The destruction of the city of New Orleans is the worst catastrophe to hit the United States since the flu epidemic of 1918-1919. The most amazing thing about the devastation in New Orleans is that the United States government has been down this road before, been hit by the same truck, and didn't learn one damn thing from it. In the latter decades of the 19th century many meteorologists warned that the city of Galveston, which was then the biggest and most important city in Texas, was a disaster waiting to happen. If a major hurricane hit, they said, the low lying island city would be completely destroyed. A seawall should be built, it was suggested , which would protect the city in this event. The powers that be, not wanting to be bothered by the expense and sacrifices in time and energy which would be required to build this seawall ignored these warnings bolstered by Isaac Cline, the head of the National Weather Service for the entire southwest U.S. which was based in Galveston, who declared in an 1892 newspaper article:

"The opinion that Galveston will at some time be seriously damaged by some such disturbance is simply an absurd delusion. The coast of Texas is ... exempt from West India hurricanes."

Cline's wife died in the hurricane but Cline himself escaped Galveston. The humiliated and embittered Cline left Galveston and became the head of the National Weather Service office in, irony of ironies, New Orleans. Cline died in 1953 at the age of 92. If Galveston was as the book title says 'Isaac's Storm' then New Orleans could be 'Isaac's revenge.'
       Many weather people have been saying for years that the levees protecting New Orleans could not withstand a direct hit from a major hurricane. To be sure it would not have been a simple matter to shore up the 350 miles of levees to enable them to resist a direct hit. It would have been an engineering project on the order of the Panama Canal which was the biggest engineering project of all time. The costs in dollars and in manpower would have been astronomical, infinitely greater than that of building a seawall to protect Galveston. ( which was done in the years following the hurricane in 1900) It is just plain silly to blame the Bush administration for this calamity although they will certainly get the lion's share of the blame because they had the misfortune to be in power at the wrong time. The truth is that the government agencies whose function is disaster relief are not designed to handle a catastrophe of this magnitude.
       The unfortunate reality is that history is dotted with examples of criminal neglect and miscalculation on the part of governments leading to major disasters of this magnitude. It seems to be the nature of the beast. I will just mention a few examples here.



       Chernobyl Nuclear disaster
On april 26, 1986 explosions destroyed the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in the then Soviet Union releasing the radiation equivalant of 100 atom bombs that destroyed Hiroshima. The official death toll is a ludicrous 31. Certainly millions in Russia and the surrounding countries have had their health affected and are to this day still being affected by this disaster.


       Eruption of Mt. Pelee
For weeks before May 8, 1902 the Mt. Pelee volcano overlooking the city of St. Pierre on the carribean island of Martinique ominously rumbled indicating a coming eruption. There was, however, an important election coming up and the incumbent leader of the island had his main power base in the city of St. Pierre. He forbid the residents to flee setting up roadblocks forcing the people to return to the city. The eruption on May 8 spawned a rare nuee ardente, ( a nuee ardente is pictured above ) a fast moving cloud of superheated toxic gasses, which came down upon St. Pierre. Only 1 person, a criminal in an underground dungeon, out of a population of 27,000 survived.


       Chinese Cultural Revolution 1966-1976
The communist chinese government , seeing the erosion of its communist ideals, declared the cultural revolution in 1966 which ruthlessly enforced communist ideology. The death toll of 20 million reported in the Western press is certainly a gross propaganda exaggeration, but the destruction of life and property, not to mention social structure was immense and widespread. In the end even the chinese gorvernment admitted the massive failure of this ill-advised movement


       Napoleon's invasion of Russia
      see also 1812: Napoleon's March to Russia
In June 1812 an estimated 600,000 man army under Napoleon arrogantly and confidently crossed the Neiman river into Russia. Six months later in December 5000 freezing haggard men ( an artist's conception of the final stages of the retreat is pictured below ) recrossed the Neiman into Napoleonic Europe. The rest were either dead or in Russian prison camps. One hundred years earlier, in 1709, Charles XII of Sweden saw his unbroken string of military victories destroyed by the Russians at Poltava. And just to prove that history repeats itself again and again Adolph Hitler's undefeated armies met disaster in Russia in the 1940s.


       Irish Potato Famine 1846
The British government did not cause the disease that destroyed the potato crop which was the major food source in Ireland but the laissez-fare policies certainly made the disaster much worse than need be. There were sporadic attempts to relieve the suffering but the availing attitude seemed to be to let nature take its course which resulted in one million starvation deaths, the emigration of two million and the reduction of the Irish population by some 33 per cent.


       Famine in Russia 1921-1922
With the Bolsheviks firmly in power following their victory in the Russian Civil War the paranoid Soviet government installed reliable political followers in all key government positions. Those responsible for agriculture were chosen for their political reliability and did not know jack shit about their supposed field of expertise. This and bad weather along with an anti-communist boycott of the new government by Europe and America led to massive crop failures which resulted in five million starvation deaths.


       Fire destroys Rome 64 a. d.
The Roman Emperor Nero may not have fiddled and there is dispute among the chroniclers about whether or not Nero started the fire but there is no doubt that Nero shamelessly used the fire to further his own nefarious ends. After the fire he instigated a massive building process which produced a array of buildings for his own selfish use while ignoring the needs of the ordinary Roman citizens. Even worse Nero found a convenient scapegoat in the despised new religious sect of Chritianity which he blamed for the conflageration. Thousands of Christians were subjected to horrible torments such as being fed to the lions before gladitorial games or being used as kindling for human torches to light up the night.