The Cyclone Is Not The Only Disaster

(The Nation)  This column was written by The Editors.

---

The catastrophe unfolding in Burma may have been precipitated by an act of nature, but its root causes and current dimensions are man-made. In the wake of Cyclone Nargis, the military junta that rules the country has made a series of reprehensible decisions, bringing death, disease and destruction to a people it is entrusted to protect. As we go to press, the UN estimates that up to 102,000 Burmese have perished; some 220,000 are missing; and close to 2.5 million are in dire need of clean water, shelter, food and medical treatment. Yet, fearful of an alliance between pro-democracy forces and foreigners, the Myanmar regime initially rebuffed offers of assistance and so far has allowed in only a trickle of emergency supplies and almost no relief workers. Much of the aid that has gotten through has been confiscated by the military and distributed to its members or sold on the black market, and the government has even blocked some of its citizens from distributing rice.

Tragically, long before the storm, the people of Burma were enduring a humanitarian disaster brought about by political means. Since 1962 successive military regimes have dismantled Burma's once enviable healthcare system - today the state spends just 3 percent of its budget on healthcare while devoting 40 percent to its armed forces. The result: Burma's health sector ranks 190 out of 191 nations; it has one of the highest TB rates in the world; and a third of its children are chronically malnourished. Moreover, as part of a recent crackdown, the junta imposed rigid travel restrictions on aid workers, forcing the Global Fund to Fight AIDS and Médecins Sans Frontières to withdraw from the country. Other groups, like the International Red Cross, were ordered to close field offices.

The acute nature of the crisis and the regime's intransigence and corruption create an agonizing humanitarian dilemma. Students and an association of Burmese monks, as well as the National League for Democracy, the party of imprisoned Nobel Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, have called on foreign governments to intervene immediately - without the consent of the junta, with or without U.N. authorization. Humanitarian intervention in Burma may be justified by the Responsibility to Protect doctrine, adopted by the UN General Assembly in 2005, which obliges the international community to step in when a state can't or won't protect its people from crimes against humanity. Efforts to put the matter before the Security Council have been stymied by China, patrons of the junta, but the United States has yet to put its full diplomatic weight behind a resolution. It should do so now. The specter of UN action might cause the junta to relent; and a resolution would at least force Chinese officials, ahead of the Beijing Olympics and on the heels of the devastating Sichuan earthquake, to rebuke the Myanmar regime or vote publicly to deny lifesaving aid.

Absent U.N. authorization, the United States and other countries should initiate airdrops of rations, although it's a flawed compromise that can't provide aid workers or medical treatment. A coalition of nations including the United States, preferably led by regional states, could also act independently - but that should be considered only after every U.N. option has been exhausted. Any kind of intervention, U.N.-led or not, risks retaliation from the junta, which could endanger aid distribution. To guard against this and to distinguish this intervention from cases like Iraq that used humanitarianism as a fig leaf, any relief efforts should be strictly confined to providing aid in the delta region. The Burmese are looking to the skies and shores for help. It is politics - not nature - that imperils them now.
The Editors
Reprinted with permission from The Nation

[messiahx4eve]

PAY ATTENTION TO THIS STORY VERY CLOSE, THIS IS SETTING ON THE AMERICAN PEOPLE AS WELL, THIS IS HOW THE POWERS THAT BE WANT US TO BE AS WELL, ANYONE THINKING THAT THIS IS A REDICULOUS POST NEEDS TO OPEN THEIR EYES AND REALLY LOOK AT WHATS GOING ON AROUND YOU. Myanmar is a preview of what WILL happen to the United States if McCain OR Obama, even Hillary is elected to office, its NOT about looks, good dental hygiene, who sleeps with whom, who has a better hair cut or any of that C*R*A*P, its about where you stand with THE PEOPLE, WE, the PEOPLE, and thats the way it should be, what we WANT and DESERVE is NOT to fall because of some stupid puppet texass oil failure, WE write the rules, WE need a rule follower & enforcer.

[johnshaft4]

Compassionate Nations should be air lifting and dropping by parachute aid to these devasted people (accompanied by jet fighters). To hell with the "junta".

[delfmast]

Burma Raid
editorialstaff net: Franklin D. Lomax writes: Pax American Coalition (PAC), largely comprised of the English speaking peoples, are being harried for not doing enough in the third world, and will be cursed as empire builders, when the Burma junta is exterminated by a covert force''''s raid, allowing the elected leader of Burma to get on with bringing her peoples into the Free World''''s family of nations. Those whiners crying that PAC is not doing enough in Africa, or to free Burma, or is doing too much to free Afghanistan, Iran, or Iraq, will, after the raid, agree that extermination of the Burmese dictators was precisely what they richly deserved, for the recent mass murder of 3000 of their subjects. The Junta demands cash money aid, no strings attached, whilst holding their enslaved peoples hostage to death by thirst, hunger, disease, and a gathering cyclone. Their cold blooded decision comprises mass murder, of up to a million more victims, unless we enrich and enable the Junta. They are supported by the Sino-Russian resources alliance that is invading all the abandoned colonies, with no strings cash infusions, and buying up the world%u2019s resource wealth, for chump change. British SAS perfected the covert operators who now comprise the magnificent covert anti-terror units used by the free nations to assert adult supervision over ****-ant dictators. Our dark angels must be allowed to do their work, now, for the angels.

[joyous88]

if bush invades he invariably kills anything that moves any way

[joyous88]

Perhaps they are afraid that if they allow haliburton

in, than GW Bush, McBushSame, and cheney/Rove will

decide to bring them peace and democracy, you know

liberty! Just like the neo cons did to Iraq.

[lewiston14]

TKTK53: Thanks for the complent. You should voice you thoughts in this forum as well

Lew

[lewiston14]

Oliver I have to agree with you. In the first few days this might have helped now it is reaching the point of no return. A C130 is a large slow moving plane an easy target that would require a force of fast moving jet fighters to accompany it. The rest of the world would look at this as %u201Cgee he is going at it again%u201D Don%u2019t get me wrong he may very well just take it upon himself to do it, would not sit well with anybody else in the world. Burma has made it perfectly clear they want these people to die and made it clear they only want aid so they can refill their cupboards. Yes we have the power to take them out in a day but to what end? I would regrettably say 3 more days and all you will be dropping rice on is dead bodies. The bugs will be spreading in that water so filled with the dead shortly and what the storm did not kill the bugs will. I do not have an answer.

[onceagirl]

The UN has become a completely useless organization. Countless genocide and now this tragic Burma situation. Would it be so wrong to just send in war planes to neutralize the cruel junta? A most effective way of making them stand down.

[glock4me]

Why does this country have two names (Burma and Myanmar), like a kid with a fake ID. We''ll send "McLovin-land" rice when they decide what they should be called.

[tksk53]

WOW
THE COMMENT BEFORE MINE HAS SAID IT ALL
NO NEED TO ADD MY 2 CENTS TO IT
GOOD JOB LEWISTON 14
TKTK53