The Center for Excellence in Disaster Management and Humanitarian Assistance (COE-DMHA) conducted a Humanitarian Assistance Response Training (HART) Course for U.S. Army Pacific (USARPAC) February 21-23 at Tripler Army Medical Center, Hawaii.
The three-day course provided an introduction to military support to civilian-led international disaster and humanitarian operations. The course was sponsored by USARPAC’s Contingency Command Post, but included participants from all services. With the frequency and severity of disasters increasing around the world, U.S. and other military forces are more often called on to support the provision of humanitarian assistance and disaster relief. But traditional military training does not teach military personnel the internationally recognized humanitarian principles and best practices for effective military support. The HART Course is designed to fill that gap by introducing participants to the roles and responsibilities of their likely counterparts and what conditions they might expect in a disaster response or humanitarian crisis.
“All of the military folks that we talk to are very interested in who are the humanitarian communities, how do they operate and how can the military work with them in a disaster response,” said Bobby Ray Gordon, COE Senior Humanitarian Operations Advisor and the lead for the course. “The unique thing about our course is that we not only go over the ‘who’ and the ‘what,’ we also talk about the ‘why,’ especially when you talk about issues and concerns that humanitarians have about working with the military.”
Although the majority of participants in a HART usually come from the unit that sponsors the course, most HARTs include representatives from all services, as well as civilians seeking familiarity with humanitarian agencies and principles. Gordon said this strengthens the course by exposing participants to a variety of backgrounds and viewpoints.
In addition to lectures covering topics such as affected populations, civilian response stakeholders, humanitarian principles and civil-military coordination, the course also included exercises. In the course for USARPAC, teams of participants were given 20 minutes to construct a free-standing shelter to cover all the team members using a plastic tarp and a few other materials for their use.
“It’s not a pop-up tent like they’re used to,” Gordon said. “It gives them a very good idea of what it would be like to be a displaced person.”
The HART Course is taught by COE staff, including active duty and retired U.S. military personnel, and personnel who have worked in the United Nations, the American Red Cross and non-governmental organizations (NGOs). Participants receive CD ROMs containing the presentations and reference materials for their use.
On average, COE conducts between eight and 10 HART courses a year. Upcoming courses include one for the Army’s 98th Civil Affairs Battalion (Airborne) at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, in April, two for U.S. European Command (EUCOM) in Stuttgart, Germany, in May-June, and another for USARPAC at Fort Shafter, Hawaii, in June.
For more information about COE’s HART Courses please contact COE at FrontOffice@coe-dmha.org.