Disasters: There Must Be a Better Way

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Help at this level can be generous, and aid-giving countries have notably eased some disasters. Andrew Natsios, director of foreign disaster assistance for the U.S. Agency for International Development, says as many as 350,000 Bangladeshis were saved this time, thanks to a U.S.-built cyclone-warning system. Natsios also points to U.S.-supplied volcano and earthquake monitors and a Chilean tidal-wave-alert network. With satellite analysis of African vegetation, he adds, Washington pre-positioned 30,000 tons of supplies before the famine last year in the Sudan.

But the U.S. budgeted just $10 million for disaster detection and preparation this year, while private charities are being whipsawed by conflicting demands. Says Marcus Thompson, Oxfam's emergencies director: "We are going flat out everywhere." What about a multinational force independent of the U.N.? The belated but effective intervention in Bangladesh by 12,000 U.S. soldiers suggests that a military-style operation might be the answer. In the Washington Post, columnist Jim Hoagland called on the U.S. to use its armed forces for other emergencies in the future. Yet developing countries often balk at U.S. intervention. On the other hand, a reserve multinational rapid-deployment force headed by Japan and with standby units in other nations might be more acceptable.

Some Japanese officials are leaning toward using their military in disaster relief. Says Foreign Minister Taro Nakayama: "The Ground Self-Defense Force has many transport helicopters available, as well as technical units trained in disaster recovery operations. We should debate this." Yoshiaki Nemoto, a Japanese Red Cross official, agrees that the military, if forbidden to wage war abroad, could be used to better purpose. "The gulf war provided a rare chance for the Japanese to face the issue and make a step forward," says Nemoto. At present Tokyo tends to resist the idea as unrealistic. When the . world is not overwhelmed by calamities, it seems, it is drowning in unrealistic ideas.