CRISIS IN THE CARIBBEAN : Haitian American Troops Part of Evolving Political Thrust : Occupation: Creation of special team is one example of a new approach to win civilians’ hearts and minds.

As part of a small U.S. Army patrol outside the airport here, Marine Sgt. Roland J. Daniel talked and laughed with the throng of Haitians staring Wednesday at the huge military buildup across the street. But a shock rippled through the crowd whenever Daniel spoke, for as the Haitians observed, here was a Haitian American who had come home.

Daniel carefully translated the Haitians’ comments from Creole into English for Sgt. Charles Crouch of the Army’s 10th Mountain Division. Crouch was leading a special unit to gauge the mood of the Haitian people, and he listened quietly as Daniel described the reaction to American occupation.

“It makes a big difference to have a translator with us out here,” Crouch said, as the crowd closed in around Daniel, who was flown in from Okinawa to help the Army as it struggles to figure out what is going on in this capital’s streets.

Watching as people mobbed Daniel, Crouch whispered: “Hearts and minds, hearts and minds.”

After Tuesday’s violence between Haitian police and demonstrators--conflict witnessed by U.S. troops, who did not intervene--Crouch’s mission to make friendly contact with ordinary Haitians gained new urgency.

Virtually all U.S. troops here were kept isolated Wednesday from Haitians. But for American personnel here--even enlisted men--it is growing clearer that the U.S. operation in Haiti has quickly become more political and humanitarian than military.

And for many U.S. soldiers here, that kind of mission--including the possibility of intractable civil strife--brought back troubled images of Somalia.

But officers here and back home insist that American forces this time are better prepared than ever before for the political and social aspects of a U.S. involvement in a troubled land.

They stress that in planning for the Haiti mission, they studied the Somalia intervention and hope to avoid the mistakes they believe U.S. forces made there. Above all, the Americans said they want to avoid another situation where the initial enthusiasm for a U.S. force turns to bitterness, antagonism and violence.

“I think, in this instance, we have come closest to welding governmental power from all branches of the government, the military, the State Department. . . ,” said one Army planner. “This is the first time I’ve seen us do it as a team, rather than have the military go off and do its thing and the State Department go off on its own.”

The creation of a team of Creole-speaking, Haitian American soldiers--recruited from across the U.S. military--is just one example of the new approach.

Senior officers here said the Pentagon combed personnel files and selected hundreds of active-duty military personnel of Haitian ancestry to be translators and mediators and to tackle other assignments all across Haiti.

“Our duties are not really defined. We were just attached to the unit,” said Army Lt. Rodrique Alexandre, a Haitian native who came to the United States 13 years ago and was brought in from Germany to work with the Army’s 519th Military Intelligence Unit. “Our motto with this operation is Semper Gumby-- always flexible,” stressed one officer.

Besides the special corps of Haitian Americans, the Pentagon also will soon dispatch a force of civil affairs specialists, largely reservists. Army officials said they hope to deploy 159 such personnel to help minimize civilian interference with U.S. military operations and to keep key roads open to U.S. troops.

U.S. troops will not set up feeding programs for the Haitians, but the civil affairs experts will coordinate such international aid efforts with private groups.

Ultimately, these experts will help in “nation-building”--a vital task that many Army officers feel was neglected in Somalia. The civil affairs experts will fan out across Haiti, officials said, to determine the condition of government services; assess and repair roads and utilities, and work on other parts of rebuilding this shattered country.

Still, even as they tackle this difficult job, the Americans will limit their activity so they can avoid creating excessive expectations among Haitians, hopes that cannot be fulfilled after the much-promised, speedy withdrawal of U.S. forces, Army officials said.

As for the Haitian American soldiers who have been recruited to work here, they said there is almost a surreal quality to their return. They said they strongly support the American intervention and believe that, while the return of ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide will not solve Haiti’s problems, it will be an improvement over the military dictatorship.

“The people I talk to are scared, and they want to know how long we are going to stay to help them,” Daniel said.

But for Haitian American soldiers, personal concerns weigh almost as heavily on their minds as the larger political issues. And those concerns tell much about conditions here.

Daniel, for instance, said he won’t contact relatives, some of whom live just a few miles from the U.S. base at the airport; he fears that if other Haitians know of their connection to him, his relatives may face retribution after U.S. troops leave.

“You know,” Daniel observed, looking past the concertina wire surrounding the airport at the crowd of Haitians, “I was in Saudi Arabia and I was in Somalia to help people. So I figured, ‘Why not help out here too?’ But even though this used to be my home, I always remember that I’m on one side of the wire and they are on the other, and that wire is there for the security of me and my people wearing green.”