Disbelief and sympathy in Asia as hurricane humbles its benefactor

by Roberto Coloma, SINGAPORE, (AFP) The sight of poor, starving and homeless Americans marooned in a flooded US city has stunned Asians, generating a mix of sympathy and scorn for a country better known as a rich benefactor than a charity case.

Many are puzzled at how the same US military machine that threw a lifeline to Asia when it was hit by a killer tsunami in December 2004 took so long to reach New Orleans and other coastal areas ravaged by Hurricane Katrina.

"We still remember when the US government dispatched dozens of aeroplanes and thousands of soldiers to help tsunami victims in Thailand and other Asian countries," Bangkok's English-language newspaper The Nation said in an editorial on September 1.

It called on all countries that have benefited from US generosity in the past to show solidarity and "reciprocate the goodwill" of the American people regardless of what they think of the US government and its foreign policy.

In the tsunami-hit island of Phuket, Thai rescue worker Suriyan Wongkanphu, 24, was confident the affected US areas would rebound from the tragedy.

"I think US rescue workers are very professional, they have good equipment and well-trained workers to handle the situation," he said. "I think the US can work through this problem because they have everything - money, technology and the people to solve it."

Singapore, a faithful US ally, was one of the first countries to provide direct assistance to hurricane victims. It has dispatched four Chinook CH-47 helicopters stationed for training in Texas to New Orleans to evacuate stranded residents and ferry relief goods.

By Monday, hundreds of homeless Americans and security personnel along with over 10,000 tonnes of equipment and supplies had been transported by the Singapore air force helicopters, officials said here.

In Australia, which like Singapore is part of the US military campaign in Iraq, former diplomat Richard Broinowski, now an associate professor in media and communications at Sydney University, said Hurricane Katrina exposed a contradiction in American society.

He said that "on the one hand we've got a country that boasts of its power and its success and its working democracy and its prosperity but on the other hand, and often hidden from view, for many people it's a country with an enormous maldistribution of income."

In Indonesia, still coping with the aftermath of last year's tsunami that left some 131,000 dead in the country, officials offered to send 40 doctors to help US survivors, state media said.

In the Philippines, a former US colony and the native land of an estimated three million immigrants in the United States, President Gloria Arroyo offered 25,000 dollars in aid plus a small contingent of relief workers.

True to their talent for finding comedy in tragedy, Filipinos suggested in a flurry of SMS phone messages that the crisis-plagued country's entire population of 84 million was volunteering to go - permanently.

The Manila Times said in an editorial that "in the face of disaster, a government must exercise strong leadership and take command. President Bush struck out on both counts."

In South Asia, tsunami victim Sri Lanka offered 25,000 dollars and asked local doctors to help the United States. War-torn and impoverished Afghanistan offered 100,000 dollars in disaster relief while Bangladesh, another of the world's poorest countries, said it would donate one million dollars' worth of humanitarian aid.

Pakistan offered to send doctors and paramedics as leading newspaper Dawn commented in an editorial that the disaster scenes from New Orleans showed "a near collapse of American society in the ravaged areas."

Columnist Syed Mansoor Hussain, in a commentary published in the Daily Times, seized on the occasion to warn of the need to heed the global environment - an issue that Bush has been accused of neglecting.

Hussain wrote that "the most important lesson that we must learn in the aftermath of the Tsunami of 2004 and Katrina of 2005 is that unless we take care of the world we live in, it just might decide to shrug us off some day." Neighbouring India, also hit by the tsunami and floods in Mumbai last July which left more than 1,000 dead, said it would provide five million dollars and medicines, as well as water purification systems.

Among the richer Asian nations, South Korea, protected by US troops from the communist North, offered 30 million dollars in cash.

Earthquake-prone Japan, which also hosts American troops, proposed sending an emergency rescue team to help its closest ally and said it was giving 500,000 dollars plus emergency supplies like tents, blankets and power generators.

China, which suffers from devastating annual floods, offered five million dollars and rescue workers to help victims of the disaster, which forced the postponement of a summit between Bush and Chinese President Hu Jintao.