# Did the US government turn down international aid in stopping/cleaning the gulf **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 24, 2010, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-us-government-turn-down-international-aid-in-stopping-cleaning-the-gulf/544357 "2010-06-24T14:42:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2010, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-us-government-turn-down-international-aid-in-stopping-cleaning-the-gulf/544357/1 "2010-06-24T14:42:53Z")
I have heard that the US administration turned down aid from various countries that were offering to help with stopping the oil leak and cleaning the oil. Is any of that true? When I try to google it I always get partisan message boards rather than objective news reports. What aid were other countries offering? Why would they turn it down if it was offered? Is this true [http://www.moonbattery.com/archives/2010/06/why-obamas-epa.html](http://www.moonbattery.com/archives/2010/06/why-obamas-epa.html) > [@](#): > > ``` > The U.S. Government has apparently reconsidered a Dutch offer to supply 4 oil skimmers. These are large arms that are attached to oil tankers that pump oil and water from the surface of the ocean into the tanker. Water pumped into the tanker will settle to the bottom of the tanker and is then pumped back into the ocean to make room for more oil. Each system will collect 5,000 tons of oil each day. > > The Dutch offered to fly their skimmer arm systems to the Gulf 3 days after the oil spill started. The offer was apparently turned down because EPA regulations do not allow water with oil to be pumped back into the ocean. If all the oily water was retained in the tanker, the capacity of the system would be greatly diminished because most of what is pumped into the tanker is sea water. > > ``` ---
**Author:** ![The\_Great\_Philosopher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3ec8ea/32.png) [@The\_Great\_Philosopher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Great_Philosopher)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2010, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-us-government-turn-down-international-aid-in-stopping-cleaning-the-gulf/544357/2 "2010-06-24T15:11:56Z")
Politifact rates the statement, “The White House has “refused” international help in dealing with the oil spill” _barely true_. It says that 18 countries have offered help to the US. However that figure is a bit misleading, because the State Department says a significant number of those offers were not for free aid, but offers to _sell_ equipment to the US. It also contains some offers that the US could not accept: Norway offered a spill response that included a chemical dispersant that is not approved by the EPA for instance. Four of these foreign aid offers have been accepted: > [@](#): > > From Mexico – Two skimmers and 13,780 feet of boom (accepted in early May). > > From Norway – Eight skimming systems (accepted in early May). > > From Netherlands – Three sets of Koseq Rigid Sweeping Arms, which attach to the sides of ships and gather oil (accepted on May 23). > > From Canada – 9,843 feet of boom (accepted on June 4). Which, incidentally, means that Sarah Palin’s claim that the US “did not accept offers from Norway or the Netherlands” was false. However Politifact does note that there was a lot of confusion from foreign countries about whether to contact the government or BP directly, that there were delays in accepting aid offers and that some offers have yet to be accepted, so the fundamental claim isn’t wildly off-base. ---
**Author:** ![puddleglum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puddleglum/32/137_2.png) [@puddleglum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puddleglum)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2010, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-us-government-turn-down-international-aid-in-stopping-cleaning-the-gulf/544357/3 "2010-06-24T16:15:16Z")
The Jones Act requires that all of the ships be registered in the US and crewed by US sailors. It is within BHO’s power to waive that requirement but he has not done so as yet. This is what most people mean about turning down foreign aid. ---
**Author:** ![howye](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a9adbd/32.png) [@howye](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/howye)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2010, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-us-government-turn-down-international-aid-in-stopping-cleaning-the-gulf/544357/4 "2010-06-24T17:09:11Z")
> [@puddleglum](#): > > The Jones Act requires that all of the ships be registered in the US and crewed by US sailors. It is within BHO’s power to waive that requirement but he has not done so as yet. This is what most people mean about turning down foreign aid. Of course, those people are also wrong. The Jones Act has not actually caused any such problems. Please see here: [The Jones Act and the Oil Spill…Not What You Think](http://deepseanews.com/2010/06/the-jones-act-and-the-oil-spill-not-what-you-think/) ---
**Author:** ![The\_Great\_Philosopher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3ec8ea/32.png) [@The\_Great\_Philosopher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Great_Philosopher)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2010, 9:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-us-government-turn-down-international-aid-in-stopping-cleaning-the-gulf/544357/5 "2010-06-24T21:54:09Z")
> [@puddleglum](#): > > The Jones Act requires that all of the ships be registered in the US and crewed by US sailors. It is within BHO’s power to waive that requirement but he has not done so as yet. This is what most people mean about turning down foreign aid. The Jones Act actually has an [exemption](http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sc-dc-0625-jones-act-qa-20100624,0,1081703.story) for “oil spill response vessels”. As such there are currently about 15 foreign-flagged vessels operating in the Gulf as part of the clean-up effort. I find it amusing that Fox News is outraged that there are not _enough_ foreigners involved! ---
**Author:** ![Voluble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/4af34b/32.png) [@Voluble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voluble)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2010, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-us-government-turn-down-international-aid-in-stopping-cleaning-the-gulf/544357/6 "2010-06-25T00:15:40Z")
According to the Wall Street Journal, where the Jones Act has really done its damage is in preventing ships with advanced oil skimming technology from being built or based in the US… thus delaying response times. Such ships cannot be built at a competitive price in the US due to union labor rates so they are not available to be operated here since it is a requirement of the Jones act that ships be owned, crewed, flagged and **built** in the US. My understanding is that is also why the skimmer arms had to be flown in and attached to US ships. Repealing the act would have helped greatly in this instance. Waiving it? Not so much as far as skimming goes. But Geert Visser, the consul General of the Netherlands said their initial offers of help were rebuffed before being accepted and now claims the same thing is happening with their plan to build sand berms. It seems they have specialized equipment that can be used to do the job much more efficiently than anything we have. I assume this is within three miles of the shore so for the US government to say that there has been no reason to waive the act one would have to believe that the offer of help from the Netherlands is not the best way to go. That may or may not be the case and there is room for disagreement on whether the waiver should have already been granted. I guess reporting is always bad on these types of things since we had a multitude of bogus reports, including one about people trapped in a stadium turning to cannibalism during Katrina. That there would be confusion over the specific nuances of legislation passed over 80 years ago in this case does not surprise me in light of the sensationalism we saw during the flooding of New Orleans. My eyes are giving out but you can Google the WSJ article, Geert Visser etc… and find the sources. I now know more about depression era, protectionist legislation than I care to remember. Needless to say, if there were a lot of laws of the same sort back then it is easy to see why the country ground to a halt. ---
**Author:** ![Diceman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Diceman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diceman)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2010, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-us-government-turn-down-international-aid-in-stopping-cleaning-the-gulf/544357/7 "2010-06-25T16:42:27Z")
Just to add to the confusion, the TV news last night said that several foreign-owned vessels were unable to help because their requests for a waiver of the Jones Act had not been processed yet. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2010, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-us-government-turn-down-international-aid-in-stopping-cleaning-the-gulf/544357/8 "2010-06-27T16:15:04Z")
> **[After delays, U.S. begins to tap foreign aid for gulf oil spill](https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/13/AR2010061304232.html)** > > Four weeks after the nation's worst environmental disaster, the Obama administration saw no need to accept offers of state-of-the-art skimmers, miles of boom or technical assistance from nations around the globe with experience fighting oil spills. Here’s a Washington Post article that says the admin has taken help from foreign countries. The delay ,they say, was caused by first deferring to BPs expertise and then due to the original BP estimates that greatly underestimated the flow. If the flow rate was actually 5000 barrels a day, help was not needed. Of course oil companies have claimed great abilities to clean up oil spills. It was not until they testified in front of congress that we found out they were lying. The government does not have experience or the technology to fight oil well fires and huge spills. Apparently nobody does. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Great\_Philosopher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3ec8ea/32.png) [@The\_Great\_Philosopher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Great_Philosopher)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2010, 11:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-us-government-turn-down-international-aid-in-stopping-cleaning-the-gulf/544357/9 "2010-06-28T11:44:40Z")
> [@Voluble](#): > > According to the Wall Street Journal, where the Jones Act has really done its damage is in preventing ships with advanced oil skimming technology from being built or based in the US… thus delaying response times. Such ships cannot be built at a competitive price in the US due to union labor rates so they are not available to be operated here since it is a requirement of the Jones act that ships be owned, crewed, flagged and **built** in the US. The WSJ generally has an axe to grind with the Jones Act though. They may be right but personally I’m wary about giving them the benefit of the doubt in these situations. Senator George LeMieux [says](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QyyL50dFkMc&feature=player_embedded#!) that there are currently 2,000 oil skimmers in the US (his criticism is that only 20 of them have been sent to the Gulf so far). ---
**Author:** ![DanBlather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f4b2a3/32.png) [@DanBlather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanBlather)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2010, 12:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-us-government-turn-down-international-aid-in-stopping-cleaning-the-gulf/544357/10 "2010-06-28T12:06:59Z")
At least the WSJ and Fox are owned by different people, so we have independent verification of the facts. I suspected all along that the \*real \*problem with the oil spill was that we paid workers too much in the US. Let’s try and fix that. ---
**Author:** ![DanBlather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f4b2a3/32.png) [@DanBlather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanBlather)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2010, 12:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-us-government-turn-down-international-aid-in-stopping-cleaning-the-gulf/544357/11 "2010-06-28T12:08:04Z")
> [@Diceman](#): > > Just to add to the confusion, the TV news last night said that several foreign-owned vessels were unable to help because their requests for a waiver of the Jones Act had not been processed yet. Was it on the news or was it on Fox? ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2010, 2:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-us-government-turn-down-international-aid-in-stopping-cleaning-the-gulf/544357/12 "2010-06-28T14:00:24Z")
> [@DanBlather](#): > > At least the WSJ and Fox are owned by different people, so we have independent verification of the facts. I suspected all along that the \*real \*problem with the oil spill was that we paid workers too much in the US. Let’s try and fix that. _snerk_