rr, folks like you just have no clue what you are talking about. Not because you are stupid, but because you just have no idea of the logistics that are required to mount an effort like this.
First, there's no way that any competent leader is going to pre-position his/her assets at the point of devastation in order to get aid in quicker. If your trucks, busses, and other equipment are destroyed they won't do anyone much good. So you have to get them out of the impact area to protect them, which means time lost in getting them to the affected area.
Second, you only have so much "stuff" to work with, especially things like trucks and trailers, so there's no point in loading them up until you know what you need. There would be no point in loading up your trucks with tents for the homeless only to find out there's no place to set the tents up due to flooding and what you really need are inflatable boats. There's no point loading up on food, which people can live without for weeks or months, only to find out what you really need is water. Yes, you can rush off with the wrong "stuff" and be timely, or you can first assess the situation and use your limited assets to bring what you need. And that takes time too.
Third, you have to acquire a lot of manpower to make all this happen. You need to get the authority, which happens quickly, but then you need to get all of the people you need to get everything going, from truck drivers, to loaders, to fuelers, to food preparers, and on and on, and that just takes time to organize.
Fourth, once you get all the equipment and people ready to roll, then you have to actually get them into position. So all of this takes a heck of a lot more time than taking a van, stopping at Wal Mart and loading it up, and driving it into town with a couple of buddies. And outfits like Wal Mart have turned product distribution/delivery into a science because that's their life blood, so of course they can get things done quicker than the support groups for a mechanized national guard battalion and it's really unfair to try to compare the two.
I also think that while there's all this blamestorming going on, there's two groups that are working hard to fly below the radar. The first is the media. They've been overdramatizing every storm that's shown up for years. They make every smaller hurricane out to be the next Andrew, and every tropical storm out to be another time to panic. It's the same as how every snowstorm back in Maryland was touted as the new potential BLIZZARD OF THE CENTURY!!! All this over-hyping of storms has caused people to become desensitized to the warnings.
And speaking of the people, I think there's also lots of blame to be cast on the fine residents of New Orleans. I've seen plenty of video of floods and storm disasters in my day, and until now I've always seen neighbors helping neighbors. They're out there by the hundreds filling sandbags, shoring up properties, helping on SAR efforts. There didn't seem to be a whole lot of that in New Orleans where it seemed like most of the people, who really were the "first boots on the ground" were running about either looting or waiting for someone to come and tell them where to go or what to do. I've never heard the later being an issue in a disaster before, yet I heard the media types yacking that line over and over again. These poor people don't know where to go or what to do, and they're sitting around waiting for someone to tell them. Gee... if it's wet where you're standing... go to where it's dry! duh! If nothing else, follow the crowds... they're all going somewhere.
The big complaint I heard from the refugees at the Superdome is that they were being "treated like animals." Well, they've been treated like animals for decades, but since they were getting their welfare and support checks they were happy. So much for Johnson's "Great Society."
Great advice -- until you're several miles down I-10, out of N.O., and realize a portion has been blown apart.
