The American Rescue Corps

Robert L. Read

<read.robert@gmail.com>

September 15, 2014

The American Rescue Corps

— by Robert L. Read

America should create a new uniformed branch of service that focuses on emergency rescues.  Like the Army, Air Force, Navy, Marines, and Coast Guard, there should be a Rescue Corps of the USA.  The mission of the Rescue Corps is to maintain American leadership of the free world and promote American ideals by providing effective, life-saving assistance to the whole world on an unprecedented scale and rapidity.

On occasion, the military does this already.  By doing so, they broaden and dilute the primary purpose of the military, which is to carry out war.  The Rescue Corps would partially relieve the military of this burden by being staffed, trained, and equipped to better taken on rescue missions which require minimal security.

Let us imagine a Corps of 10,000 people—very small compared to our military forces.  Let us further imagine that the Corps contains a trained staff whom we would normally think of as:

• Doctors,
• Paramedics,
• Nurses,
• Infectious disease experts,
• Linguists,
• Fire fighters,
• Construction engineers,
• Logistics officers,
• Forensic scientists,
• Security personnel, 
• Communication officers, and
• Transport specialists.

This permanent staff could be augmented by a Reserve, of course.

Let us further imagine that such a Corps utilizes commercial transport as well as military transport capability as its primary deployment capability.  Now, imagine that backed by the prestige of the United States to obtain the right to deploy internationally, the Rescue Corps can quickly deploy to anywhere in the world.

If the Rescue Corps existed today the Ebola outbreak of 2014 would already be contained.  The suffering caused by the earthquake in Haiti would have been greatly lessened.  The hardship wrought by Hurricane Katrina might have been greatly reduced.  The prestige of America would be greatly enhanced.

Such a corps could plan for and train for response to various catastrophes well in advance.  We know that tsunamis and earthquakes will occur again.  Probably wildfires in America will continue to be a problem.  Hurricanes will strike America and our friends on the Caribbean periodically. Oil will spill.  In all probability, a nuclear accident will occur again.

I don’t believe that the Rescue Corps would spend too much time sitting idle.  Lesser emergencies that did not involve the entire Corps could be addressed and would be valuable training exercises and experience for the Corps.

Although the Corps might have a small police force to provide security, it would be very lightly armed by military standards.  The United States might be able to negotiate entry for the Rescue Corps, perhaps ahead of time, in situations where the Marine Corps would not be welcomed.  For example, Tehran is one of the largest cities on one of the most dangerous fault lines in the world.  If we could pre-negotiate the entry of the Rescue Corps into Iran in the case of a  major earthquake striking Tehran, the diplomatic benefits of a successful Rescue deployment might greatly exceed all of its costs.

Backed by the financial power of the USA, the Rescue Corps might purchase massive transport capabilities ahead of disasters via commercial transport.  This would simply be good planning.  In exchange for a retainer and fee in the event of a disaster, an airline might agree to interrupt service by reprioritizing a number of flights to transport thousands of Rescuers and their equipment to a disaster area.  Such commercial contracts could be considered the primary means of deployment for some disasters in some areas, whereas military transport might be the primary deployment mechanism in other cases.

However, domestic deployment of the Rescue Corps might be more frequent than international deployment.  Unquestionably, a reserve capacity at the national level of Rescuers can provide needed buffer capacity to local paramedics and firefighters in the event of locally overwhelming disasters.

By forcing our military to carry out non-war rescue missions, we dilute their training and weaken this primary purpose.  By creating a Rescue Corps, we mitigate this problem and offer Americans a route of service to their country which is primarily about saving lives. The Rescue Corps would be a powerful force for good in the world, and a powerful force for American diplomacy.

Robert L. Read

<read.robert@gmail.com>

twitter: @RobertLeeRead

Announcing the Presidential Innovation Fellow Foundation

Announcing the Presidential Innovation Fellow Foundation

“The Presidential Innovation Fellows (PIF) program brings the principles, values, and practices of the innovation economy into government through the most effective agents of change we know: our people. This highly-competitive program pairs talented, diverse technologists and innovators with top civil-servants and change-makers working at the highest levels of the federal government to tackle some our nation’s biggest challenges. These teams of government experts and private-sector doers take a user-centric approach to issues at the intersection of people, processes, products, and policy to achieve lasting impact.” — http://www.whitehouse.gov/innovationfellows

Mission

A number of Presidential Innovation Fellows who have completed their Fellowship have created an non-profit support organization incorporated within the District of Columbia:

1. To further the mission of the Presidential Innovation Fellows program (“PIF”) of bringing the principles, values, and practices of the innovation economy into government to tack the Nation’s biggest changes and to achieve a profound and lasting social impact; and
2. To provide a conduit for nongovernmental support for the PIF program and its mission; and
3. To serve as an alumni association for PIF Fellows, providing an avenue for PIF Fellows and their networks to continue contributing to solving challenges of national concern.

Structure

The Presidential Innovation Fellows Foundation (PIFF) is a member-governed corporation whose members have successfully completed six months as a Fellow and accept membership.  The members elect the Board, which appoints officers to carry out the business of the PIFF as governed by the by-laws and the articles of incorporation.  The Interim Board consists of  Raphael Majma, Interim President, Robert L. Read, Interim Treasurer, Adam Riggs, Interim Secretary, Henry Wei, MD, and Sarah Allen.

The intention of the Interim Board is to run an election by the end of October to elect a permanent board.  Board members serve a two-year term.  Board terms will be staggered so that each year 2 or 3 Board positions will be open, except for the first year, in which 5 positions will be open.

The PIFF is an internet-based organization and most voting and meetings will be held electronically subject to rules established by the Secretary.

Initial Plans

Our immediate plans are to support the Third Round of Innovation Fellows, who have recently begun their terms in Washington DC, and to leave the incoming Board well-positioned to carry on operations.  In order to do this, we need to raise seed money to cover minor expenses such as creating a website and executing our first fundraising campaign.

The expense of paying the attorneys to perform the incorporation was financed by a loan from the Interim Board to the corporation that we hope to have repaid at such time that PIFF has sufficient funds both for that and to carry on its operations.

Future Plans

The future of the PIFF will be determined by the future Board, and ultimately its members.  Some ideas that have already been discussed for the PIFF are:

• Telling the story of the program, both its successes and its failures.
• Recruiting aggressively future Fellows using channels unavailable to the White House.
• Supporting travel of former Fellows to train and inform active Fellows.
• Working to insure the durability of the PIF program.
• Supporting learning from other nations and teaching other nations based on the experience of the program.
• Supporting outreach to young people and segments of American society underrepresented in technology and government.