Community Policing, Haiti Style

Today’s worries about Haiti:

1. HAITI’S MILITARY: Lt. Gen. Hugh Shelton, leader of the U.S. expeditionary force, reports excellent cooperation between the American and Haitian military commands. Fine, but let’s hope they’re not about to become blood brothers. Keep in mind that the reason we’re there is the Haitian military. This is an army that has existed not to defend the country but to repress the Haitian people at the behest of the country’s ruling economic elite. Raoul Cedras has not been running any Salvation Army. Haitian police and soldiers beat at least one person to death Tuesday. Any superficial commonalities between the Haitian and American forces should not blind the U.S. officials there to the profound differences between them.

2. POLICING HAITI: The dramatic agreement signed Sunday in Port-au-Prince permits the Haitian military and police forces to continue to police that troubled country. Good luck. Aren’t the island nation’s troubles only compounded by an arrangement in which the Haitian military continues to do its thing as the U.S. military force, climbing rapidly toward 15,000-strong, looks the other way? U.N. Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali will be understandably reluctant to commit U.N. peacekeepers to the subsequent phases until the U.S. forces can create what a U.N. resolution calls “a secure and stable environment.” How can that be done without U.S. troops taking over the policing role from the Haitian military? There is absolutely no reason to believe that police accustomed to bullying citizens (and far worse) will suddenly change from persecutor to protector.

3. ARISTIDE’S ICINESS: Exiled President Jean-Bertrand Aristide is not happy that the Haitian military is still involved in running things and that Cedras is still around. OK, but maybe the ousted leader could be more pragmatic: After all, U.S. armed forces are there and the chemistry in his country is now quite different. No one thinks that the American deal with the junta is ideal, by any means; but U.S. policy, however flawed and bumbling, is committed. Aristide’s coldness does not auger well for Aristide-Washington relations down the road.