[Vision2020] RE: Homeland Security Dept. Failure!

[Phil Nisbet]

Ted you write;

”My only interest is in "Truth."”

Phil wrote on 9/06/05 responding to my post subject headed "Homeland 
Security Dept. Failure!:"

”Actually the shoe seems firmly on the opposite foot.

There are 13,500 members of the Louisiana National Guard.  Of those troops,
only 3000 are serving in the Middle East.  Only 500 members of the remaining
10,500 had been called out and put in place by the Louisiana Governor's
Office prior to the Levee breaking.”

http://www.shreveporttimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/articleAID=/20050830/NEWS01/508300352/1002/NEWS

“As Hurricane Katrina surged past New Orleans, Louisiana mobilized its 
soldiers to help, as did Mississippi, Alabama and other southern states. 
Despite prominent roles in the War on Terror, the states report more than 
the 50 percent strength mandated for homeland missions. Louisiana has 65 
percent of its troops available for state missions; Mississippi, 60 percent; 
Alabama, 77 percent; and Florida, 74 percent, Guard officials said.”

“The Louisiana National Guard had called almost 3,500 of its members to 
state active duty as of 7 a.m. Monday to help with missions that ranged from 
aiding law enforcement agencies with traffic control and security to 
conducting searches and rescues and providing generator support. Guard 
members conducted security and screening at the emergency shelter at the New 
Orleans Superdome, and elsewhere helped state police with evacuations.”

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9117367/

“About 200 National Guardsmen were inside the New Orleans Superdome during 
the height of the storm providing security and distributing food and water. 
Thousands of storm refugees had taken shelter in the 77,000 seat football 
stadium, home of the NFL’s New Orleans Saints.”

In addition;

“Louisiana Guardsmen assisted state police with the evacuation of New 
Orleans and have helped establish 122 shelters across the state, according 
to the Army public affairs office.”
According the Office of the Governor of Louisiana the total deployed 
Louisiana National Guardsmen deployed at the time of the levee break was 
500.  The rest of the 3500 that were called to active duty at 7 am on the 
29th were still forming up.

“State  governors "hold me accountable to make sure they have the right kind 
of units and the right kinds of capabilities that are able to respond if the 
governors call them out to forest fires or hurricanes or critical 
infrastructure protection or enhanced security measures,” Army Lt. Gen. 
Steven Blum, chief of National Guard Bureau, told the American Forces Press 
Service last month. At least 50 percent of any one state’s total Guard 
enlistment will remain in the United States at all times, he said.  Most 
states have at least 75 percent of their Guard forces at home, Blum said.

Louisiana has 3,500 active National Guard troops, that represents about half 
of the total that Louisiana could call up if requested, Milord said.  About 
35 percent, or 3,000 Louisiana National Guard troops, “are supporting 
deployed operations” in Iraq, he said.”

I wrote the following then;

“As of 3 September, there were only 3000 members of the Louisiana National
Guard on duty and the Governor had not called up any additional units.
Further, as of yesterday, only 3800 Louisiana National Guard troops were on
active duty, just over half of their forces deployed either to the hurricane
or Iraq.”

So, Ted, please provide us with any sort of proof that Gov. Blanco issued 
orders for any other troops than the 3500 she called to active duty on 29 
August?  As the National Guard itself noted, she had thousands of more 
guardsmen she could have called to active duty after the levees broke.  Even 
as of this writing, she had not taken any further action to call up the 
remaining elements of the Louisiana National Guard.

Then I wrote’

”So, with ten thousand troops at her command, why was it again that there
were no more than 500 Guardsman stationed in New Orleans as the flooding
began?”

As you can see from the above, she called out troops that normally take 48 
hours to assemble on the morning of the 29th.  As I had previously noted, 
when she called for a Louisiana State of Emergency on the 26th, she could 
have very easily called those troops to be on alert for movement.  She did 
not act until it was far too late to position them where they were going to 
be most needed.

Then I wrote;

“And considering that all those other states are deploying people into her
area, why is it that she, the Governor of that state, does not see fit to
have the rest of her forces out there giving a hand?”

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050903/ap_on_re_us/katrina_national_guard

“In fact, when New Orleans' levees gave way to deadly flooding on Tuesday, 
Louisiana's National Guard had received help from troops in only three other 
states: Ohio, which had nine people in Louisiana then; Oklahoma, 89; and 
Texas, 625, figures provided by the National Guard show.”

So there were National Guard troops from other states in the area on the 
29th, yet Blanco did not call up her major guard units until the very day 
that the levees collapsed.  Indeed, she had fewer troops on the street than 
Texas did when the city was flooding at a rapid rate and the first Coast 
Guard helicopters began evacuating hospitals.

Next I will deal with your other assertions from the earlier post;

“And why is Phil so intent in that post on proving that the National Guard 
from Louisiana sent to Iraq, along with all the important equipment they 
took with them, could not have saved one single more life in this disaster, 
one single person who would have lived if the thousands of Louisiana 
National Guard, and all the critical equipment they took with them to 
foreign soil, had been at home in Louisiana?”

In essence Ted, nobody can claim that Gov of Louisiana Blanco could not have 
called the guard she needed up on the 26th, as was her right, and had them 
sitting right there ready to act on the 29th when the levees broke.  Had she 
called all 7,000 of the very able Military Police units, communication units 
and generator units still in her state and had them ready on the 29th, not 
calling them up on the 29th as she did, you can not assert that the looting, 
the panic and the death toll in New Orleans would not have been lower.

She could have used then on the 28th to assist in evacuation of the city and 
to insure that the disabled people who ended up stranded and drowned were 
evacuated.  The fact that she waited until the day the levees fell down 
around her ears to send for the guys to do the job that was needed the 
minute she order a complete evacuation of all of those Parishes is something 
I think you will be hard pressed to explain.

”Phil has no proof that these Louisiana National Guard resources in Iraq 
could not have saved extra lives in this disaster.  In fact, it is more 
reasonable to assume the absence of these resources led to more lives being 
lost, than to assume this absence made no difference whatsoever.”

Ted, the 256th Infantry was only one unit.  That unit has a TO&E.  They 
would indeed have been useful after the levee broke and after the Governor 
and Mayor had failed to carry out adequate evacuation or call the Military 
Police, communications units and generator units into service or any of the 
rest.  But unlike your suggestion, they do not mix and match equipment to 
“send the best” to anything in the Army.  The TO&E of the 256th had 
amphibious components that would have been principally useful after the 
fact, once the Governor and Mayor had already screwed the pooch.

”Is it not possible that the best and most capable Louisiana National Guard 
troops, along with the best equipment they likely took with them, were the 
troops missing from Louisiana when Katrina hit?  Or should we contemplate 
that we sent the worst of the worst of Louisiana's National Guard and their 
support equipment to Iraq?”

No, Ted, we sent the Infantry and did not send the Military Police Units or 
the Communication Units or the Special Forces Units or any of the rest of 
the Louisiana National Guard.  The equipment that is issued to each unit is 
not mixed and matched.  Try passing an IG sometime and get found with the 
gear of some other unit in your possession and you might figure this one 
out.  They need a bunch of grunts, so they called for the Brigade of 11Boo’s 
from Louisiana to go to Iraq.  Those not specifically assigned to the 256th, 
that is to say the guys who would have been most useful to have had deployed 
prior to any sort of levee collapse, the MPs to assist the New Orleans cops, 
the communication people to see that communication was kept open, the 
Special Forces guys and a whole bunch more, were still boots right there who 
were not deployed and not even called till the morning of the 29th.

As for the assertion that the bulk of the Louisiana National Guards Heavy 
equipment was not present, the Engineer battalion was right there and could 
have been in New Orleans.  The Infantry Brigade in Iraq was not where the 
heavy equipment was, unless you figure that APC’s are heavy equipment.  The 
Communication Gear was not in Iraq either, it was sitting in Baton Rogue.

Then you write this one Ted

“But why did Phil seem so focused in his post (on 9/03/05, subject headed 
"Of Deltas and CO2") on blaming state and local officials with false 
statements of fact, and not the federal government, for the slow federal 
response time to this huge disaster?  A federal response that would have 
required massive assistance, even if the New Orleans's flood protection 
system had not failed, even if local and state officials had pre-positioned 
more critical assets for survival, even if they had evacuated more of the 
poor and disadvantaged with limited means to escape?  Even skipping New 
Orleans, the devastation of Biloxi, Gulf Port and other coastal areas in 
Mississippi required a rapid extensive federal response that many agree was 
too slow to materialize.”

Ted, wake up and sniff the coffee.  I had absolutely no need to cover the 
subject of Federal Failures.  Hells Bells, you and Hanson and Lund and the 
rest have been going on about them ad nauseum.  What not one of you ever 
covered and tried with great diligence to avoid, was the responsibility of 
local and state governments for their very real and very serious breeches in 
the Tragedy that is New Orleans.  I covered those elements because in your 
ideological rants and need to blame Bush for the mess that happened there, 
you completely disregarded the screw up at the local levels.

And you are POed in that element of my recital because the two local 
politicos are Democrats.  If they had been members of the GOP, I have a 
feeling you would have found no fault in my assessment.

Prior to any of the posts you cited in your screed about my supposed 
falsehoods, I had said quite frankly that the Feds had responsibility for 
their failures and that had they acted to correct the initial stupid 
planning carried out by Nagin and Blanco, none of this would have been as 
nasty in terms of lose of life.  That idiocy can be laid at Brown’s doorstep 
and of course devolves back to the man who put him in that post.

Yet you state;

“Mistakes were made at all levels of the Katrina disaster, from individuals 
who lived in the flood prone areas all the way to the top, President Bush.”

And then when the faults at any other level are shed light on, you react as 
if the person exposing that truth were somehow a liar and that it must all 
be Bush and the Feds at fault.  Please listen to your own statements Ted, 
have the balls to recognize that your political bias is showing and that 
indeed every level was at fault (Though I for one do not feel that is true 
for the poor buggers who were stuck with no transport through no fault of 
their own other than poverty).

Phil Nisbet

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