Armed "Services"

This is an interesting take that I had never really considered. Our military, whatever it's other intended uses, is the most organized and quickly-deployable humanitarian force in the world. Without it, chaotic regions (like Haiti) would be too disorganized and dangerous for civilian aid organizations to operate effectively.

Clearly, people who favor reduced spending on our military want impoverished Haitians to die.

Just kidding.

*****
Proud of My Country: Observations on the Cataclysm in Haiti
by Mona Charen
As I write, the aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson and half a dozen other U.S. Navy ships are steaming toward Haiti. They will join some 900 soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division in providing emergency aid. Twenty-two hundred Marines will also be on hand.

We don’t maintain the world’s largest military to provide humanitarian relief. But those who disdain our military power may want to say a private prayer of thanksgiving that we make the sacrifices to maintain it — if only because in cases such as this, there is no substitute for a military response. After the 2004 tsunami, when ports and roads were destroyed, the U.S. deployed 15,000 troops, a carrier task force, and a Marine expeditionary force. This flotilla supervised the delivery of tents, water, food, medicine, and other supplies to Indonesia and Thailand before any other aid could arrive. The chief of naval operations at the time, Adm. Mike Mullen, noted with justifiable pride: “We literally built a city at sea for no other purpose than to serve the needs of other people.”

The following year, the U.S. military deployed similar aid to Pakistan after an earthquake, to Bangladesh following a cyclone, and to the Gulf coast after Katrina....