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Bush sends more than 7,000 troops to Gulf
(AP)
Updated: 2005-09-04 09:53
Defending the administration's response, Chertoff said: "We were prepared for one catastrophe. The second catastrophe, frankly, added a level of challenge that no one has seen before."
He said he still has confidence in FEMA director Michael Brown.
Chertoff denied that the administration's response was hindered by the thousands of Guard troops in Iraq.
"That process of identifying and mobilizing is taking time. But it's not a problem of not having enough Guard," he said.
He said the federal government normally acts in support of state and local authorities. In this case, he said, a larger federal role frees up the National Guard to do more in the law enforcement area.
The active-duty soldiers were being deployed to provide security and humanitarian assistance, said Lt. Gen. Joseph Inge, deputy commander of Northern Command.
He said one complication is finding Guard members with particularly needed skills, such as military police training, rather than sending in tank drivers.
On Friday, a force of 1,000 Guardsmen was dispatched to the New Orleans Convention Center to help evacuate thousands of people, dehydrated and near exhaustion after living in squalid conditions without regular food and water for up to five days.
With reports of thugs and criminals among the thousands stranded there, commanders didn't move in until there was a sufficiently large force to take on any resistance, said Lt. Gen. Steven H. Blum, chief of the National Guard Bureau.
Weapons were found at the site but no shots were fired and no Guardsmen were injured, Blum said.
"It was done almost invisibly," Blum told reporters at the Pentagon.
In other developments Saturday:
_The Labor Department announced a $62 million emergency grant to provide as many as 1,000 jobs to dislocated workers in the parts of Louisiana devastated by Katrina and support projects that provide food, clothing and shelter.
_The Transportation Department said it has arranged for Amtrak passenger trains to join in the effort to evacuate residents from New Orleans.
_Bush canceled his meeting Wednesday with Chinese President Hu Jintao, the White House said Saturday, citing the hurricane aftermath. The two leaders agreed, however, to meet on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly session later this month.
After returning from his tour of the region Friday, Bush immediately signed a $10.5 billion disaster aid package passed by Congress — an amount he repeatedly called "just the beginning" of federal expenditures for storm relief. He issued a memorandum saying Hurricane Katrina had created a "severe energy supply interruption" that could damage the national economy, and he formally authorized the release of crude oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.
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