A disproportionate response?

Melanie Phillips
The Spectator
19 January '10

The unfolding mega-disaster in Haiti has exposed in the most sickening form the utter uselessness of the UN. Of course, it must be acknowledged that the UN is itself one of the victims of this tragedy, with more than 100 of its staff said to have been killed in the earthquake and its aftermath. And yes, the wholesale destruction of Haiti’s already fragile infrastructure means that the difficulties in getting supplies to the people are exceptional.

Nevertheless, the key problem appears to be a total absence of leadership, so that no-one is taking control of the situation. Haiti’s own government is unable to do this; until yesterday, America was taking a back seat waiting upon the UN to do the business. But the UN has conspicuously failed to do so. As a result, while the countries of the developed world have been pouring in aid and supplies, this has been piling up while the people of Haiti are dying from injury, disease and lack of water. And now that the US has finally lost patience and piled in troops to deliver supplies to the people, there are predictable cries from the French -- and doubtless other knee-jerk America-bashers – that America is ‘occupying’ Haiti. Such is the derangement of the anti-America obsession.

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