National Security Watch: The militarization of disaster response

USNews
Sep. 22, 2005

It's something seasoned emergency management professionals have seen before: Everything seems to go wrong in a domestic response to a natural disaster, and the public and the politicians, tired of bureaucratic bungling, look for a savior in the form of the military.

"It's a sentimentalism that always comes back," says Art Botterell, a five-year veteran of the Federal Emergency Management Agency and an occasional consultant to the Department of Homeland Security. Botterell says after federal officials were roundly criticized for their response to Hurricane Andrew in 1992, politicians everywhere looked to bring the military's efficient command structure and Star Wars-style logistics to bear in disaster response.

"It sounds simple and it sounds macho," Botterell says. "But then they realized emergency management wasn't just trooping through the mud doing military-style stuff; it's mostly endless planning missions with civilians."

Regardless, the militarization of disaster response seems to be one prescription the White House is looking to apply to the woes exposed by Hurricane Katrina. When President Bush addressed the nation from New Orleans last Thursday, he made it clear he wanted to carve out a greater role for GI Janes and Joes during America's future major catastrophes.

"The system, at every level of government, was not well coordinated and was overwhelmed in the first few days," the president said of the civilian response to Katrina. "It is now clear that a challenge on this scale requires greater federal authority and a broader role for the armed forces, the institution of our government most capable of massive logistical operations on a moment's notice."

And plenty of members of Congress are already volunteering as foot soldiers in the effort. The Senate Armed Services Committee, led by Sen. John Warner, is already considering proposals to beef up the military's role in natural disasters by creating National Guard units specializing in disaster response and clearing the way for active troops to engage in law enforcement activities on U.S. soil. In a nod toward avoiding tussles like the one between the administration and Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco over who should have controlled the National Guard during the rapidly deteriorating early Katrina response, aides say the senators are also considering legislation that would allow the feds to take command of the National Guard without first getting approval from a governor– in extreme circumstances.

But the reforms won't come easily. Congress would have to overhaul the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878, an act that forbids active troops (but not National Guard members) from taking part in law enforcement on U.S. soil. Defense Department Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was reportedly skittish about overstepping the military's boundaries during the first week after Katrina. And staffers with the office of California Rep. Duncan Hunter, head of the House Armed Services Committee, have indicated that reforming Posse Comitatus is not on their fall agenda.

But over in the Department of Homeland Security, officials are already throwing out ideas to use the military to gather intelligence in chaotic disasters. In New Orleans, for instance, Coast Guard officials conducting helicopter rescues could see broken levees and burgeoning crowds outside the city's convention center, long before crucial federal officials on the ground learned of such developments from local authorities, according to extensive Coast Guard interviews with U.S. News. Russ Knocke, the DHS press secretary, says DHS realizes now that such eyes in the air are crucial.

"People want us to be omniscient and omnipresent, but the truth is, we're not," Knocke says. "We could have had the military, for instance, fly over New Orleans early on to help us gain visibility on things–water levels and developing pockets of criminal activity." Knocke says DOD assets in the future could even assist in "stabilizing a city" or "conducting a large-scale evacuation."

The fleets of men and women in fatigues will almost certainly see some sort of Katrina-inspired growth spurt in the coming months, but one things is clear for now: Just where they'll fit is anything but certain.