Apples and oranges. You don't need guns, fighter planes, missiles and tanks to provide disaster relief. (Besides, in response to at least some past missions of that nature, haven't Conservatives complained that the U.S. military was being used as "an international Meals on Wheels" operation?) The complaints by military leaders - politicians all, by the way, and I agree completely with Ethereal's assessment of their motivation in pleading poverty - center on the Services' readiness to fight a war and kill people - not to deliver food, build shelters or dig folks out of the rubble.