I don't disagree with that at all. I'm firmly in the respond first, figure out where it was at later. I was playing devil's advocate.
Atleast in wyoming, to the best of my knowledge, when a wildland fire occurs on private ground, but spills onto BLM, there is a portion of the response covered by the BLM. Same goes for if it starts on BLM and spills onto private. The BLM will pick up part of the tab for that fire, particularly if they were unable to respond to it. I'm sure there are a lot of folks more familiar than me on fire policy.
It's just another thought on the give and take on the private/public land relationship. And what being a good neighbor looks like.