No Helicopters

It seems the World Food Program's Humanitarian Air Service needs to cut relief activities in Sudan thanks to countries being unwilling to pony up the $77 million that's needed.

I expect, naturally, that every conservative and liberal hawk writer who's penned dozens of articles bemoaning the fact that the UN has stopped unilateral militarism from rescuing Darfur will also speak out against this. After all, it's not like this is a group of people who just likes macho posturing and is only interested in helping other people when the method of helping them is killing someone. Not like that at all. Doubtless all the folks who editorialized in favor of an invasion of Burma just haven't spoken out about this helicopter problem yet because they're too busy. Or maybe they have a principled objection to cost-effective, logistically feasible methods of humanitarianism.

Comments

Inside the brain of a liberal hawk:

"I got beat up in school a lot and I've put on 150 pounds since then. I need a way to look tough so that a women might actually touch me. However, if I advocate something and it happens and it goes bad, I look stupid and could be blamed. What should I do? I know, let's invade the eastern DRC! Anyone who doesn't want to is the next coming of Neville Chamberlain."

Posted by Reality Man | June 10, 2008 12:52 PM

The UN would just paint the helicopters black and use them to covertly flouridate our water.

Posted by Njorl | June 10, 2008 1:00 PM

"I got beat up in school a lot and I've put on 150 pounds since then."

Full stop.

Posted by Jeffrey Davis | June 10, 2008 1:15 PM

What! All that money could be used to fight global warming.

Posted by jvoe | June 10, 2008 1:43 PM

It's odd to me that other countries aren't stepping up here, since it seems like a really great chance to demonstrate an alternative to American leadership.

Imagine if France and Brazil donated this money and made a big deal of it. They'd get great press, and 77 million just isn't that much money for either or these countries.

Posted by TW Andrews | June 10, 2008 1:53 PM

fwiw, France pitched in about $700,000. Ireland the same. Obviously, this is a paltry sum. But my sense for why these two countries in particular ponied up at all is that they are the two largest force contributors to the EU-FOR, across the border in Chad.

Posted by un dispatch | June 10, 2008 2:14 PM

"It seems the World Food Program's Humanitarian Air Service needs to cut relief activities in Sudan thanks to countries being unwilling to pony up the $77 million that's needed."

Screw that, we need the money to rebuild America. Our firemen need it. We need it to rebuild New Orleans before we spend it on Sudan and Iraq.

Posted by Peter K. | June 10, 2008 2:59 PM

Pound for pound, helicopters are the most expensive way of transporting anything short of space travel. They only make sense if timelyness is vital (i.e. medivacs) or if *natural* distasters have *temporarily* disrupted the normal supply chain. (i.e. Indonesian Tsunami).

If it is "too dangerous to travel by road." it is potentially too dangerous to travel by helicopter. Man portable SAM's are cheper than they've ever been. And helo's have a habit of dropping out of the sky even under the best of conditions.

Posted by Kolohe | June 10, 2008 4:39 PM

For Burma, not helicopters, Air cushion landing craft. 70 tons of cargo per trip, no need for docks or roads, not susceptible to underwater hazards or debris blocking waterways.

A Red Cross ship bringing aid to Burma sank, with virtually all the supplies, reportedly due to tree roots piercing the hull below the waterline.

Posted by Jon H | June 10, 2008 9:27 PM