wigwam, your right unless martial law is declared any military deployed would have no more powers than you or me. initially their role would be to support civil powers not implement them. as you say their role initially will be the ability to deploy an efficient logistical chain delivering stuff etc. even in northern ireland technically we were there to support the ruc, it was the ruc that had the legal powers and authority.
in days gone by the military could have provided a lot of medically skilled people, but nowadays most of them are reservists already working in the nhs. oh for a spare field ambulance unit round about now.