Haiti's capital Port-au-Prince has become a war zone as gangs fight for control of city streets, making normal life impossible.
Earlier in the week, gangs attacked the National Assembly building only to be dislodged after fierce fighting by Hait's police/military force. With 80% of the capital under the control of heavily armed gangs, the State Department ordered all nonessential personnel out of the capital.
It wasn't an easy evacuation. The helicopter airlift happened in the middle of the night and involved dozens of aircraft.
“This airlift of personnel into and out of the embassy is consistent with our standard practice for embassy security augmentation worldwide, and no Haitians were on board the military aircraft,” the statement said.
“President Biden approved the operation,” the official said. “He has been briefed, receives updates from his team, and is deeply concerned about the situation in Haiti.”
The embassy remains open — for now. The Marine protection detail, in charge of embassy security on a daily basis, have had their force augmented with additional Marines. It's unknown how long they'll stay and what their role will be.
The gangs are demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Ariel Henry, who was in Kenya looking for help in creating an international force to restore order in his country. But Kenya's high court ruled any help would be unconstitutional and Henry flew back home empty-handed.
His troubles weren't over, however.
Henry, who is facing calls to resign or form a transitional council, remains unable to return home. He arrived in Puerto Rico on Tuesday after he was unable to land in the Dominican Republic, which borders Haiti.
On Saturday, the office of Dominican President Luis Abinader issued a statement saying that “Henry is not welcome in the Dominican Republic for safety reasons.” The Dominican Republic, which shares the island of Hispaniola with Haiti, has closed its land border.
“Given the current situation, the presence of the Haitian prime minister in the Dominican Republic is not considered appropriate,” according to the statement, adding that “this decision reflects the firm position of the Dominican government to safeguard its national security and stability.”
The whole rest of the world is waiting for America to once again shoulder the load of entering an impossible security situation and sacrificing our soldiers so the rest of them can sit back and tell us what a lousy job we're doing and how many international laws we're breaking.
Biden isn't exactly telling them to go to hell, but I wish he would. He's still trying to cobble together an international force of peacekeepers to restore order and allow elections to be held. But the U.S. will do that without the help of Henry, who is wildly unpopular in the country,
Still, Biden is refusing to throw U.S. troops into the Haitian briar patch. In an election year, Americans coming home in body bags is not a good look.
“In all, the U.S. military and its proxies have been in Haiti for at least 41 of the last 108 years, always in the name of securing peace, political stability, and human rights — and never actually succeeding in doing so,” Jonathan M. Katz wrote for Foreign Policy magazine last year.
The Caricom regional trade bloc has been notably ineffective in trying to get regional actors to convince various groups to come together to form some kind of transitional government.
Caricom said Friday that while regional leaders remain deeply engaged in trying to bring opposition parties and civil society groups together to form a unity government, “the stakeholders are not yet where they need to be.”
“We are acutely aware of the urgent need for consensus to be reached,” according to the statement. “We have impressed on the respective parties that time is not on their side in agreeing to the way forward. From our reports, the situation on the ground remains dire and is of serious concern to us.”
In February, Henry agreed to hold a general election by mid-2025, and the international community has tried to find some foreign armed force willing to fight gang violence there.
The combined Haitian police/military force is not up to the task of restoring or maintaining order. There may come a time in the near future when the U.S. will have to evacuate its remaining personnel and abandon Haiti to chaos.
Unless there is a collective effort by the world community to save Haiti, the U.S. should not be the only nation left standing when the music stops in this deadly game of musical chairs.
