President Clinton’s Policy on Haiti

President Clinton’s Haiti policy has been a disaster from the beginning because it has never been grounded in a coherent and consistent definition of America’s vital interests. Candidate Clinton’s initial Haitian strategy had as its primary goal the vilification of President Bush’s policy. Its shallow roots were exposed when Clinton reversed himself almost immediately after taking office and adopted his predecessor’s policy.

Now, Clinton seems to have forgotten one of the essential lessons that we learned painfully in Vietnam, Lebanon, and, more recently, in Somalia and Bosnia--that the U.S. should not try to impose political solutions on other countries, regardless of how well-intentioned our motives.

America has a legitimate interest in supporting democracy in Haiti. The real question, however, is whether the restoration of President Aristide is of sufficient national interest to invest the most precious capital that the U.S. has to offer--the lives of the men and women who wear the uniform of this country. The answer is no.

JAMES M. FITZGERALD

La Jolla

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* Why is it, I wonder, that most of ex-President Reagan’s and Bush’s appointees are so quick to point out all the constitutional ramifications of Clinton’s actions and plans while they were so very, very silent during their own terms?

I refer to Doug Bandow’s Column Right (July 7). He asks, referring to Haiti, “Should young Americans die to ‘restore’ democracy in a nation with no democratic tradition?” Has he forgotten Grenada, Lebanon, Nicaragua (CIA), Kuwait, Panama and Somalia? Only in Kuwait, as he admits, did the President stoop to ask Congress for authorization to sacrifice American lives for the same reasons he seems to damn Clinton for.

As a Vietnam veteran, I surely do not agree with the necessity of ever endangering our military’s lives for any reason not completely founded on our national security. It’s just that I do so wish the political diseases of hypocrisy and short-term memory loss could be cured in all parties.

JOHN CANNON

Olancha

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* Robert E. White (Commentary, July 6) argues with the “purists” who worry about potential U.S. invasion of Haiti, even though we decry the cruel usurpers on that tragic island. Our worries are legitimate. They are based on U.S. occupation of Haiti, which ended 60 years ago but left an unending legacy of rule by the few rich and well-connected, and misery for the rest.

Our worries are based on our recent history of virtually unilateral war against Iraq, which may have been initiated by Presidents Reagan and Bush, but was and is pursued mercilessly by the Clinton Administration. I would like to entrust Haiti’s rescue and President Aristide’s reinstatement to a broad international coalition of which the U.S. is only an obedient part. But I can’t.

HELEN L. TRAVIS

San Pedro

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* Haiti has long been recognized as one of the poorest countries in the Western Hemisphere. The boat people dilemma, however, is a relatively recent development. As inconvenient and burdensome as that is for its powerful neighbor, this issue must not be dismissed merely as a case of the poor in search of greener pastures.

The solution seems rather simple: Rescue the victims, or remove the predators, or perhaps a combination of the two. The world community would applaud.

JEAN G. NICOLAS

Fullerton