Iceberg wrote:Good for them. Too bad it's off-topic. The stupid editorial is nothing but more "Oh we are so underappreciated and persecuted" bullcrap from soldiers who ought to shut up and soldier instead of being so visibly contemptuous of everybody who isn't a soldier and isn't under military discipline..
Too bad
The Diplomidad, which is run by a career diplomat in the State Department
backs up this Sailor's story.
The Diplomidad wrote: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.
WFP (World Food Program) has "arrived" in the capital with an "assessment and coordination team." The following is no joke; no Diplomad attempt to be funny or clever: The team has spent the day and will likely spend a few more setting up their "coordination and opcenter" at a local five-star hotel. And their number one concern, even before phones, fax and copy machines? Arranging for the hotel to provide 24hr catering service. USAID folks already are cracking jokes about "The UN Sheraton." Meanwhile, our military and civilians, working with the super Aussies, continue to keep the C-130 air bridge of supplies flowing and the choppers flying, and keep on saving lives -- and without 24hr catering services from any five-star hotel . . . . The contrast grows more stark every minute.
Well, dear friends, we're now into the tenth day of the tsunami crisis and in this battered corner of Asia, the UN is nowhere to be seen -- unless you count at meetings, in five-star hotels, and holding press conferences.
Aussies and Yanks continue to carry the overwhelming bulk of the burden, but some other fine folks also have jumped in: e.g., the New Zealanders have provided C-130 lift and an excellent and much-needed potable water distribution system; the Singaporeans have provided great helo support; the Indians have a hospital ship taking position off Sumatra. Spain and Netherlands have sent aircraft with supplies.
The UN continues to send its best product, bureaucrats. Just today the city's Embassies got a letter from the local UN representative requesting a meeting for "Ms. Margareeta Wahlstrom, United Nations Deputy Emergency Relief Coordinator and the Secretary-General's Special Coordinator for Humanitarian Assistance in Tsunami-afected countries." Wow! Put that on a business card! And she must be really, really special because she has the word "coordinator" twice in her title!
The letter, in typically modest UN style, goes on to explain that "Ms. Wahlstrom's main task will be to provide leadership and support to the international relief effort. She will undertake high-level consultations with the concerned governments in order to facilitate the delivery of international assistance." Oh, and she'll be visiting from January 4-5.
Once, again, a hearty Diplomadic "WOW!" She's going to do all that in two days! The Australians and we have been feeding and otherwise helping tens-of-thousands of people stay alive for the past ten days, and still have a long, long way to go, but she's going to wrap the whole thing up in a couple of days of meetings. Thank goodness she's here to provide the poor lost Aussies and Yanks with leadership. The Diplomad bows in awe to such power and wisdom. The letter is signed, by the way, by the same UN official who suggested a couple of days back that the Australian and US air traffic controllers in Aceh should don UN blue (see our post of January 2.)
Ok, enough with the UN; you get the picture. Now to the EU. The EU could copy the Australian-American model of acting quickly and effectively to save lives, or they could copy the UN model of meeting at a leisurely pace to plan for the possibility of setting up a coordination center that will consider making a plan for the possibility of an operations center to consider beginning to request support for the tsunami's victims. Ah, my wise friends, guess which model of "action" the EU chose? No need to emulate those "cowboys" from Australia and the USA with their airplanes and loading crews working round-the-clock; oh, no, much too tacky, sweaty and dirty. No need to feed into the system those goofy Aussiyankeebushowardian New World Anglo-Saxons already have created. No, they'll follow the much more elegant Kofi Annan model. A couple of EU planners have shown up to begin making arrangements for an assessment team to arrive, etc., etc., you know the rest. Meanwhile, people die.
But all is not lost. The Dutch, who on occasion show the great common sense for which they were once justifiably famous, have signed up with the Aussiyankeebushowardian Core Group. Thanks to a European Diplomad (Yes, The Diplomadic insurgency has gone international!) we have in our possession a short situation report circulated by the Dutch at the most recent EU meeting here in this corner of the Far Abroad. This January 2 report is written by local Dutch diplomats who traveled to Aceh and saw the reality on the ground. We will cite the two principal paragraphs, and leave them unedited in their original rather charming Dutch-English,
The US military has arrived and is clearly establishing its presence everywhere in Banda Aceh. They completely have taken over the military hospital, which was a mess until yesterday but is now completely up and running. They brought big stocks of medicines, materials for the operation room, teams of doctors, water and food. Most of the patients who were lying in the hospital untreated for a week have undergone medical treatment by the US teams by this afternoon. US military have unloaded lots of heavy vehicles and organize the logistics with Indonesian military near the airport. A big camp is being set up at a major square in the town. Huge generators are ready to provide electricity. US helicopters fly to places which haven't been reached for the whole week and drop food. The impression it makes on the people is also highly positive; finally something happens in the city of Banda Aceh and finally it seems some people are in control and are doing something. No talking but action. European countries are until now invisible on the ground. IOM staff (note: this is a USAID-funded organization) is very busy briefing the incoming Americans and Australians about the situation.
The US, Australia, Singapore and the Indonesian military have started a 'Coalition Co-ordination Centre' in Medan to organize all the incoming and outgoing military flights with aid. A sub-centre is established in Banda Aceh."
Isn't that nice? Europeans with a sense of reality.
The only fault The Diplomad can find with the Dutch report is that it understates the role of the Australians in the relief effort -- they deserve considerably more credit than this report gives them. It's hard to praise the Aussies too much for what they have done in the wake of the tsunami. They are absolutely splendid -- too bad they've got that thing about that weird game, uh, cricket, is it?
Anyhow, soon I will return to my habitual corner of the Far Abroad and leave my colleagues here to deal with the UN, the EU and their Coordination Efforts.
Saturday, January 08, 2005
UNbearable . . . .
Saturday evening moving into night. We have a slight lull in the pace of activity at the Embassy; all of today's C-130s are loaded and on the way -- even my teen-aged son whom I can't get to pick up his room was unloading trucks at the airport. After a few calls, we managed to snag another hanger at the airfield to store the pile of supplies which keeps growing despite the multiple C-130 flights. It's a pleasure to watch the Australians and our guys work together. They're interchangeable -- except for that, that . . . uh, you know, that cricket thing . . . but for that flaw the Aussies would seem perfectly normal.
You don't want to hear about Aussies and Yanks working. You know all about that. You want to know about the UN. The UN, you ask, what about the UN? Gee, fUNny you should ask. I was just thinking about the UN. Yesterday the UN rep who flew up to Aceh solely for the event, held a press conference at which he criticized the US airlift of supplies. The little S.O.B sniffed that it was "uncoordinated" and that some villages were fed twice while others were missed and that no "assessment teams" were being sent. The Guardian and AP have picked up the story, but my internet is so s-l-o-w, that I haven't been able to find it and link to it. Maybe tonight the internet will speed up and I can find it. I learn from colleagues who were there, no journalist asked the little twit just how many people the UN had fed, and if, indeed, "assessment teams" are what is needed why haven't the gadzillion UN assessment teams hanging out in the capital moved into these remote villages. I'm sorry but I detest these Vultures more and more.
What else is the UN up to, you ask? Oh the usual that you would expect from an organization with a dozen or so well-funded agencies supposedly devoted to emergency humanitarian relief . . . no, no, not feed people or provide them medical care, what do you think the UN is, the US military or something? What is wrong with you readers? Has The Diplomad taught you nothing? The correct response is put out a press release in New York claiming to be doing all sorts of things that others, e.g., US and Australia, are doing -- oh, and catch the dig at US helicopters.
The local UNocrats, not to be outdone by their New York Vulture brethren, tore themselves away from the buffet at the Hyatt, and put out a matrix, dated January 5, that sums up what the UN has "done" since the quake and tsunami hit on December 26. It's a pack of outright lies and distortions.
My favorite entries in the matrix come from UNICEF (see the prior pre-tsunami Diplomad posting on the glories of UNICEF.) Under "Water & Sanitation," UNICEF tells us "Response team being deployed." Yessiree, that'll put water into dehydrated kids' mouths -- a "response team" which is not even here yet. Under "Health," UNICEF engages in a grotesque lie: The matrix lists a number of items as tsunami relief which UNICEF had PREVIOUSLY donated to the Ministry of Health -- this is known as "double counting" or "cooking the books." Under "Food/Nutrition," they list "Deworming tablets for 676,000 children (to combat anemia.)" How about combating starvation first? In the "Education" column we learn that UNICEF has donated "100 sports kits; 50 psycho-social kits; 50 uniform kits; 100 furniture kits; psycho-social training and supplies for 300 teachers."
Let the mockery begin . . . Oops! No, no, wait, my friends, the best, the best is yet to come!
Under "Other," UNICEF proudly boasts it has sent the one item desperate people most want, UNICEF Director Carol Bellamy! Yes, she arrived, took a tour, and gave a press conference. Just think how many people were saved by UNICEF flying Bellamy and her entourage out here first class, putting them up in a five-star hotel, and flying them up and back to Aceh, and then back to New York. Makes you want to rush out and buy those UNICEF cards and go out collecting money for UNICEF doesn't it? Carol Bellamy, Queen of the Vultures and the Supreme High Priestess, Con Artist Without Peer has graced these shores, we truly live in an age of wonders.
UNDP comes close to UNICEF in the brazenness competition. All the columns save one are blank. Under "Other," UNDP states "$100K cash grant for coordination + assessment; 2 Recovery experts sent to arrive 12/31." In other words, they've spent $100,000 to do what they're supposed to do in the first place, coordinate and assess; oh and they've flown two folks out here (first class, of course) who'll do something or another. Have they in fact arrived? What have they done since then? These are questions to which you will never get a straight answer. WFP, OCHA, and WHO can barely come up with anything to brag about: in fact, WHO (World Health Organization) has NO entries at all in the matrix' columns. UNHCR claims to have provided 20 thousand jerry cans for water, there's one problem with that claim: USAID provided the cans which are filled up on the USS Abraham Lincoln with pure water and flown to affected areas by USN Seahawk choppers -- the very ones that get criticized so very much.
Our folks in Aceh report that UN "coordination" means that the UN holds a meeting every day at 5 pm near the runway in Aceh. Every donor nation and NGO stands up and states what it's doing; the UN rep writes it down. Some times, however, it's hard to hear. The distinctive "whoop! whoop! whoop!" of those nasty American choppers and the roar of Australian and American C-130 engines on the tarmac can prove very bothersome to the UN rep as he tries to hear what everyone else is doing. Poor man! If only those stingy Aussies and Yanks would have the decency to shut down relief operations while the UN rep is trying to hold a meeting, after all, he's here to help, help himself, that is, to taking credit for what the others are doing.
One last thought. Who ever said Mother Nature didn't have a black sense of humor? Let me tell you a true story about an Acehenese cow. She survived the earthquake and the tsunami. On January 5, as she was crossing the runway a B-737 bringing relief supplies hit and killed her. The 737? Crumpled undercarriage and damaged wing. Nobody human hurt. Runway operations shut down until (please play Flight of the Valkyries) a superb combined USAF/USN team came choppering in with the most amazing gadgets and moved the thing off the runway, restoring full operations in just a few hours. To paraphrase the Joker, "Where do they get such wonderful toys!"
Back to the airport . . .
