What did the U.S. offer Kenya in terms of a promise to organize a force to go to Haiti and try to restore order?
It’s certainly not a suicide mission. Haiti’s incompetence has been so bad for so many years that civil society can only be introduced with a bayonet. Kenyan police are unable to bring law and order into a country without laws or order.
Kenya agreed to send Haiti 1,000 police officers to train their local police force and promised to form an international coalition to provide additional security assistance.
It is not surprising that the United Nations has thrown in the towel on the whole affair.
Stephanie Tremblay is a spokesperson for Antonio Guterres the U.N. Secretary-General. She said, “They do not ask for a peacekeeping mission” in Haiti. They are asking for international assistance, not from the U.N.
What about a force that is not UN but is still international? What could possibly go wrong?
Who do you think is going to be the one to come to the rescue if something goes wrong — which seems likely given the current state of Haiti — and save the international force from the fire? Haiti was a French colony so we might be able to convince France to come in and save us. You can be sure that President Emmanuel Macron will not make a move towards Haiti without the help of his friend Joe Biden.
Matthew Miller, the spokesperson for the U.S. State Department, said that after the assessment mission is completed, the U.S. State Department will discuss with the other members of the multinational force what assistance the other countries may need.
But the UN’s history in Haiti is a tainted one.
New York Times:
Haiti’s history with the world body is complicated. It deployed thousands of troops from 2005 to 2017 after political turmoil and natural disasters. The soldiers were responsible for bringing cholera into Haiti which killed more than 10,000 people. But the United Nations took a long time to accept responsibility. Human rights groups also accused the troops of sexual abuse, impregnating hundreds of women and abandoning them.
Antonio Guterres is the U.N. Secretary-General. He has been criticizing the rich nations for refusing international aid to Haiti, and for not sending troops to the meat grinder.
Not just any black troops will do. Not just any black troops will do
Jean Jonassaint is a professor at Syracuse University and an expert on Haiti. She said, “I do not think 1,000 soldiers from Kenya can solve the problems in Haiti. They don’t know French or Haitian Creole and they cannot communicate directly with the population.” “And I do not think they are trained to deal with the gangs.”
It’s like watching two trains running on the same track at high speed, with their engineers blindfolded but the passengers asleep. There’s no stopping a collision.
