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Chavez offers victims food oil and water { September 2 2005 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2005/09/02/us_sends_mixed_signals_on_accepting_aid_from_abroad/http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2005/09/02/us_sends_mixed_signals_on_accepting_aid_from_abroad/
FOREIGN ASSISTANCE
US sends mixed signals on accepting aid from abroad
By Farah Stockman, Globe Staff | September 2, 2005
WASHINGTON -- The offers of foreign aid keep pouring in: helicopters from Canada, cash from Japan, tents and military aircraft from France -- even oil from Venezuela, a political foe. At least 25 countries have offered humanitarian assistance to the United States to recover from Hurricane Katrina, one of the worst natural disasters in US history.
But despite the increasingly desperate situation on the ground, the Bush administration has sent mixed signals about whether it will take these global well-wishers up on their offers.
President Bush indicated yesterday morning that the United States had not requested foreign help and didn't need it.
''I'm not expecting much from foreign nations because we haven't asked for it," Bush told ABC's ''Good Morning America." ''I do suspect a lot of sympathy, and perhaps some will send cash dollars. But this country is going to rise up and take care of it. You know, we love help, but we're going to take care of our own business, as well."
Hours later, however, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice had spoken with the White House and decided that ''we will accept all offers of foreign assistance. Anything that can be of help to alleviate the difficult situation, the tragic situation of the people of the area affected by Hurricane Katrina will be accepted."
It would not be the first time the United States -- the world's largest humanitarian donor -- has received a helping hand from abroad.
The terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, brought a flood of rescue teams, some from as far away as Turkey. After Hurricane Andrew in 1992, Japan gave cash and tents to the governments of Florida and Louisiana.
But Americans typically have been reluctant to accept aid, in part because the United States already has much of the equipment that countries intend to give and because coordinating the aid is complex and laborious, said one State Department official who asked not to be identified.
But as thousands remained in need of food and shelter yesterday, the mood in Washington appeared to shift, with McCormack telling reporters than no aid would be turned down.
Roberta Cohen, a specialist on humanitarian disasters at the Brookings Institution, a nonpartisan think tank, said yesterday that the administration should seriously consider the offers. ''If [aid] were rejected out of hand because of national pride, that would be unfortunate," she said.
A European diplomat who asked not to be identified said the State Department told embassies on Wednesday that the US government did not need help in the first phase of rescuing survivors and restoring order, but that the Federal Emergency Management Agency would sift through aid offers to see if any could be of use in the second phase of cleanup and reconstruction.
The Canadian military has set aside a number of Hercules Aircraft C130, in case the United States calls, and is in the process of packing a ship with a helicopter, water purifying equipment, and electric generators that could sail for the Gulf of Mexico at a moment's notice.
Some of the United States' poorest neighbors also offered assistance, including Honduras, Jamaica, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, and Mexico.
Perhaps the most unusual offer came from Hugo Chavez, the socialist leader of Venezuela who is openly hostile to the US government. On Wednesday, Chavez offered drinking water, food, and oil to the United States.
Later, Chavez told Venezuelan television that Bush was a ''cowboy" and the ''king of vacations" who had failed to evacuate the population of New Orleans before the hurricane hit.
© Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company
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