United States Government Accountability Office

GAO Statement for the Record to the 

Subcommittee on Terrorism, 

Unconventional Threats and Capabilities, 

Committee on Armed Services, 

House of Representatives 

HURRICANE KATRINA

Better Plans and Exercises 

Need to Guide the Military’s 

Response to Catastrophic 

Natural Disasters 

Statement of the Record by Sharon Pickup, Director 

Defense Capabilities and Management 

For Release on Delivery

Expected at 10:00 a.m. EDT 

Thursday, May 25, 2006

 

GAO-06-808T 
What GAO Found

United States Government Accountability Office

Why GAO Did This Study

Highlights

Accountability Integrity Reliability

May 25 2006

HURRICANE KATRINA

Better Plans and Exercises Needed to 

Guide the Military’s Response to 

Catastrophic Natural Disasters 

Highlights of GAO-06-808T, a statement 

to Subcommittee on Terrorism, 

Unconventional Threats and Capabilities,

Committee on Armed Services, House of 

Representatives 

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. 

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. 

www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-06-808T.

To view the full product, including the scope 

and methodology, click on the link above. 

For more information, contact Sharon Pickup 

at (202) 512-9619 or pickups@gao.gov. 
Mr. Chairman and the Members of the Subcommittee: 

Thank you for the opportunity to provide this statement for your hearing 

on how the Department of Defense (DOD) is preparing for the upcoming 

hurricane season and applying lessons learned from Hurricane Katrina. 

Hurricane Katrina was one of the largest natural disasters in our nation’s 

history and, because of its size and strength, will have long-standing 

effects for years to come. Prior catastrophic disasters and the actual 

experience after Katrina have shown the need for DOD to contribute 

substantial support to state and local authorities given its extensive 

capabilities and expertise in key areas such as damage assessment and 

communications. As you know, under the National Response Plan, DOD is 

generally assigned a supporting role in disaster response but, even in this 

role, has specific planning responsibilities in anticipation of being called 

upon in a disaster. Within DOD, the 2005 Strategy for Homeland Defense 

and Civil Support envisioned a reliance on National Guard and Reserve 

forces for homeland missions, including disaster response, but recognized 

that active duty forces may also play a role depending on the nature of the 

event. Individual states have their own disaster response plans which 

typically include substantial supporting roles for their National Guards. 

In anticipation of and in the days following Hurricane Katrina’s landfall, 

the military1

 took many proactive steps and mobilized significant 

resources—both active duty and National Guard forces—that saved many

lives and greatly enhanced response efforts. At the same time, as local, 

state, and federal governments responded in the days following Katrina, 

confusion surfaced as to what responsibilities the military has and what 

capabilities it would provide in planning and responding to a catastrophic 

event. While this experience underscored the importance of the military, 

especially in the wake of a catastrophe, it also identified some areas 

requiring more attention to enhance future military responses. As the 

nation is quickly approaching the 2006 hurricane season, sorting out the 

relevant lessons learned during Hurricane Katrina for the military, putting 

them in the context of the military’s role in the complex disaster response 

mission, and then following though with needed changes is vital. 

 1

Throughout this statement, we use the term military to refer to the combined efforts of the

National Guard and the federal military force. We use the term DOD to distinguish between 

the federal military response commanded by the U.S. Northern Command and the National

Guard response. During Katrina, DOD’s federal military response consisted of active duty

military personnel and reservists who volunteered to be part of the federal response. 

Page 1 GAO-06-808T 
This statement is based on our report issued earlier this month, entitled 

Hurricane Katrina: Better Plans and Exercises Needed to Guide the 

Military’s Response to Catastrophic Natural Disasters (GAO-06-643), and 

summarizes the key points from that report, including (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 our recommendations to the Secretary of

Defense; and (3) the extent to which the military is taking actions to 

identify and address the lessons learned. The work supporting our report 

reflects our travel to the affected areas, interviews with officials who led 

the response efforts at both the federal and state levels, and extensive 

analysis of data and documents from numerous military organizations that 

provided support to the Hurricane Katrina response operations. We 

conducted our review from September 2005 through April 2006 in 

accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. In 

addition to our recently completed review of the military response, we 

have published several products2

 on Hurricane Katrina and prior disasters, 

and currently have a large body of ongoing work to address preparation, 

response, recovery, and rebuilding efforts related to hurricanes Katrina 

and Rita. 

The military mounted a massive response to Hurricane Katrina that saved 

many lives and greatly assisted recovery efforts but faced several 

challenges from which many lessons are emerging. The military took 

proactive steps and responded with over 50,000 National Guard and 20,000 

active federal personnel. Consistent with its June 2005 civil support 

strategy—but unlike past catastrophes—DOD relied heavily on the 

National Guard during the response. Active duty forces were also alerted 

prior to landfall, and key capabilities, such as aviation, medical, and 

engineering forces, were initially deployed. Growing concerns about the 

magnitude of the disaster prompted DOD to deploy large, active ground 

units to supplement the Guard beginning about 5 days after landfall. 

However, like other responders, the military faced challenges in its 

Summary 

 2

For example, see GAO, Disaster Assistance: DOD’s Support for Hurricanes Andrew and 

Iniki and Typhoon Omar, GAO/NSIAD-93-180 (Washington, D.C.: June 18, 1993); 

Statement by Comptroller General David M. Walker on GAO’s Preliminary Observations

Regarding Preparedness and Response to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, GAO-06-365R 

(Washington, D.C.: Feb. 1, 2006); and Hurricane Katrina: GAO’s Preliminary

Observations Regarding Preparedness, Response, and Recovery, GAO-06-442T 

(Washington, D.C.: Mar. 8, 2006). 

Page 2 GAO-06-808T 
response that affected its ability to gain situational awareness and 

organize and execute its response. These challenges included obtaining 

timely damage assessments; restoring and maintaining interoperable 

communications; coordinating search and rescue efforts; and assuming 

unexpected responsibilities for logistics support, which led to limited 

visibility of items that had been ordered by the Federal Emergency 

Management Agency (FEMA) and were in transit to the affected areas. 

Moreover, integrating the large numbers of active and Guard forces from 

many parts of the country was at times problematic. In addition, a key 

mobilization statute, which limits a unit or member of a reserve 

component from being involuntarily ordered to federal active duty for 

disaster response, also affected the integration.3

 Reservists who responded

to Katrina were volunteers, and they constituted a relatively small portion 

of the response when compared to the National Guard and active 

component portions of the response. While the military clearly provided 

vital support, no one had the total picture of the situation on the ground, 

the capabilities that were on the way, the missions that had been 

resourced, and the missions that still needed to be completed. 

Unfortunately, many of these problems are long-standing, and we reported 

similar issues after Hurricane Andrew hit south Florida in 1992. Therefore, 

the key lesson learned is that while the military has significant and 

sometimes unique capabilities that can be brought to bear, additional 

actions are needed to ensure that its contributions are clearly understood 

and well planned and integrated. 

Many of the challenges faced in the response point to the need for better 

plans and more robust exercises, as we outlined in our recommendations 

to the Secretary of Defense. Such plans are needed to better define the 

military’s role in a catastrophic natural disaster, identify capabilities that 

could be available and provided by the military, and integrate the response 

of the active and reserve components. Robust exercises are then needed to 

test those plans and allow planners to refine them. Prior to Hurricane 

Katrina, disaster plans and exercises were insufficient and did not 

 3

Section 12304 of Title 10 of the United States Code prohibits the involuntary activation of

National Guard and Reserve members for domestic disaster operations. While this 

restriction applies to both National Guard and Reserve forces, National Guard forces were 

mobilized under both state active duty and Title 32 for Hurricane Katrina. No similar 

provisions exist to specifically mobilize Reserve forces for disaster response, although it is 

conceivable that if the President declares a national emergency and invokes 10 U.S.C. §

12302 reserve component forces could become available for involuntary activation. Under 

10 U.S.C. § 12301 (d), the President can activate National Guard and Reserve volunteers for 

any purpose. 

Page 3 GAO-06-808T 
incorporate lessons learned from past catastrophes to fully delineate the 

military capabilities needed to respond to a catastrophe. For example, the 

government’s National Response Plan (NRP) made little distinction 

between the military response to a smaller regional disaster and its 

response to a catastrophic natural disaster. In addition, DOD’s emergency 

response plan for providing military assistance to civil authorities during 

disasters did not account for the full range of assistance that might be 

provided by DOD, address the respective contributions of the National 

Guard and the federal responders, or establish response time frames. 

National Guard state plans did not account for the level of outside 

assistance that would be needed during a catastrophe and were not 

synchronized with federal plans. Moreover, plans had not been tested with 

a robust exercise program in that none of the exercises that were 

conducted prior to Katrina called for a major deployment of DOD 

capabilities in response to a catastrophic hurricane. As a result, a lack of 

understanding exists within the military and among federal, state, and 

local responders as to the types of assistance and capabilities that DOD 

might provide in the event of a catastrophe, the timing of this assistance, 

and the respective contributions of the active duty and National Guard 

forces. We recommended that DOD take a number of actions to help 

address planning and exercise inadequacies, including fully addressing the 

proactive functions the military will be expected to perform under the 

NRP in the event of a catastrophe and improving military plans and 

exercises so that these plans specifically address the potential

contributions of the military in key areas—such as damage assessment, 

communications, search and rescue, and logistics support—as well as the 

integration of the military’s active duty and Reserve and National Guard 

forces. 

Since Hurricane Katrina, DOD has analyzed the military response and is 

taking several actions to address the lessons learned from Hurricane 

Katrina and prepare for the next catastrophic event. In addition to 

conducting its own lessons-learned reviews, DOD is also examining the 

lessons and recommendations from other sources, including GAO. DOD 

generally concurred with the recommendations we made in our recent 

report and is taking actions to address catastrophic disaster response 

problems that we and others have identified. While it is too early to 

evaluate DOD’s actions, many appear to hold promise, such as the efforts 

to refine the NRP complete its operational plan, and embed defense 

officials into FEMA regional offices. However, such DOD actions are only 

first steps. Some issues identified after Katrina are long-standing problems 

that we identified after Hurricane Andrew in 1992. Moreover, they will be 

difficult to address because they are complex and cut across agency

Page 4 GAO-06-808T 
boundaries. Thus, substantial improvement will require sustained 

attention from the highest management levels in DOD and from leaders 

across the government. 

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. The plan generally

calls for a reactive federal response following specific state requests for 

assistance. However, the NRP also contains a catastrophic incident annex 

that calls for a proactive federal response when catastrophes overwhelm 

local and state responders. The NRP generally assigns DOD a supporting 

role in disaster response, but even in this role, DOD has specific planning 

responsibilities. For example, the NRP requires federal agencies to 

incorporate the accelerated response requirements of the NRP’s 

catastrophic incident annex into their own emergency response plans. 

Background 

Within DOD, the Strategy for Homeland Defense and Civil Support, which 

was issued in June 2005, envisions a greater reliance on National Guard 

and Reserve forces for homeland missions. The military response to 

domestic disasters typically varies depending on the severity of an event. 

During smaller disasters, an affected state’s National Guard may provide a

sufficient response, but larger disasters and catastrophes that overwhelm 

the state may require assistance from out-of-state National Guard or 

federal troops. For Katrina, the response heavily relied on the National 

Guard, which is consistent with DOD’s Strategy for Homeland Defense and 

Civil Support. This represents a departure from past catastrophes when 

active duty forces played a larger role in response efforts. 

During disaster response missions, National Guard troops typically 

operate under the control of the state governors. However, the National 

Guard Bureau has responsibility for formulating, developing, and 

coordinating policies, programs, and plans affecting Army and Air National 

Guard personnel, and it serves as the channel of communication between 

the U.S. Army, the U.S. Air Force, and the National Guard in U.S. states 

and territories. Although the Chief of the National Guard Bureau does not

have operational control of National Guard forces in the states and 

territories, he has overall responsibility for National Guard Military 

Support to Civil Authorities programs. The U.S. Northern Command also 

has a mission to provide support to civil authorities. Because of this 

mission, U.S. Northern Command was responsible for commanding the 

federal military response to Hurricane Katrina. 

Page 5 GAO-06-808T 
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. Issues arose with damage 

assessments, communications, search and rescue efforts, logistics, and the 

integration of military forces. 

The Military Response 

Was Massive but 

Faced Several 

Challenges, Which 

Provide Lessons for 

the Future 

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. Military 

officials began tracking Hurricane Katrina when it was an unnamed 

tropical depression and proactively took steps that led to a Katrina 

response of more than 50,000 National Guard and more than 20,000 federal 

military personnel, more than twice the size of the military response to 

1992’s catastrophic Hurricane Andrew. By the time Katrina made landfall 

in Louisiana and Mississippi on August 29, 2005, the military was 

positioned to respond with both National Guard and federal forces. 

Prior to Katrina’s landfall, active commands had published warning and 

planning orders and DOD had already deployed Defense Coordinating 

Officers to all the potentially affected states. DOD also deployed a joint 

task force; medical personnel; helicopters; ships from Texas, Virginia, and 

Maryland; and construction battalion engineers. Many of these capabilities 

were providing assistance or deploying to the area within hours of 

Katrina’s landfall. DOD also supported response and recovery operations 

with communications equipment and many other critically needed 

capabilities. 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.

Prior to landfall, anticipating the disruption and damage that Hurricane 

Katrina could cause, the governors of Louisiana and Mississippi activated 

their National Guard units. In addition, National Guard officials in 

Louisiana and Mississippi began to contact National Guard officials in 

other states to request assistance. While National Guard forces from 

Louisiana and Mississippi provided the bulk of the military support in the 

first days after landfall, most of the Guard response to Hurricane Katrina 

came later from outside the affected states. The National Guard Bureau 

acted as a conduit to communicate requirements for assistance in 

Louisiana and Mississippi to the adjutants general in the rest of the 

Page 6 GAO-06-808T 
country. The adjutants general of other states, with the authorization of 

their state governors, then sent their National Guard troops to Louisiana 

and Mississippi under emergency assistance agreements between the 

states. Requirements for out-of-state National Guard or federal assistance

were increased because thousands of National Guard personnel from 

Mississippi and Louisiana were already mobilized for other missions and 

thus unavailable when Hurricane Katrina struck their states. The National 

Guard troops that had been mobilized from within the affected states were 

able to quickly deploy to where they were needed because they had

trained and planned for disaster mobilizations within their states. The 

deployment of out-of-state forces, though quick when compared to past 

catastrophes, took longer because mobilization plans were developed and 

units were identified for deployment in the midst of the crisis. At the peak

of the military’s response, however, nearly 40,000 National Guard 

members from other states were supporting operations in Louisiana and 

Mississippi—an unprecedented domestic mobilization. 

Challenges Provide 

Lessons for the Future 

While the military response to Katrina was massive, it faced many 

challenges, which provide lessons for the future, including the need for the 

following: 

• Timely damage assessments. As with Hurricane Andrew, an underlying

problem in the response was the failure to quickly assess damage and gain

situational awareness. The NRP notes that local and state officials are 

responsible for damage assessments during a disaster, but it also notes 

that state and local officials could be overwhelmed in a catastrophe. 

Despite this incongruous situation, the NRP did not specify the proactive 

means necessary for the federal government to gain situational awareness 

when state and local officials are overwhelmed. Moreover, DOD’s planning 

did not call for the use of the military’s extensive reconnaissance assets to 

meet the NRP catastrophic incident annex’s requirement for a proactive

response to catastrophic incidents. Because state and local officials were 

overwhelmed and the military’s extensive reconnaissance capabilities 

were not effectively leveraged as part of a proactive federal effort to 

conduct timely, comprehensive damage assessments, the military began 

organizing and deploying its response without fully understanding the 

extent of the damage or the required assistance. According to military 

officials, available reconnaissance assets could have provided additional 

situational awareness during Hurricane Katrina, and in September 2005, 

considerable surveillance assets were made available to assess damage 

from Hurricane Rita, primarily because of the lessons learned from 

Hurricane Katrina. 

Page 7 GAO-06-808T 
• Improved communications. Hurricane Katrina caused significant 

damage to the communication infrastructure in Louisiana and Mississippi, 

which further contributed to a lack of situational awareness for military 

and civilian officials. Even when local officials were able to conduct 

damage assessments, the lack of communication assets caused delays in 

transmitting the assessments. Under the NRP, the Department of 

Homeland Security has responsibility for coordinating the 

communications portion of disaster response operations. However, 

neither the NRP, the Department of Homeland Security, nor DOD fully 

identified the extensive military communication capabilities that could be 

leveraged as part of a proactive federal response to a catastrophe. DOD’s 

plan addressed internal military communications requirements but not the 

communication requirements of communities affected by the disaster. 

Because state and local officials were overwhelmed and the Department of 

Homeland Security and DOD waited for requests for their assistance 

rather than deploying a proactive response, some of the military’s 

available communication assets were never requested or deployed. In 

addition, some deployed National Guard assets were underutilized 

because the sending states placed restrictions on their use. 

Communications problems, like damage assessment problems, were also 

highlighted following Hurricane Andrew. 

• Coordinated search and rescue efforts. While tens of thousands of 

people were rescued after Katrina, the lack of clarity in search and rescue

plans led to operations that according to aviation officials, were not as 

efficient as they could have been. The NRP addressed only part of the 

search and rescue mission, and the National Search and Rescue Plan had 

not been updated to reflect the NRP. As a result, the search and rescue 

operations of the National Guard and federal military responders were not 

fully coordinated, and military operations were not integrated with the 

search and rescue operations of the Coast Guard and other rescuers. At 

least two different locations were assigning search and rescue tasks to 

military helicopter pilots operating over New Orleans, and no one had the 

total picture of the missions that had been resourced and the missions that 

still needed to be performed. 

• Clear logistics responsibilities. DOD had difficulty gaining visibility 

over supplies and commodities when FEMA asked DOD to assume a 

significant portion of its logistics responsibilities. Under the NRP, FEMA is 

responsible for coordinating logistics during disaster response efforts, but 

during Hurricane Katrina, FEMA quickly became overwhelmed. Four days

after Katrina’s landfall, FEMA asked DOD to take responsibility for 

procurement, transportation, and distribution of ice, water, food, fuel, and

Page 8 GAO-06-808T 
medical supplies. However, because FEMA lacked the capability to 

maintain visibility—from order through final delivery—of the supplies and 

commodities it had ordered, DOD did not know the precise locations of 

the FEMA-ordered supplies and commodities when it assumed FEMA’s 

logistics responsibilities. As a result of its lack of visibility over the meals 

that were in transit, DOD had to airlift 1.7 million meals to Mississippi to 

respond to a request from the Adjutant General of Mississippi, who was 

concerned that food supplies were nearly exhausted. 

• Better integration of military forces. The military did not adequately 

plan for the integration of large numbers of deployed troops from different 

commands during disaster response operations. For example, a Louisiana 

plan to integrate military responders from outside the state called for the 

reception of not more than 300 troops per day. However, in the days 

following Hurricane Katrina, more than 20,000 National Guard members 

from other states arrived in Louisiana to join the response effort. In 

addition, the National Guard and federal responses were coordinated 

across several chains of command but not integrated, which led to some 

inefficiencies and duplication of effort. Because military plans and 

exercises had not provided a means for integrating the response, no one 

had the total picture of the forces on the ground, the forces that were on 

the way, the missions that had been resourced, and the missions that still 

needed to be completed. Also, a key mobilization statute limits DOD’s 

Reserve and National Guard units and members from being involuntarily 

ordered to federal active duty for disaster response. As a result, all the 

reservists who responded to Hurricane Katrina were volunteers, and they 

made up a relatively small portion of the response compared to the 

National Guard and active component members. Moreover, the process of

lining up volunteers can be time-consuming and is more appropriate for 

mobilizing individuals than it is for mobilizing entire units or capabilities 

that may be needed during a catastrophe. After Hurricane Andrew, we 

identified this issue in two 1993 reports.4

 4

GAO/NSIAD-93-180 and GAO, Disaster Management: Improving the Nation’s Response to

Catastrophic Disasters, GAO/RCED-93-186 (Washington, D.C.: July 23, 1993). 

Page 9 GAO-06-808T 
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. 

• The National Response Plan. The NRP, which guides planning of 

supporting federal agencies, lacks specificity as to how DOD should be 

used and what resources it should provide in the event of a domestic 

natural disaster. The NRP makes little distinction between the military 

response to smaller, regional disasters and the military response to largescale, catastrophic natural disasters. Even though past catastrophes, such 

as Hurricane Andrew in 1992 and the 1989 earthquake in the San Francisco 

area, showed that the military tends to play a much larger role in 

catastrophes, the NRP lists very few specific DOD resources that should 

be called upon in the event of a catastrophic natural disaster. Given the 

substantial role the military is actually expected to play in a catastrophe—

no other federal agency brings as many resources to bear—this lack of 

detailed planning represents a critical oversight.

Better Plans and 

Exercises Needed to 

Define and Guide 

Future Military 

Responses during 

Catastrophic Natural 

Disasters 

• The DOD plan. When Hurricane Katrina made landfall, DOD’s plan for 

providing defense assistance to civil authorities was nearly 9 years old and

was undergoing revision. The plan had not been aligned with the NRP and 

had been written before the 2005 Strategy for Homeland Defense and Civil 

Support, which called for a focused reliance on the reserve components 

for civil support missions. The plan did not account for the full range of 

tasks and missions the military could need to provide in the event of a 

catastrophe and had little provision for integrating active and reserve 

component forces. It did not address key questions of integration, 

command and control, and division of tasks between National Guard 

resources under state control and federal resources under U.S. Northern 

Command’s control. Moreover, the plan did not establish time frames for 

the response. 

• National Guard plans. At the state level, the plans of the Louisiana and 

Mississippi National Guards were inadequate for Katrina and not well 

coordinated with those of other National Guard forces across the country. 

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. For 

Page 10 GAO-06-808T 
example, Joint Forces Headquarters Louisiana modified its plan and 

reassigned disaster responsibilities when thousands of Louisiana National 

Guard personnel were mobilized for federal missions prior to Hurricane 

Katrina. However, the Louisiana plan did not address the need to bring in

thousands of military troops from outside the state during a catastrophe. 

Similarly, Mississippi National Guard officials told us that even their 1969 

experience with Hurricane Camille, a category 5 storm that hit the same 

general area, had not adequately prepared them for a catastrophic natural 

disaster of Katrina’s magnitude. For example, the Mississippi National 

Guard disaster plan envisioned the establishment of commodity 

distribution centers, but it did not anticipate the number of centers that 

could be required in a catastrophic event or following a nearly complete 

loss of infrastructure. In addition, the National Guard Bureau had not 

coordinated in advance with the governors and adjutants general in the 

states and territories to develop plans to provide assistance for 

catastrophic disasters across the country. Specifically, the bureau had not

identified the types of units that were likely to be needed during a 

catastrophe or worked with the state governors and adjutants general to

develop and maintain a list of National Guard units from each state that 

would likely be available to meet these requirements during catastrophic 

natural disasters. 

• Exercises. An underlying reason that insufficient plans existed at all

levels is that the disaster plans had not been tested and refined with a 

robust exercise program. Such exercises are designed to expose 

weaknesses in plans and allow planners to refine them. 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. The Homeland Security Council has issued 15 

national planning scenarios—including a major hurricane scenario—that

provide the basis for disaster exercises throughout the nation. While DOD 

sponsors or participates in no less than two major interagency field 

exercises per year, few exercises led by the Department of Homeland 

Security or DOD focused on catastrophic natural disasters, and none of 

the exercises called for a major deployment of DOD capabilities in 

response to a catastrophic hurricane. In addition, although DOD has 

periodically held modest military support to civil authorities exercises, the 

exercises used underlying assumptions that were unrealistic in preparing 

for a catastrophe. For example, DOD assumed that first responders and 

communications would be available and that the transportation 

infrastructure would be navigable in a major hurricane scenario. Finally,

the First U.S. Army conducted planning and exercises in response to six 

Page 11 GAO-06-808T 
hurricanes in 2005. These exercises led to actions, such as the early 

deployment of Defense Coordinating Officers, which enhanced disaster 

response efforts. However, DOD’s exercise program was not adequate for

a catastrophe of Hurricane Katrina’s magnitude. 

Based on our evaluation of the aforementioned plans and exercises, we 

made several recommendations to the Secretary of Defense. First, we 

called for DOD to work with the Department of Homeland Security to 

update the NRP to fully address the proactive functions the military will be 

expected to perform during a catastrophic incident. 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. Third, we called for the National Guard Bureau 

to identify the National Guard capabilities that are likely to respond to 

catastrophes in a state status and to share this information with active 

commands within DOD. 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. We also raised a matter for 

congressional consideration, suggesting that Congress consider lifting or 

modifying the mobilization restriction—10 U.S.C. § 12304 (c)(1)—that 

limits reserve component participation in catastrophic natural disasters. 

DOD has collected lessons learned following Hurricane Katrina from a 

variety of sources. Within the department, DOD has a formal set of 

procedures to identify, capture, and share information collected as a result 

of operations in order to enhance performance in future operations. Even 

in the midst of the Hurricane Katrina response operation, officials from 

various military organizations were collecting information on lessons 

learned and this continued well after most operations had ceased. For 

example, communications issues that had surfaced were studied by both

active and National Guard commands that had responded to Hurricane 

Katrina. DOD also formed a task force to study the response and is 

compiling and analyzing various military and other lessons-learned reports 

to help design an improved response to future natural catastrophic events. 

According to DOD officials, they have also reviewed White House and 

congressional reports identifying lessons to be applied or challenges to be

addressed in future response operations. 

As of today, DOD has also begun taking actions to enhance the military’s 

preparedness for future catastrophic events. Specifically, in responding to

DOD Is Taking Steps 

to Address Lessons 

Learned 

Page 12 GAO-06-808T 
our recently issued report, DOD generally concurred with our 

recommendations for action and told us that it had developed plans to 

address them. DOD noted, for example, that the NRP would be revised to

plan for a significant DOD role in a catastrophe and a more-detailed DOD 

operational plan that has been in draft would be finalized. Our 

recommendations and DOD’s response to them are shown in appendix I. 

In addition, DOD said that it was taking several additional actions, 

including 

• colocating specially trained defense department personnel at FEMA 

regional offices; 

• folding support from federal reconnaissance agencies into the military’s 

civil support processes; 

• developing “pre-scripted” requests that would ease the process for civilian

agencies to request military support; 

• conducting extensive exercises, including the recently completed Ardent

Sentry and other planned events, with FEMA; and 

• delegating authority for deploying defense coordinating elements and 

placing on “prepare to deploy” orders communications, helicopter, aerial 

reconnaissance, and patient-evacuation capabilities. 

The department plans to complete many of these steps by June 1, 2006—

the start of the next hurricane season—but acknowledged that some 

needed actions will take longer to complete. Since details about many of 

the department’s actions were still emerging as we completed our review, 

we were unable to fully assess the effectiveness of DOD’s plans, but they 

do appear to hold promise. 

In conclusion, while DOD’s efforts to date to address the Hurricane 

Katrina lessons learned are steps in the right direction—and the 

department deserves credit for taking them—these are clearly only the 

first steps that will be needed. The issues cut across agency boundaries, 

and thus they cannot be addressed by the military alone. The NRP 

framework envisions a proactive national response involving the collective 

efforts of responder organizations at all levels of government. Looking 

forward, part of DOD’s challenge is the sheer number of organizations at

all levels of government that are involved, both military and civilian. In 

addition, many of the problems encountered during the Katrina response 

are long-standing and were also reported after Hurricane Andrew in 1992. 

Because of the complexity and long-standing nature of these problems, 

DOD’s planned and ongoing actions must receive sustained topConcluding 

Observations 

Page 13 GAO-06-808T 
management attention, not only at DOD but across the government, in 

order to effect needed improvements in the military’s support to civil 

authorities. While the issues are complex, they are also urgent, and 

experience has illustrated that the military has critical and substantial 

capabilities that will be needed in the wake of catastrophic events. 

For further information regarding this statement, please contact me at 

(202) 512-9619 or pickups@gao.gov. Individuals making key contributions 

to this statement include John Pendleton, Assistant Director, Michael 

Ferren, Kenya Jones, and Leo Sullivan. 

Contact and Staff 

Acknowledgements 

Page 14 GAO-06-808T 
Page 15 GAO-06-808T 

Appendix I: GAO’s Recommendations to the 

Secretary of Defense to Improve Military 

Support and DOD’s Response 

GAO recommendation to the Secretary of Defense 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. 

DOD said that it is working with the Department of Homeland

Security to revise the NRP. While DOD stated that the long-term 

focus of the U.S. government should be to develop more robust 

domestic disaster capabilities within the Department of 

Homeland Security, it acknowledged that DOD will need to 

assume a more robust response role in the interim period and 

when other responders lack the resources and expertise to 

handle a particular disaster. 

Establish milestones and expedite the development of detailed 

plans and exercises to fully account for the unique capabilities and 

support that the military is likely to provide to civil authorities in 

response to the full range of domestic disasters, including 

catastrophes. 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.

DOD listed a number of steps it is taking to improve its disaster 

response planning and exercises and said that consistent with its 

Strategy for Homeland Defense and Civil Support, the active

component should complement, but not duplicate, the National 

Guard’s likely role as an early responder. DOD also said that

planning and exercises should include local, state, and federal 

representatives and should stress the responders with the 

highest degree of realism possible—to the breaking point if 

possible. 

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. 

DOD listed steps the U.S. Northern Command is taking to better 

understand the capabilities of National Guard units, and it stated 

that the National Guard is creating a database to facilitate 

planning its employment in support of the homeland. 

Establish milestones and identify the types of scalable federal 

military capabilities and the units that could provide those 

capabilities in response to the full range of domestic disasters and 

catastrophes covered by DOD’s defense support to civil authorities 

plans. 

DOD noted that it has developed scalable capability packages in 

conjunction with pre-scripted requests for assistance and U.S. 

Northern Command’s Contingency Plan 2501, which is 

scheduled to be signed in the spring of 2006.

Source: GAO.

Note: The recommendations are from GAO, Hurricane Katrina: Batter Plans and Exercises Needed to

Guide the Military’s Response to Catastrophic Natural Disasters, GAO-06-643 (Washington, D.C.: 

May 15, 2006). 

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