Haiti: Can We ‘Do The Right Thing’? : Concessions to Make a Democracy

There was a picture of a carnival procession, men, women and children wearing bright masks. Of a morning. . .The harsh colors gave an impression of gaiety, the drummers and trumpeters seemed about to play a lively air. Only when you came closer you saw how ugly the masks were and how the masquers surrounded a cadaver in grave-clothes; then the primitive colors went flat. . .Wherever that picture hung, I would feel Haiti close to me.

Graham Greene, “The Comedians” 1965

If you knew Haiti, it was an amazing sight--those helicopters like giant insects buzzing over the beautiful, ravaged land; men in camouflage landing and taking up combat positions at the little airport as if this might be their war, and all the Haitians waving and cheering. You wondered if the Americans had secured the airport’s gift shop and bookstore and the little bar. You hoped they were buying up Creole dictionaries.

You could tell the Haitian military was not supporting the U.S. intervention because the Haitian people had not been given tiny American flags to wave in front of the TV cameras. (When Jean-Claude (Baby Doc) Duvalier fell and the Americans spirited him out of the country, the people had the flags.) At the bottom of the screen on CNN, a cutline ran: U.S. Occupation of Haiti. If you knew about the Americans’ 1915 landing in Haiti, it was like a deja vu you had never really vu ‘d.

History makes you pessimistic. The words being used were Army-bureaucratese, circa Vietnam: “permissive entry,” “administrative landing.” The style, too, was Vietnam: cooperation with dictators.

It was odd--after the “success” of the Carter Mission--to watch all the television people congratulating themselves and the U.S. team on a successful venture (No U.S. soldiers hurt!) when you knew what a capitulation we had made to the Haitian generals--butchers on Thursday, and honorable on Monday. Of course, for many TV commentators, last Thursday, with President Bill Clinton examining graphic photographs of Haitian Lt. Gen. Raoul Cedras’ victims, was as far away and forgettable as 1915.

On July 28, 1915, we invaded Haiti with one ship and one battalion. We conquered in a day. It wasn’t very bloody--two sailors died, victims of random shootings. The Haitian Army, even more pathetic than now, was immediately disarmed. We stayed for 19 years, in which we used Haitian slave labor to build roads for Haiti, and alienated the population, while waging an intermittent and brutal war against anti-American guerrillas.

This time around, the intervention was even less bloody, but by the second day of the occupation, Haitians were already paying with their blood for the “bloodless” incursion. At least two Haitians have been killed by the still-ruling Haitian authorities since the occupation began--one in Cite Soleil (an Aristide stronghold) and one, a hapless coconut vendor helping the crowd celebrate the Americans’ arrival, killed by a policeman’s baton. Who knows how many died in the provinces, with all cameras trained on the capital. And no one is sure what the term of the occupation is to be, or what its goals are.

The result of the Carter mission was a shock to the Aristide government--which up through last Sunday night had been talking with U.S. officials in some detail about the transition to democracy and the disarming of the Haitian forces. With a gun to their heads, the Haitian military, about to be invaded by a force that is--to put it mildly--vastly superior, got the following concessions:

You can stay in power until the end of your appointed term.

You leave hororably.

You and your men receive complete amnesty for all crimes committed.

You remain in Haiti if you so desire.

Exiled President Jean-Bertrand Aristide’s return is not mentioned.

The army retains all its weapons.

The embargo will be lifted while the junta is still in power.

You will be consulted respectfully on occupation strategy and military planning.

Lt. Col. Michel Francois will not be included in this agreement.

The Administration will sign this agreement with de facto President Emile Jonaissant, whose government the United States does not recognize.

It used to be that when you put a gun to someone’s head, he begged for mercy. Of course, he has to believe you’re willing to shoot, and he has to believe the gun is loaded with bullets not blanks. In this case, we put a gun to his head, and then we begged him for mercy. The dirty secret is the Clinton Administration didn’t want to invade and the generals knew it. They really had the upper hand.

Why? One theory is that it has always been the U.S. plan to allow the Haitian military to remain more or less intact, and to grant the leaders of the coup and its bloody aftermath some kind of legal amnesty. After all, the military is the only institution that works in Haiti--or so the U.S. Embassy in Port-au-Prince believes.

This theory goes on to postulate that though Jimmy Carter was the front man for this mission, Gen. Colin L. Powell was the important figure as far as the Haitian generals were concerned. (They’d been asking to have him as negotiator for more than a year.) Powell is himself a Caribbean military man (Jamaican by birth), with sympathies for the difficult position the Haitian generals find themselves in. He is also a military man who knows how to deal with military men.

For all who wondered why Aristide did not say thanks the day after Carter returned, well, there was nothing to be thankful for. No date was set for his return; if he does return he may have to return with his enemies still covertly at the head of the army and living in Haiti; the United States--by signing the agreement with Jonaissant--essentially recognized the de facto government for the first time.

Carter’s behavior after the discussions was both insulting to the Aristide government and nothing short of loopy: failing to mention the democratically elected Aristide government, praising Cedras as “honorable,” describing Jonaissant as forceful; dandling Cedras’ son on his knee.

Although Aristide and his people have seen enough of the U.S. government to know not to expect things to be straightforward, they were understandably nonplussed by the upshot of the final negotiation. But in the end, Aristide bit the diplomatic bullet and said “merci.” He said thank you in exchange for the 21-gun salute for a head of state on the steps of the Pentagon in front of network news cameras. Not a bad deal. That was one photo-op whose implications will be hard for the Administration to renege on.

In spite of the many disastrous aspects of the Carter-Cedras “compromise,” one may emit a cautious cough of approval for certain aspects of what’s happening--not forgetting that the idea of an invasion was wrongheaded from the start.

First, since the incursion wasn’t resisted by the Haitian Army’s high command, perhaps thousands of Haitians who would otherwise have been killed by soldiers and paramilitary shock troops in the hours just before and after the invasion have been spared. Second, many young American soldiers are getting a good education about what’s going on in Haiti. Third, Americans have abandoned the illogical idea that they can “guarantee civic order” without interfering in Haitian-on-Haitian violence. Fourth, one must assume the Americans intend, slowly, to disarm, downsize and reconfigure the Haitian armed forces. If not, why are we there? The Army is the problem in Haiti.

There are steps the Americans can take to make the Haitian people more confidant about the long-term goals of the occupation. Haitians must be allowed to demonstrate in favor of democracy--if only to prove that the U.S. presence has changed something. A date must be set for Aristide’s return; Francois, head of the Port-au-Prince police and paramilitary, must be dealt with and his men disarmed.

In addition, a blanket amnesty for all those who committed crimes during the past three years must be rejected by the U.S. government because democracy cannot be constructed in a country that has never resolved the issues of its past; an impartial international and Haitian truth commission (excluding Carter) must be established for making recommendations in war-crime cases, and Cedras and Army Chief of Staff Phillipe Biamby must be exiled or brought to trial.

When progressives point out that Aristide was duly elected by 67% of the Haitian people, men like Cedras and Biamby always retort that Adolf Hitler, too, was elected. But this is not true. Hitler, as head of the Nazi Party, was appointed chancellor by President Paul von Hindenburg in 1933. Hitler then staged corrupt elections that gave his party’s coalition a slender parliamentary majority. The Fuhrer then ruled by decree during the rest of the Nazi period.

In the United States, much of the battle over Haiti policy during the past three years has been waged with such slogans and slurs. Now it’s time get real. We’re there. No matter who wins the fight in Congress and the U.S. media over what Aristide’s real personality is like--and the fight has little to do with fact--it’s clear that the Clinton Administration believes there can be no democratic resolution to the Haitian crisis without the man who represents Haitian democracy.

Bringing Aristide back implies a real U.S. commitment to democracy in Haiti. Once he’s back, the Haitian people will feel that positive change is again possible.

Clinton said he would invade Haiti to do “the right thing.” Now that he’s pulled off an occupation to kudos from almost all his enemies, he should profit from that position of power to mark himself off from previous U.S. Administrations, distance himself from the Haitian army and begin working with the Aristide government and other respectable Haitian elements to bring about justice, reconciliation and a lasting peace.

* HAITI: Please see related article by Henry A. Kissenger on Page 2.