"RAND National Defense Research Institute"

"Prepared for the Office of the Secretary of Defense for Policy, approved for public release; distribution unlimited"--T.p.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 89-92).

The history of CFE-DMHA -- A review and assessment of the Center's activities -- Missions, geographic focus, and courses of action.

"In recognition of the important role that the U.S. military has to play in humanitarian assistance and disaster relief, congressional legislation established the Center for Excellence in Disaster Management and Humanitarian Assistance (CFE-DMHA) in Honolulu in 1994 to provide and facilitate education, training, and research in civil-military operations. This report examines CFE-DMHA's history, activities, and roles to help determine how the missions assigned to it can best be performed to achieve the objectives of the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) in this domain. The report finds that a center focused on disaster management and humanitarian assistance (DMHA) fulfills important needs that will only grow in the future. After identifying some key concerns with the center's functioning, including a fundamental misalignment of mission and resources, the report concludes that CFE-DMHA should not be abolished, but that it should focus, for now, on a subset of activities and missions. While the Asia-Pacific represents a priority area for DMHA, because of the prevalence and severity of disasters in that region, there is also a need for additional training, engagement, research, and information related to DMHA civil-military coordination in other regions, which a globally oriented center could provide and that the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) should guide. Based on these conclusions, and after reviewing a number of courses of action, the report concludes that aligning CFE-DMHA with an existing globally oriented organization under OSD would best position the center to serve these purposes"--Publisher's website.