BBC - US tsunami effort "superfluous"

According to EU Referendum blog the BBC's Peter Marshall had this to say.

The Asian tsunami has provided a perfect example of the need for an efective UN under an activist Secretary General. This time Kofi Annan was quick off the mark and America's independent efforts soon looked superfluous.

This is not an isolated incident of BBC bias against US efforts in the tsunami relief. I posted earlier about the Telegraphs's report on the BBC's bias in this matter.

Last week we were subjected to one of the most extraordinary examples of one-sided news management of modern times, as most of our media, led by the BBC, studiously ignored what was by far the most effective and dramatic response to Asia's tsunami disaster. A mighty task force of more than 20 US Navy ships, led by a vast nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, the Abraham Lincoln, and equipped with nearly 90 helicopters, landing craft and hovercraft, were carrying out a round-the-clock relief operation, providing food, water and medical supplies to hundreds of thousands of survivors.

As for the UN, the Telegraph had this to say:

The helicopters are taking off and landing now in the tsunami-shattered villages and towns. The sick are being taken for treatment. Clean water is being delivered. Food is arriving. Soon the work of reconstruction will begin.

The countries doing this good work have politely agreed to acknowledge the "coordinating" role of the United Nations. But it is hard to see how precisely the rescue work would be affected if the UN's officials all stayed in New York - or indeed if the UN did not exist at all.

The UN describes its role in South Asia as one of "assessment" and "coordination." Even this, however, seems to many to be a role unnecessary to the plot. The Daily Telegraph last week described the frustration of in-country UN officials who found they had nothing to do as the Americans, Australians, Indonesians, and Malaysians flew missions.

It will be the treasury departments of the G-7 missions that make decisions on debt relief, and the World Bank, aid donor nations, private corporations, and of course the local governments themselves that take the lead on long-term reconstruction. And yet we are constantly told that the UN's involvement is indispensable to the success of the whole undertaking. How can that be?

The Diplomad, quoted in the Telegraph article, is a good source of information on what's really happening on the ground in the tsunami relief effort. According to him, the less the UN is involved the better.

I wonder if Peter Marshall and the BBC think this is superfluous:

The U.S. relief funds do not count the assistance provided by the U.S. military, which has 24 Navy ships, one Coast Guard vessel and about 15,000 servicemen and women involved in the relief effort. The Pentagon has estimated that it is spending about $6 million a day in those operations.

Fortunately, the BBC's viewers are leaving them.

Figures published tomorrow will show that the BBC's audience share has fallen to its lowest level for years. Industry body Barb (the Broadcasters' Audience Research Board), will report that the BBC's overall share of viewers dropped from 38.3 per cent in 2003 to 36.62 per cent in 2004, a fall of just under 4.5 per cent.

UPDATE:

EU Referendum has an update from The Weekend Australian.

It was Tony Blair, coming onto the scene, who then spoke to Bush and told him that that co-ordination should go through the UN and the G8. But, as the US and other core-group members had already found, the UN had no capacity to do anything or to make any difference in the short term.

It was not until 31 December that the UN had got itself sufficiently together for there to be a video-conference, involving Powell and the UN's Kofi Annan and various senior UN officials. After that, core group meetings routinely included UN representatives.

So much for Marshall's comment that "Kofi Annan was quick off the mark".
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