diplomatic squabbling with the French government very publicly accusing the American military of blocking flights carrying French medical supplies in favour of flights carrying American food, water and equipment. Putting aside the argument of whether the situation in Haiti is so severe that protecting the healthy with clean water and sanitation should be more of a priority then treating the already sick with anti-biotics and analgesics the situation does highlight why it would be in the best interests of Haiti to allow the US military to be more aggressive in their relief efforts.

With the co-operation of the other aid agencies the USAF could close Port-au-Prince airport to all no-USAF traffic. Instead the international aid flights would be diverted to a much larger airport in the USA where they can be landed and unloaded in a much higher volume. The cargoes could then be sorted, separated and tactically loaded onto USAF transport planes that fly an air bridge into Haiti. This would mean that rather then having one plane landing with 10 pallets of water followed by another plane loaded with 10 pallets of food followed by another plane with 10 pallets of medical supplies etc you could have a series of planes all landing with 2 pallets of water, 2 pallets of food, 2 pallets of medical supplies, 2 pallets of tents and 2 pallets of rescue equipment. This would allow the ground controllers to know exactly what is coming in and when which would save time unloading and would allow the supplies to be more easily fitted into the cluster system that the aid agencies are meant to using in order to avoid bottlenecks and duplication.

Apart from Frances attempts to commit diplomatic suicide the aid effort in Haiti is continuing to expand the reach and volume of its operations as quickly as possible. There is still no word on when the sea port will be open but work on it is continuing. Aid flights are still landing at the single airports single runway and attempts are being made to double the number of road convoys coming in from the Dominican Republic although security concerns, a lack of warehousing space and shortages of fuel are hampering efforts. The UN has deployed an extra 3000 troops and the US have mobilised a further 4000 bring their total deployment to around 16,000. Canadian troops are attempting to create a second airport to deal with aid flights at Jacmel. In total aid agencies delivered aid to 400,000 people today and hope to increase that number tomorrow. There are small amounts of locally produced food available in the markets and rescue teams are still pulling people alive out the ruins.