Haiti: Dangerous Muddle

By Conn Hallinan

FPIF Policy Report

http://www.fpif.org/papers/2004haiti_body.html

In 1994, when President Bill Clinton sent 20,000
American troops into Haiti to restore Jean-Bernard
Aristide to the presidency, there was widespread
support for a mission aimed at restoring democracy and
relieving the misery of the Haitian people. It also
seemed to herald a new day in the post-cold war world,
when American invasions were not automatically
synonymous with supporting some Latin American caudillo
or South East Asian despot.

With the exception of the isolationist Right, virtually
every voice in the political spectrum cheered the
policy of "liberal intervention." The use of American
power to make good things happen was a heady drug.

Unfortunately, an addictive one.

Although there is no question that the 1994
intervention was good for Haiti , military intervention
has turned out to be fraught with problems,
particularly when it is wielded by one country.

Liberal Interventionism Ran Off the Rails Key Points
There is no question that the 1994 intervention was
good for Haiti , but military intervention has turned
out to be fraught with problems, particularly when it
is wielded by one country. Liberal intervention ran off
the rails in Yugoslavia when the Clinton administration
sidelined the United Nations and used the North
Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) instead. Modern
wars are not won or lost on battlefields, they are won
or lost in the streets and byways of everyday life.

It is tempting to pin the problematical aspects of the
policy on the Bush administration and its coterie of
aggressive, neocon policymakers. But the fissures in
"liberal intervention" began showing up long before the
Republicans took control of the White House.

The Yugoslav war is a case in point.

On the surface the rationale for an intervention seemed
straightforward. Serbia’s President, Slobodan Milosevic
was a thug who was oppressing Albanians in the Serbian
province of Kosovo . Or at least that was how the war
was sold. On the ground things were a little more
complex, as they often are in the Balkans.

Milosevic was certainly a thug, but so was Croatia’s
President, Franjo Tudjman, and we were fine with him.
Milosevic did, indeed, oppress Albanians in Kosovo, but
the Kosovo Liberation Army was hardly representative of
goodness and democracy. Many KLA members—including
most the leaders—were no less thuggish than Milosevic,
and according to Interpol, deeply engaged in Europe’s
largest drug ring.

Was there cause for military intervention? Could there
have been a resolution short of war? We will never
know, because the Serbs were presented with an
ultimatum at Rambouillet designed to start a war.

The Americans demanded that Serbia surrender its
sovereignty, exactly what the Austro-Hungarian Empire
demanded of Serbia following the assassination of the
Archduke Ferdinand in 1914. Back then the Serbs said no
and the Austrians launched World War I.

"Rambouillet," argues Dan Goure of the conservative
Center for Strategic and International Studies, "was
not a negotiation, it was a setup, a lynch party."

Was Yugoslavia "liberal intervention" like Haiti?
Questionable. There was a human rights crisis in
Kosovo, but it was the war that kicked off the worst
aspect of it, the forced expulsion of Albanians from
Kosovo. And unlike Haiti, in Yugoslavia the U.S. and
NATO went for the jugular. Power plants and water
pumping stations were bombed. The electrical grid and
energy systems were flattened, and transportation
networks were systemically destroyed. The bombing
campaign was a direct violation of articles 48, 51, and
54 of Protocol I, Part IV, of the Geneva Conventions.
In short, a war crime.

The allies also saturated the country with depleted
uranium and cluster bombs. Needless to say, the victims
of the war were primarily Serbian civilians.

The Yugoslav war was where "liberal intervention" ran
off the rails. The first sign of that was when the
Clinton administration sidelined the United Nations and
used the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)
instead. The U.S. dominates NATO in a way that it could
never hope to dominate the UN, and that fact allowed
the U.S. military to carry out the kind of war it
wanted, a war the UN might well have put the brakes on.

Not a NATO or UN War, But Another U.S. Affair In the
end it was hardly even a NATO war. The U.S. picked all
the targets, carried out upwards of 90% of the air
attacks, and excluded its allies from the operational
aspects of the war. It was, pure and simple, a U.S.
affair. It was also a dry run for a new kind of war,
one that maximized destruction and minimized
casualties.

Was it successful? Well, the Albanians have largely
cleansed Kosovo of the Serb and Roma minority
populations. NATO still occupies Kosovo. The
humiliation of the war, and its painful aftermath,
continues to stoke the fires of Serbian nationalism.
Serbia refuses to give up its war criminals. Success?
War has never produced "success" in the Balkans before,
why anyone thought it would this time is a mystery.

The most troubling aspect of the Yugoslav war was the
exclusion of the UN. It has been downhill ever since.
Afghanistan is a case in point. Yes, it was very nice
to rid Afghanistan of the Taliban (although we nursed
the pinion that impelled that steel), and it certainly
struck a blow at al Qaeda, the organization which
carried out the 9/11 attacks.

But again, it was a U.S. operation. The UN was
sidelined, and even NATO was brought in after the fact.
Our ally in Afghanistan was the homicidal Northern
Alliance , steeped in violence and drug dealing. And as
in Yugoslavia , the war was a high tech, slice-and-dice
air operation that killed lots of civilians. There was
an uncomfortable feeling that the war might be about
Central Asian oil and gas, but it was hard to protest
freeing Afghan women and ending the rule of the Mad
Mullahs.

Yet Afghanistan reflects the dangers of "liberal
intervention" by one country. The U.S. certainly "won"
the war, although the outcome was hardly in doubt. But
the war is not over. Indeed, it appears to be getting
worse, in part because the Bush administration spent
tens of billions busting up the place, but not a whole
lot putting it back together. Modern wars are not won
or lost on the battlefield s, they are won or lost in
the streets and byways of everyday life. Fix what you
break or the bill gets dear.

This is hardly a new observation. For 800-plus years
the English won every major "battle" in Ireland. In the
end they lost the war. It is a lesson the Israelis
should pay some attention to.

Haiti Illustrates Failures of Single-Power Intervention
Key Problems Seven weeks after the 1994 invasion of
Haiti, the Republicans took control of Congress and
systematically dismantled aid to the impoverished, war-
torn country. The opposition forces that converged on
Port au Prince are the very thugs and murderers the
U.S. invaded to get rid of in 1994. Whether through
enmity or indifference, U.S. fingerprints are all over
the overthrow of Aristide.

The 1994 Haiti intervention illustrates the problem of
single power intervention even when authorized by the
United Nations.

Seven weeks after the invasion, the Republicans took
control of Congress and systematically dismantled aid
to the impoverished, war-torn country.

The cuts meant there was no effort to rebuild roads,
ports, airports, or infrastructure. When Aristide’s
opposition cried foul over eight contested seats in the
2000 election, the U.S. froze the final $500 million in
aid.

The aid was never very substantial. Per capita, the
U.S. was giving Haiti one fifth what it was spending in
Bosnia, and one tenth what it was distributing in
Kosovo. After 1996, U.S. aid to Haiti was the same as
what it had given the dictatorship that deposed
Aristide. Aid did flow, but not to Aristide. Instead,
U.S. organizations like the National Endowment for
Democracy (NED) funneled hundreds of thousands of
dollars to the opposition.

Shortly after the demonstrations and attacks on
Aristide began, the U.S. State Department made it clear
it would do nothing to impede his overthrow. In early
February, an anonymous State Department official told
the New York Times that the U.S. was not adverse to
replacing Aristide, "When we talk about undergoing
change in the way Haiti is governed, I think that could
indeed involve changes in Aristide’s position," the
official said. This past week, shortly before Aristide
was driven out, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell,
and President George W. Bush, essentially called for
him to step down.

There is no question that the Aristide government was a
troubled one, and some of the opposition was composed
of former supporters alienated by corruption, violent
pro-Aristide gangs, and the contested 2000 election.
Most of this group was non-violent, and based mainly
among Haiti ’s elites and the business community. But
the forces that converged on Port au Prince are the
very thugs and murderers the U.S. invaded to get rid of
in 1994.

Louis-Jodel Chamblain, one of the principal leaders of
the armed opposition, is a former death-squad leader
and one of the founders of the brutal Front for the
Advancement of Progress in Haiti (FRAPH) that killed
thousands of people between 1991 and 1994.

The shady nature of people like Chamblain and Andre
Apaid of Group 184, has deeply worried human rights
groups, and generated some anger in Washington. U.S.
Representatives Barbara Lee (D-Ca) and Maxine Waters
(D-Ca) have both challenged the "neutrality" of the
U.S. State Department. In a recent letter to Powell,
Lee wrote, "with all due respect, this looks like
regime change." It would appear that Lee was right on
target.

There is certainly reason to suspect the two men in
charge of diplomacy in the region. Otto Reich , U.S.
Ambassador to the Organization of American States
(OAS), played an important role in the coup attempt
against Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, and U.S.
Assistant Secretary of State Robert Noriega, has been a
long-time critic of Aristide.

Whether through enmity or indifference, U.S.
fingerprints are all over the overthrow of Aristide.

Single-Power Intervention Responds to Single-Power
Interests If one could turn back the clock, and
transform the 20,000 American troops into a UN
peacekeeping force, working from the beginning in close
conjunction with the OAS and the Caribbean Community
(Caricom), the outcome might have been different. The
Republicans would still have sabotaged the U.S. part of
the aid package, but international aid would have kept
flowing since there would have been a real regional and
international commitment to the liberal intervention.
As it was, the U.S. insisted from the beginning on
total control of the peacekeeping venture. When U.S.
political will for the peacekeeping and nation-building
missions waned, there was no multilateral commitment to
ensure that the democratic transition was consolidated.

Which brings us back to the initial problem with
"liberal intervention." It may be a good idea at times,
but there are caveats.

First, intervention by one country, or even a group of
countries dominated by one country—NATO in
Yugoslavia—is a bad idea. Individual nations have
their own interests. Take the recent Iraq War. Maybe
some people invaded Iraq to get rid of Saddam Hussein.
Others might have deluded themselves into thinking
there were weapons of mass destruction, but anyone who
thinks it had nothing to do with Middle East oil simply
needs to do the math.

In 2001, Vice-President Dick Cheney’s National Energy
Policy Development Group recommended that the U.S.
"make energy security a priority of our trade and
foreign policy." It is hardly a surprising conclusion.
U.S. oil demands will increase by one third over the
next 20 years, and two thirds of that will be imported.
Since 65% of the world’s oil reserves lie in the Middle
East, one doesn’t need a crystal ball to predict
American policy in the region.

So was Iraq just about oil? No. Was it about oil? Of
course.

Second, an intervention that isn’t willing to invest in
raising living standards will fail. No single country
has the resources. Only international organizations can
spread out the costs necessary for the long-term work
needed to rebuild a country and to deflect the very
natural suspicion that "liberal intervention" is really
"occupation" by another name.

The Republicans call this "nation-building," and
everywhere but in Iraq the Republicans hate it.

But it isn’t nation-building, it’s payback.

Afghanistan is indeed poor and backward, but it would
have been less so if the colonial powers (and then the
cold war) had not played the "great game" at the
expense of its people.

Haiti is unquestionably a basket case. And don’t the
French who colonized it and the Americans who occupied
it and exploited it bear some responsibility for that
condition?

Colonialism smashed up the world, deliberately
squelched economic progress by the colonized, drew
arbitrary lines on maps, and sowed the dragon’s teeth
of ethnic division and uneven development. Do we now
get to shake our heads over "failed states," wash out
hands, and walk away?

From the Caribbean to Africa, the great imperial powers
loaded the dice for nations, and the world can ill
afford to let the consequences of this rigged game go
on. Does this mean military intervention on occasion?
Yes. But not under one flag, only under the auspices of
international organizations like the UN.

This strategy will have to confront the heart of the
Bush administration and its Praetorian Guard of think
tanks: the Heritage Foundation, the National Institute
for Policy Study, the American Enterprise Institute,
the Project for New American Century, and the Center
for Security Policy.

For these ideologues, international organizations—and
particularly the UN—are the anti-Christ. Last March,
neoconservative guru Richard Perle hailed the Iraq war
as an opportunity "to take the UN down."

It is interesting to note, however, that obituaries
about the UN’s imminent demise fall off in direct
relationship to the number of American casualties and
roadside bombs in Iraq. Back in February of last year,
President Bush warned the UN General Assembly that its
"last chance" to prove "its relevance" was to adopt a
war resolution against Iraq . For the past two months
the administration has literally begged the UN to bail
it out from the morass in which it is now entrapped.

A cynic might point out that the mills of God grind
slowly, but they do grind most exceedingly fine.

Key Solutions Unilateral "liberal intervention" is not
only a bad idea politically, it doesn’t work.
International intervention isn’t successful all the
time either, but its chances are better. Neocon
historian Max Boot describes the UN as a bunch of
"Lilliputians," which is exactly what is needed: power
restrained by laws, rules, and treaties. The U.S.
should immediately take the crisis in Haiti to the UN
Security Council, with a parallel effort in the OAS and
Caricom. The Haitian opposition members—both
nonviolent and violent—should understand that they
have no automatic claim to political legitimacy. The
hasty departure of the country’s duly elected president
Jean-Bertrand Aristide was the sad result of the threat
of massive political violence by feared former members
of Haiti’s security forces and intense U.S. pressure.
Haiti’s interim government should call quickly for new
elections under multilateral supervision.

Not only is unilateral "liberal intervention" a bad
idea politically, it doesn’t work. International
intervention isn’t successful all the time either, but
its chances are better. Neocon historian Max Boot
describes the UN as a bunch of "Lilliputians," which,
suggests Jorge Castenada, Mexico’s former foreign
minister, is exactly what is needed: power restrained
by laws, rules, and treaties. Successful intervention
doesn’t demand centralized command control, it requires
legions of doubting Thomases. In the case of Haiti, the
U.S. should immediately take the matter to the UN
Security Council, with a parallel effort in the OAS and
Caricom. The Haitian opposition members—both
nonviolent and violent—should understand that they
have no automatic claim to political legitimacy. The
hasty departure of the country’s duly elected president
Jean-Bertrand Aristide was the sad result of the threat
of massive political violence by feared former members
of Haiti’s security forces and intense strong-arming
and political pressure by the U.S. government. If
President Aristide did resign as has been widely
reported, then Haiti’s interim government should call
quickly for new elections under multilateral
supervision. What’s more, all U.S. aid should be
released immediately, and the International Monetary
Fund and the World Bank should back off from their
austerity prescriptions, which would only serve to
further impoverish the poorest country in the
hemisphere.

There are some who dismiss the OAS, and even the UN, as
little more than cat’s paws for U.S. policy, and
certainly both organizations have served as its hand
maidens in the past. Supporting the criminal sanctions
against Iraq was a shameful blot on the UN’s history,
and the OAS should have suspended the U.S. for
supporting the military coup in Venezuela.

But both organizations have independent streaks that
appear to be strengthening. In any case, they are the
only game in town, and the UN has scored some notable
successes. It helped end the Iran-Iraq war, facilitated
the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan, and has
overseen elections in El Salvador, East Timor, and
Eritrea. It also had disastrous failures in Rwanda and
Bosnia. In the long run, however, it is the only
serious solution to international crises.

Sir Brian Urquhart, author of A Life in Peace and War,
and a longtime UN diplomat who has served from the
Congo to the Middle East, recently put his finger on
why the UN still represents the best hope for the
world: "The world is a dangerous place," he says, "and
when governments find themselves into another dangerous
muddle, they will come back."

[Conn M. Hallinan is a provost at the University of
California, Santa Cruz, and an analyst for Foreign
Policy In Focus (online at www.fpif.org). He can be
reached at .]

Published by Foreign Policy In Focus (FPIF), a joint
project of the Interhemispheric Resource Center (IRC,
online at www.irc-online.org) and the Institute for
Policy Studies (IPS, online at www.ips-dc.org). ©2004.
All rights reserved.

Recommended Citation Conn Hallinan, "Haiti: Dangerous
Muddle," Foreign Policy In Focus (Silver City, NM:
Interhemispheric Resource Center, March 2004).

Web location: http://www.fpif.org/papers/2004haiti.html