As a civilian reconstruction type, I'd be interested, while house-to-houses are going on, in getting as much local population, social and econ information as possible, embedded with questions of: Do you need help? Is there a food supply? What is most important to get reopened? How many houses were damaged? What resources exist/are needed to rebuild?

I'm pretty interested in the hinterland---ag types, markets, resources.

Assuming that it is a great place from which to distribute bad stuff (prssure plates, etc...), I assume the town has some basic market-serving functions too. What were they? What would it take to bring them back? What basic levels of government and/or community control needs to be in place?

I'm increasingly becoming concerned that we may "over-build" some of these places with stuff that can't be sustained, absent the LaLa Land of Foreign Aid, and isn't wanted or needed. Where is the line of "good enough" in a rural village, or small region-serving town?

My guess, too, is that once a basic Phase I stabilization, inventory, repair job is done, the next level of serious development, if warranted, is going to need to be left to some "higher" program (USAID, NGOs?), so that the military does not become unproductively engaged in town building, and is free for the next challenge.

Steve