Time is running out for the survivors of Burma's deadly cyclone. Hundreds of thousands of desperate people are scavenging for rice, living among the bloated corpses of the dead, trying to shelter from further storms and begging those few relief workers who have penetrated the devastated Irrawaddy delta for food. There have been few pictures, because the ruling junta has refused to allow in foreign aid workers and camera crews. But already the world knows well enough that up to 2.5 million people face suffering and starvation.

The pressures on the paranoid military Government are mounting. Sir John Holmes, head of the United Nations humanitarian effort, has arrived in Rangoon, and is soon to be joined by Ban Ki Moon, the Secretary-General. Britain's envoy, Lord Malloch-Brown, has voiced, in an interview with The Times, what a growing number of aid workers are saying: unless a massive rescue operation is allowed to begin immediately, aid may have to be dropped from the air, without Burmese permission, or sent in by force.

“We rule out nothing,” the Foreign Office minister said. “We want to get the aid directly to the people.” He echoes suggestions by Gordon Brown at the weekend that forced aid drops were being considered. The Prime Minister said the natural disaster was becoming a “man-made catastrophe” because of the Burmese Government's failings. France already has a naval ship anchored in the region with 1,000 tonnes of food and shelters for 15,000 people, and the Royal Navy has a frigate equipped with helicopters 12 miles off the coast. Dropping aid in small packages has been done before, especially by the Belgian Air Force, which has used C130 planes to scatter individual rations of food and clean water that will last a person for a day. But however plausible and attractive this option may seem, the consequences need careful calculation.

Any such exercise without permission would clearly violate Burmese airspace. Planes risk being shot at; there is no guarantee that survivors, rather than black marketeers or troops, would be able to reach the aid; and the Burmese Army would be deployed to clear anyone from the area.

The political fallout could be as daunting. It may so feed the junta's suspicion of the outside world that it would send in the army to expel the Red Cross and others who have, quietly and gradually, begun to move aid into the delta. The West would then argue that the junta was effectively committing atrocities against its own people, and invoke the United Nations 2005 New York declaration, which sets out the “responsibility to protect” populations from crimes against humanity. If, as is likely, China vetoed any UN action opposed by Burma, the West might be tempted to bypass the UN. But any use of troops or ships - if they were available - could be met by force from Burma's 400,000-strong army, turning the devastated delta into a battleground.

Far better, still, to look for a way of using India, China and Burma's fellow members of the Association of South-East Asian Nations to take over aid delivery or accompany a UN-sanctioned air drop. The issue is time. Pleading with the junta has gone on for two weeks with no sign of the callous clique relenting. Neither the West nor survivors can wait. The new, robust line on air drops must be voiced by all those arriving in Rangoon. This is the riskiest and least-effective means of delivering help. But if all else fails, it may yet be the only way. Preparations must begin now.