By William Tucker

It has now been several weeks since a catastrophic earthquake destroyed much of Port-au-Prince Haiti and while the international response was rapid, at least it appeared that way to an outside observer, the relief efforts were really hindered by lack of coordination. As is often the case, the U.S. Military took the lead on the logistics end which eventually required taking control of the airport and repairing the main port of the Haitian capital to ensure that supplies moved into the disaster area as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, the U.S. was roundly criticized for this action. This post will not deal with the international wrangling that followed this criticism, we'll leave that to the pundits, rather we will instead focus on the need for the incident command system to be implemented in international crisis responses to better serve the affected region and limit the jurisdictional tug of war.

In the U.S., arguments over jurisdiction are common in response to a crisis, and responding internationally further complicates the issue. The government of Haiti has a difficult time enforcing the writ of the state in the best of times and nearly ceased functioning in the immediate aftermath of the earthquake. This, of course, brings to light several issues that must be addressed for future international disaster response. Who serves as an incident commander when the government of the afflicted nation ceases to function? What about security concerns? Can the United Nations assume a governing role and coordinate a disaster response?

Throughout the week we'll address these questions and hopefully lead into a thought provoking discussion.