Smith, Rhonda M. and Stansfield, Barbara J. The Process of Providing Humanitarian Assistance: A Department of Defense Perspective. Air Force Institute of Tech Wright-Patterson AFB OH, Sep 1995.
This research effort was a qualitative study on the current process of how the DOD provides humanitarian assistance. Currently the process is not well defined and is situation dependent. Historical documents and current guidelines, policies, and regulations were researched for information on what types of humanitarian assistance the DOD provides, how the process is initiated, and who is involved in the process. Agencies outside of the military, both civilian and government, were researched to determine the extent of coordination necessary for the military to provide humanitarian assistance. A model was compiled to portray the current process and given to key personnel identified in the research as subject matter experts. Subsequently, their opinion was used to determine the validity of the model and gather additional points of contact for future research. Once the process and key players were defined, additional research can be conducted to further determine the effectiveness of using the DOD to provide humanitarian aid.