We Have Met the Enemy, And It Is Us

USS Bataan (right) rode out Katrina in the Gulf, then followed it into shore.

She had to ride out Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday -- waiting for FEMA to call it into action -- an 855-foot long island with state of the art hospital facilites.

Waiting just off shore -- this warship was stopped dead in its tracks by red tape.

The Bataan waited. Its doctors waited. It's hospital beds waited. It's food and water, its desalination plants able to churn out 100,000 gallons of drinking water a day waited.

FEMA never allowed it to help fully.

Bataan's helicopters could pick people off rooftops -- but it's other resources were put on hold.

Fighting Mad

The military is beginning to speak up about bureaucratic red tape that kept them grounded when they were ready to go into the Katrina aftermath:

"We weren't able to go for 34 hours! We could have been airborne in six hours and overhead plucking out people... but between all the agencies that have a part in the approval process it took 34 hours to get three of my helicopters airborne." -- Col Tim Tarchick, Air Force Reserve Command to CBS News

The military may have been able to respond within hours. But they're not allowed to touch a single piece of equipment or deliver a single bottle of water until FEMA gave them the OK.

"We are in support of FEMA; we are not running our own operation." -- MAJ GEN Dan Colglazier, Deputy Commander, 1st US Army, quoted by Newhouse News Service

Back aboard USS Bataan, the ship's website reports that FEMA did not call in medical personnel until Saturday, September 3 -- six days after the hurricane hit.

The website also reports that FEMA did not call in their 26-member "fly-away" medical team until Sunday, September 4.

On shore, hospitals were overwhelmed. Bataan's commander said his ship was ready to help, but he couldn't "force himself on anyone." That's the law.

He told the Chicago Tribune he was ready to welcome patients aboard. But he needed FEMA to order it. FEMA never did.

Bataan

USS Bataan is named after one of history's great "last stands" -- American forces in the Phillipines held out for months against the Japanese until they ran out of food, water, and ammunition. The Japanese led the survivors on the "Bataan Death March" through jungles to POW camps. The battle and its aftermath have long been some of America's greatest examples of resolve and survival.

It is a shame that red tape kept a ship named for American suffering from ending American suffering in New Orleans for so long. (Chicago Tribune/CBS/Newhouse News Service)