The contrast is still astonishing. 62 dead in the September 1989 earthquake in the San Francisco Bay area; 45,000 to 200,000 dead in the Haitian earthquake of the same magnitude.
A Frenchman who heads an organization called Architectes de l’urgence (Emergency Architects) offered part of the explanation before he left for Port-au-Prince to help.
Patrick Coulombel, who had already worked in Haiti, told an interviewer in Le Monde that the concrete buildings that predominate there are more susceptible to earthquakes than structures of steel. “They build in concrete because it is much cheaper than steel,” he explained. “The problem is, that contrary to what you might expect, building in concrete is highly technical. Badly-built concrete buildings can have dramatic consequences.”
He went on: “But most highly skilled people have left Haiti. There are few of the architects and engineers still there that you needed to build well.”
I thought back to one of my visits to Haiti, when I sat on the plane next to a Haitian electrician named Richard who was going home from New York to bury his mother. (When I expressed sympathy that she had died relatively young, aged 63, he said his family was actually relieved she had lived so long, given the life expectancy there.)
As we circled the now famous Port-au-Prince airport, he pointed proudly to the landing lights. “I helped install those,” he said.
Richard was part of what is sometimes called the “brain drain” from the third world. He was working for the New York transit authority, and – typically of Haitians in the diaspora – also earning an advanced degree. He did not leave Haiti to earn more money. He left – like tens of millions from elsewhere in the third world – because there was no longer any work at all for him at home.
The generosity of Americans and others has been inspiring. In the end, though Haitians like Robert who live overseas will contribute even more to help rebuild their homeland. In 2008, the diaspora sent $1.2 billion to Haiti. One expert predicts that figure will double in 2010.
Correction: The October 1989 earthquake in the Bay area.
Jared Diamond’s analysis is interesting. He contrasts Haiti and the Dominican Republic and believes that the Republic was fortunate in its evil dictator, who promoted economic development as a way to profit from it himself. Whereas the Haitian evil dictators suppressed development.
Read about the problems of Medecins Sans Frontieres blocked relief landings here:
link to msf.org
and here:
link to msf.org
I particularly liked the detail about having to go out to a destroyed market to buy a hacksaw to amputate gangrenous limbs of 12 dying patients.
But, of course, the streets of Port-au-Prince are rife with gangs of armed looters, aren’t they? Nigger places always are when there are disasters.
Well, not exactly. Read: link to current.com
written by an eye witness.
And who’s doing the blockading, and will handle ‘security’?
Why, the good ole generous US of A, who have already managed to land 12000 extra troops in Haiti in double-quick time, and taken over the responsibility for the main airport plus 3 others in Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
By contrast, Cuba already had 344 doctors working in Haiti, and are sending their special disaster brigade, first established to offer help to the United States when Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans and the Gulf Coast in 2005, an offer rejected by ex-President George W. Bush.
link to current.com
If I was American, I would be squirming in shame.
Well, yes, but at least the USA states have minimum building safety standards, going forward. I’m not a complete Libertarian.
But meanwhile, the gallant Israelis managed to get an IDF medical team in, very early on:
link to mfa.gov.il
Quote: Israeli Ambassador Amos Radian and Maj. Gen Yair Golan, head of the IDF Home Front Command, met with the Prime Minister of Haiti and toured the demolished UN headquarters and other disaster areas in order to asses the continuation of Israeli aid.
As of 20 January:
• 383 people have been treated in the hospital, among them dozens of children
• 140 life-saving operations have been performed
• 60 patients are currently hospitalized
• 7 babies have been born in the hospital
In other words they are nearly rescuing as many people as children they massacred in Gaza a year ago.
I’m sure the Prime Minister of Haiti was grateful to be relieved of his greater responsibilities to escort a couple of visiting wallies around.
Can we get some saving figures on the other national aid groups, or only Israel’s? How’s Iceland doing? Finland? Ireland? Funny, I can’t seem to find that info.
Well, I did find this from 9 days ago:
link to icenews.is
And this from 7 days ago:
link to msnbc.msn.com
And, in addition to Icelandic and Fin aid, this about Irish aid:
link to irishtimes.com
It gets better…
The humanitarian aid is becoming militarized:
link to youtube.com
That message had to be sent in 3 parts, due to Mondoweiss’ policy on links, but here’s another couple of little gems on Haiti aid:
USAID Haiti Earthquake Fact Sheet #5
link to yubanet.com
Jan. 18, 2010 – As of 1700 hours local time on January 17, U.S. Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) teams had rescued 30 individuals from collapsed buildings, including one individual rescued at approximately 1615 hours local time and three individuals rescued overnight from the Caribbean Market. To date, international USAR teams have rescued a total of 62 individuals throughout Port-au-Prince.
– On January 17, USAID/OFDA, in coordination with the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), facilitated the delivery to Port-au-Prince of 9,600 10-liter water containers to serve 19,200 people, 3,840 hygiene kits to benefit 19,200 people for two weeks, and 200 rolls of plastic sheeting to meet the shelter needs of 10,000 people.
Here’s reminding you that 200,000 are reported dead, with unknown numbers homeless, and the US sends 200 rolls of plastic sheeting?
and
US to increase troops in Haiti by a third as rescue teams pull back
The US is to send another 4,000 troops to Haiti to assist the earthquake relief effort in its third troop surge to the devastated country.
The move, which will increase the number of US troops involved in the huge aid effort to 16,000, will mean diverting Marines who were to be deployed in the Gulf and Africa….
As the disaster entered its eighth day, international rescue teams began to pull back, with hopes fading of finding many more survivors in the rubble.
link to timesonline.co.uk
Of course, Timesonline is part of the Murdoch empire, as is Fox News, whose trade-marked slogan is “Fair and Balanced’, so they don’t identify which ‘international rescue teams’ are pulling back.
I’m sure you can guess who they are.
Citizen: Of course you can’t find those figures. None of those countries has access to Fox News or MSNBC
Major contributors to Haiti relief have been:
Norwegian, Finnish, Spanish, Danish and Japanese Red Cross, Iceland, Finland and Gaza (Gaza? Yes). Those are the ones I know.
Not a single one of those is a major power, except Japan (I have no idea about the national contributions of Russia, China, India, Brazil, and Iran).
But us little Brits have contributed something, but no troops:
The government has donated more than £6m to the rescue efforts and the Queen has offered an undisclosed amount to the DEC appeal.
Mr Brown also sent a message of sympathy and support to Haitians on behalf of the British public and said the country had become the “centre of our world’s attention, the world’s compassion”.
International Development Secretary Douglas Alexander said the government’s donation would “kick-start” the humanitarian relief effort.
“It is already clear that we are facing a major humanitarian crisis. Haiti needs help and it needs it now,” he said.
He said homeless Haitians needed food, water, sanitation, shelter and medicine.
The UK rescue team’s leader, Lincolnshire fire chief Mike Thomas, said the rescuers’ first priority was to start to identify where people were still trapped.
“We’re hoping to get our dogs out there quite quickly as they will be invaluable in helping to target those areas,” he said.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/8458547.stm
Which is all very British, and very nice, but no details and no results have been published.
We are not contributing any troops to the US troop surges in Haiti
I don’t understand why the US military is more concerned about security and supplying troops than it is about getting food, water and medical attention to the Haitians. Is it assumed that because the Haitians are black they will riot and loot at the first opportunity (as inner city residents did in Rodney King riot in Los Angeles)?
If looting, rioting and other violence are not occurring (and it would seem from witness reports that they are not) then the US media would like to help you to assume the worst, as they did during Katrina.
Niggers always riot in times of high emotion. Everybody knows that.
That gives good cover for a military takeover of the country
I wonder why anyone in his right mind would want to take over Haiti. One would think we have more than enough problems to deal with already.
To keep Evil Powers from taking it over.
A DELIGHTFUL BIT OF HISTORY: …About 90 years ago when Professor Woodrow Wilson was president of the USA, his secretary of state was a fundamentalist lawyer named William Jennings Bryan who had three times run unsuccessfully for president. The Americans had decided to invade Haiti to collect debts owed by Haiti to Citibank…Secretary Bryan was dumbfounded by the Haitians. “Imagine,” he said, “Niggers speaking French!”… – from “No, Mister, You Can’t Share My Pain”, By JOHN MAXWELL, 01/19/10 link to counterpunch.org
It is interesting how you provided this information in the post Mr. North, I am thinking that you assume what causes “brain drain” in Haiti is known to most people, rather than the mere recitation of this happening for just any old reason that can be made up. With oppression and sanction amply applied from the beginning, to all of the other atrocities committed on the people to the present day, this drain is nothing but a natural outcome of these continuous acts. However, I think you already know this, and assume that the other readers also know this.
AMY GOODMAN DEMOCRACY NOW – THE NATURAL DISASTER OF THE EARTHQUAKE WAS PRECEEDED BY MAN MADE DISASTER
There is only one way for Haitians to Lève-toi dans la lumière, and that is by the complete destruction and dismantling of western Imperialism.
A strange thing happened yesterday to Paul Woodward’s blog, War in Context link to
An Associated Press article I linked to yesterday describing the exodus of Haitians fleeing from the ruins of Port-au-Prince, strangely was subsequently replaced by a report describing the rescue of a 22-year-old man by an Israeli search team 10 days after the earthquake leveled much of the capital.
Today, the blog is highlighting an article by Paul himself:
‘The painful truth: Haiti’s disaster is good for the Jews’
If I came up with a headline claiming the devastation in Haiti is “good for the Jews”, I could reasonably be accused of being anti-Semitic. But it’s not my headline. It comes from this report on a site run by Israel’s popular Hebrew daily, Maariv.
(link to nrg.co.il
for those who can read Hebrew)
The message that Israel is saving Haiti was likewise captured in an editorial cartoon in Yediot Aharonot which shows American soldiers digging for earthquake survivors. A voice from beneath the rubble calls out, “Would you mind checking to see if the Israelis are available?”
In fact Paul’s link leads to a NYTimes article at: link to nytimes.com
But, looking at Yediot Aharonot’s website to find the cartoon, I found this:
Haiti mission winds down
The IDF’s rescue and medical care team in Haiti is expected to complete its work in the disaster zone within days.
IDF Home Front Command Chief, Major General Yair Golan, said Saturday that the army is preparing to end the mission, after more hospitals have been opened up in Haiti following the establishment of Israel’s field hospital in the quake-ravaged country.
“Done the PR bit, boys. The story will be off the radar now, so we can go home. Forget Haiti. They can look after themselves now”
The cynics amongst us who said the Israelis would milk the situation for just 3 weeks were wrong; they’re leaving after only two weeks.
Every disaster needs a hero, the report says, and the heroes in Haiti are the Israelis.
The message that Israel is saving Haiti was likewise captured in an editorial cartoon in Yediot Aharonot which shows American soldiers digging for earthquake survivors. A voice from beneath the rubble calls out, “Would you mind checking to see if the Israelis are available?”
Every disaster needs a hero, the report says, and the heroes in Haiti are the Israelis.
The message that Israel is saving Haiti was likewise captured in an editorial cartoon in Yediot Aharonot which shows American soldiers digging for earthquake survivors. A voice from beneath the rubble calls out, “Would you mind checking to see if the Israelis are available?”
Apologies for the repeat of half the message, which should have ended with YNet’s web link: link to ynetnews.com
after
The cynics amongst us who said the Israelis would milk the situation for just 3 weeks were wrong; they’re leaving after only two weeks.