I agree that USAID and State are the best mechanisms for long term "teach a man to fish" projects, but what about the short-term in the immediate aftermath of combat ops or upon initial intervention for more permissive environments? Most of the time the military is the only presence and I would think that having the skill sets necessary to answer the mail from a humanitarian perspective is a crucial need. From what I'm seeing the military doesn't seem to want to put much resources into this aspect of small wars. Of course to do this, we'd need a new approach that values non-lethal power as much as lethal power and that just isn't as sexy as putting rounds down range.

If you can point me to any good website discussing approaches to distributing humanitarian aid (from food to schools to health care, etc.) especially those looking at military involvement, I'd certainly appreciate it.
-john