But maybe good ol' capitalism would have worked then, if many people had some income to spend, an enterprising importer could have shipped some stuff out of China or something :) . Relief can be very inefficient in those cases.

I posted on https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9666194 that jbniche's theory seems to be supported by the studies in that article.

Edit: I think a combination of both approaches might be needed. I'd really like to know what the Red Cross did and the effect it had, but we can't if they're being so opaque.

And what happens to the local farmers and roofers when you start shipping in goods and handing them out for free? They have a few more bags of rice but are out of business, and dependent on the next aid shipment for their other necessities. If you want to ship goods, then ship them to the harbor and sell them to local truck drivers for slightly more than the locally produced equivalent.