Haiti has had its share of turmoil over the last several decades, but nothing compares to the situation in which it now finds itself in with armed gangs.
has so many problems at the moment that you would need three hands to account for them all. The country has had its fair share ofroaming the country, with the most powerful located in the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince. Haiti hasn’t held an election in eight years, its last president was assassinated in his home , and there isn’t a single elected officeholder in the country. TheOn top of all the political and economic problems lies a security catastrophe.
Even in an ideal world where the gangs were eliminated, Haiti’s problems would continue to be there. The gangs, in fact, are as much a symptom of the disease as they are the cause. Haitian politicians have spent decades using criminal elements to do their bidding, whether it’s undermining political rivals, trying to get supporters to the polls, or stifling the vote.
The institutions that make up the state rest on very thin foundations, a consequence in part of the multiple foreign interventions that have been conducted by the United States and the U.N. since the early 20th century. If anything, those interventions only made Haiti’s combustible situation even worse. If you don’t believe me, just read about the U.N.’s 17-year mission in the country, when U.N.
The difference between then and now, however, is stark. Back then, the U.S. believed it could at least be a part of the solution. Yet the Haiti of today is seemingly immune to foreign-imposed schemes. Right now, the U.S. and its partners in the Caribbean are betting on another foreign intervention to pull Haiti from the abyss. The Biden administration has agreed to fund the Kenya-led stabilization force to the tune of $200 million, and the plans have already been approved by the U.N.
But if Haiti’s history has taught us anything, it’s that boots in the area aren’t a cure-all. Assuming the 1,000-strong Kenyan-led force actually deploys , the Kenyans will encounter gangs that are more powerful than the Haitian police with whom they are ostensibly going to partner. Nobody really knows how the mission is supposed to work.
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