	Background

About 9 months prior to Katrina’s landfall, the NRP was issued to frame  the federal response to domestic emergencies ranging from smaller,  regional disasters to incidents of national significance. For Katrina, the response heavily relied on the National  Guard, which is consistent with DOD’s Strategy for Homeland Defense and  Civil Support. The Military Response Was Massive but Faced Several Challenges, Which Provide Lessons for the Future

During its massive response to Hurricane Katrina the military faced many  challenges, which provide lessons for improving the future military  response to catastrophic natural disasters. The Military Response Was Massive

In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, the military mounted a massive response  that saved many lives and greatly assisted recovery efforts. Growing concerns about the magnitude of the disaster  prompted DOD to deploy large active duty ground units beginning on  September 3, 2005, 5 days after Katrina’s landfall. Communications problems, like damage assessment problems, were also  highlighted following Hurricane Andrew. Better Plans and Exercises Needed to Define and Guide Future Military Responses during Catastrophic Natural Disasters

Operational challenges are inevitable in any large-scale military  deployment, but the challenges that the military faced during its response  to Hurricane Katrina demonstrate the need for better planning and  exercising of catastrophic incidents in order to clearly identify military  capabilities that will be needed and the responsibilities that the military  will be expected to assume during these incidents. Prior to Katrina, plans  and exercises were generally inadequate for a catastrophic natural  disaster. Moreover, the plan did not establish time frames for  the response. The Mississippi and Louisiana National Guard plans appeared to be  adequate for smaller disasters, such as prior hurricanes, but they were  insufficient for a catastrophe and did not adequately account for the  outside assistance that could be needed during a catastrophe. As a result, when  Hurricane Katrina struck, a lack of understanding existed within the  military and among federal, state, and local responders as to the types of  assistance and capabilities that the military might provide, the timing of  this assistance, and the respective contributions of the National Guard and  federal military forces. Based on our evaluation of the aforementioned plans and exercises, we  made several recommendations to the Secretary of Defense. Second, we  recommended that DOD develop detailed plans and exercises to fully  account for the unique capabilities and support that the military is likely to  provide during a catastrophic incident, specifically addressing damage  assessments, communication, search and rescue, and logistics as well as  the integration of forces. Finally, we recommended that DOD identify the  scalable federal military capabilities it will provide in response to the full  range of domestic disasters and catastrophes. DOD Is Taking Steps to Address Lessons Learned

DOD has collected lessons learned following Hurricane Katrina from a  variety of sources. Specifically, in responding to  our recently issued report, DOD generally concurred with our  recommendations for action and told us that it had developed plans to  address them. The issues cut across agency boundaries,  and thus they cannot be addressed by the military alone. Because of the complexity and long-standing nature of these problems,  DOD’s planned and ongoing actions must receive sustained top- management attention, not only at DOD but across the government, in  order to effect needed improvements in the military’s support to civil  authorities. Appendix I: GAO’s Recommendations to the Secretary of Defense to Improve Military Support and DOD’s Response

Department of Defense (DOD) Response (dated May 5, 2006)
Provide the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security with  proposed revisions to the National Response Plan (NRP) that will  fully address the proactive functions the military will be expected to  perform during a catastrophic incident, for inclusion in the next NRP  update. The plans and exercises should specifically address  the use of reconnaissance capabilities to assess damage, use of  communications capabilities to facilitate support to civil authorities,  integration of active component and National Guard and Reserve  forces, use of search and rescue capabilities and the military’s role  in search and rescue, and role the military might be expected to  play in logistics. Direct the Chief of the National Guard Bureau to work with the state  governors and adjutants general to develop and maintain a list of  the types of capabilities the National Guard will likely provide in  response to domestic natural disasters under state-to-state mutual  assistance agreements along with the associated units that could  provide these capabilities, and make this information available to  the U.S. Northern Command, U.S. Joint Forces Command, and  other organizations with federal military support to civil authority  planning responsibilities.
Why GAO Did This Study

Hurricane Katrina was one of the largest natural disasters in U.S. history. Despite a large deployment of resources at all levels, many have regarded the federal response as inadequate. GAO has a body of ongoing work that covers the federal government's preparedness and response to hurricanes Katrina and Rita. This statement summarizes key points from GAO's report on the military's response to Katrina (GAO-06-643), which was issued earlier this month. It addresses (1) the support that the military provided in responding to Hurricane Katrina along with some of the challenges faced and key lessons learned; (2) actions needed to address these lessons, including GAO's recommendations to the Secretary of Defense; and (3) the extent to which the military is taking actions to identify and address the lessons learned. In its report, GAO made several recommendations to improve the military response to catastrophic disasters. The recommendations called for updating the National Response Plan to reflect proactive functions the military could perform in a catastrophic incident; improving military plans and exercises; improving National Guard, Reserve, and active force integration; and resolving response problems associated with damage assessment, communication, search and rescue, and logistics issues. The Department of Defense (DOD) partially concurred with all of the recommendations.

What GAO Found

The military mounted a massive response to Hurricane Katrina that saved many lives, but it also faced several challenges that provide lessons for the future. Based on its June 2005 civil support strategy, DOD's initial response relied heavily on the National Guard, but active forces were also alerted prior to landfall. Aviation, medical, engineering, and other key capabilities were initially deployed, but growing concerns about the disaster prompted DOD to deploy active ground units to supplement the Guard beginning about 5 days after landfall. Over 50,000 National Guard and 20,000 active personnel participated in the response. However, several factors affected the military's ability to gain situational awareness and organize and execute its response, including a lack of timely damage assessments, communications problems, uncoordinated search and rescue efforts, unexpected logistics responsibilities, and force integration issues. A key lesson learned is that additional actions are needed to ensure that the military's significant capabilities are clearly understood, well planned, and fully integrated. As GAO outlined in its recommendations to the Secretary of Defense, many challenges that the military faced during Katrina point to the need for better plans and more robust exercises. Prior to Katrina, disaster plans and exercises did not incorporate lessons learned from past catastrophes to fully identify the military capabilities needed to respond to a catastrophe. For example, the National Response Plan made little distinction between the military response to smaller regional disasters and catastrophic natural disasters. In addition, DOD's emergency response plan for providing military assistance to civil authorities during disasters lacked adequate detail. It did not account for the full range of assistance that DOD might provide, address the respective contributions of the National Guard and federal responders, or establish response time frames. National Guard state plans were also inadequate and did not account for the level of outside assistance that would be needed during a catastrophe, and they were not synchronized with federal plans. Moreover, none of the exercises that were conducted prior to Katrina had called for a major deployment of DOD capabilities to respond to a catastrophic hurricane. Without actions to help address planning and exercise inadequacies, a lack of understanding will continue to exist within the military and among federal, state, and local responders as to the types of assistance and capabilities that DOD might provide in response to a catastrophe; the timing of this assistance; and the respective contributions of the active, Reserve, and National Guard forces. DOD is examining the lessons learned from a variety of sources and is beginning to take actions to address them and prepare for the next catastrophe. It is too early to evaluate DOD's actions, but many appear to hold promise. However, some issues identified after Katrina, such as damage assessments, are long-standing, complex problems that cut across agency boundaries. Thus, substantial improvement will require sustained attention from the highest management levels in DOD and across the government.