[_fat_santa]

I'm surprised the last of the elected officials didn't call for foreign intervention, though I'm sure no country wants to go in there and fight the street gangs for control.

I think the US would have the best shot of restoring order (assuming the Hatian govt asked them). I would imagine no gang in Haiti wants to (or is even capable of) a ground war with the US Army, so the "intervention" would be 90% aid and 10% a show of power.

But who knows. I'm Monday Couch Quarterbacking this.

[AdamJacobMuller]

> I would imagine no gang in Haiti wants to (or is even capable of) a ground war with the US Army, so the "intervention" would be 90% aid and 10% a show of power.

The mechanics and operations of a ground war against a civillian population are terrible.

"surely the US will dominate because we have tanks and missiles and nuclear bombs!"

The net situation seems to me to be that you're fighting in civillian-dense areas against a group which is difficult to distinguish from civillians meaning your operations and people are absurdly constrained while theirs are very open and free.

Every mistake you make (and you're going to make mistakes) compounds to make people hate the invaders more (regardless of how altruistic the mission may be) and pushes more people to their side.

Every loss you incur on your side erodes your political support back home and hardens your troops against the population (those bastards killed kenny).

It's an incredibly vicious cycle which seems unwinnable.

Did we forget the lessons from Iraq and Afghanistan so soon?

[somenameforme]

I don't think people really understand or think about what happened in Afghanistan. Like maybe we were just holding back or something. The final drone strike we carried out in Afghanistan is both deeply symbolic and enlightening. We killed a guy, his family, and bystanders including 7 children. The reason is that somebody thought the water bottles the guy was loading into his truck looked suspicious, so that was a good enough reason to kill him and everybody around him - even knowing full well this strike was likely to receive far more attention than average.

The army initially claimed they took out a terrorist with a vehicle full of explosives. They blamed any 'collateral damage' on secondary explosive discharges. The excessive scrutiny on this, the final symbolic drone strike, revealed those water bottles were full of water. And not only were the target and his family not terrorists, they were aid workers literally working for a US NGO in the process of trying to get a visa to the US. Nobody was held accountable or punished in any way. [1]

The point of this is that we certainly weren't "holding back" or anything of the sort. We were absolutely brutal in Afghanistan, and this went on for 20 years. But ultimately winning an occupation against a civilian population that is both hostile and armed, is basically impossible. Afghanistan now has the honor of being the only country to have defeated both the USSR and the USA. And they did it, for the most part, with "obsolete" weapons and improvised explosives, all while kitted out in robes and sandals.

[1] - https://www.newsweek.com/afghan-targeted-us-drone-strike-wor...

[AdamJacobMuller]

> I don't think people really understand or think about what happened in Afghanistan.

I hope that's not true. I know it's more present for me because I lost family there, but, I was against the wars long before that and I'm against them long after he died.

> The point of this is that we certainly weren't "holding back" or anything of the sort.

You misunderestimate the power of the US Military. We could have reduced the entire country to ashes, and it probably would have cost a fraction of what it ultimately cost the US.

> But ultimately winning an occupation against a civilian population that is both hostile and armed, is basically impossible.

Yes.

[polski-g]

> But ultimately winning an occupation against a civilian population that is both hostile and armed, is basically impossible

Spain and the United States used to do that all the time. Just look at the indian tribes. You just have to be willing to be mean (wipe out nearly every male).

[mrguyorama]

You cannot wipe out a population that looks and acts identical to a population you are unwilling to wipe out.

[polski-g]

Which is why Spain and USA did what they did.

[blockwriter]

I just watched Black Hawk Down for the first time. That was a bleak portrait of international intervention against irregular forces.

[throwayyy479087]

Every single time we do this, it's held up by the rest of the world as evidence of the US being a bloodthirsty colonial power.

Another comment said "Haiti refuses to hold themselves to any standards" - I agree, knowing a lot of Haitian-Americans. _Those_ people are lovely, and their stories of what dealing with the government, cops, and local enterprise is horrible. Most do very well here and refuse to ever return. Haiti seems permanently fucked, some say it has to do with the history with France, some with the breakup of the farmland. I'm not sure, but I'm not sending my son to die for their corruption.

[AdamJacobMuller]

We did a poor job, especially in our most recent situations in Iraq/Afghanistan.

Granted, I'm not sure it's actually possible to do this job well, I think there are flaws in the system and human nature which intrinsically make it impossible to do it. See: Abu Ghraib among many other options.

[throwayyy479087]

We do a poor job because it’s not possible to square the circle with our stated rules of engagement.

Russia did a GREAT job with Syria, they’ve managed to nearly end the war. They brutally murdered anyone that was opposed to their puppets and didn’t follow rules about protecting civilians, but they did win. I don’t think purging corruption from Haiti is possible without something similar.

[AdamJacobMuller]

We could save Haiti by carpet bombing it, killing everyone there and hanging a "free land" sign on the door and telling the Dominican Republic to have at it.

I know you're not actually advocating that :)

My point is (and I think we largely agree) is that peacekeeping or nationbuilding missions like what we would need to do in Haiti are incredibly difficult, if not impossible. Too permissive and the opposing forces have free reign and take over. Too harsh and you turn the average population against you and they start supporting the opposing forces and now you're just fighting a whole country. It's a lose/lose.

[cafard]

The USMC imposed order in Haiti in the 1920s. The rules of engagement were pretty damned loose.

[AdamJacobMuller]

Somehow I didn't know about this.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_occupation_of_Ha...

The parallels to the current situation are uncanny. I hope we don't make the same mistakes again.

[Armisael16]

They did, back in October: https://apnews.com/article/caribbean-united-nations-port-au-...

As you say, no country wants to get involved. The US would be the most capable power in the area, but it’s almost impossible to imagine that ending well.

[rayiner]

That would be a shocking violation of Haiti's sovereignty. It would be colonialism.

Civil wars are sometimes a necessary thing in the organic development of a nation. In general, it's not the business of other countries to prevent them.

[noworriesnate]

Exactly! For Europeans to develop to the point they could dominate the rest of the world, they took a thousand years to recover from Roman imperialism and develop distinct ethic/national identities. We have to not interfere with the third world and be willing to not interfere for a thousand years for them to sociologically mature to the point they can operate effectively in the first world.

The solution to problems caused by imperialism is never more imperialism. The solution to such problems can only come from within those people.

[whythre]

Sounds like a good rationale for letting a lot of people die right now.

[Someone]

> I'm surprised the last of the elected officials didn't call for foreign intervention

There was such a call in October last year, but the population doesn’t seem to want an intervention (https://therealnews.com/haitians-reject-us-oas-calls-for-for...). That’s not completely surprising, given the recent UN mission that

- seems to have imported cholera into the country from Nepal (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Stabilisation_M...)

- had UN peacekeepers rape citizens (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Stabilisation_M...)

[kjs3]

The US has a problematic history of intervention in Haiti, so we aren't the first choice of pretty much anyone on the ground. And consensus is Haiti isn't where anyone is going to be able to shoot their way to a solution. There have been some negotiations around getting Canada to lead an intervention [1], but that hasn't apparently gone too far. So...it'll get a lot worse for most Haitians before it gets better.

[1] https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/trudeau-haiti-intervention-....

[throwayyy479087]

Honestly, it should be the French. If there were a Black African Francophone country that had the spare resources, that would be even better - maybe Algeria in 50 years. I don't think that Haiti wants a bunch of Yankees running around, with our crappy history there.

[kjs3]

You're probably not wrong, but the French have some crappy history there as well, and haven't had much luck with conflict intervention in former colonies recently (see: Mali). The only certainty is that it's a really complicated problem.

[panick21_]

You don't need to fight a 'ground war' to cause a whole lot of problems. And you risk radicalizing the people.

[ashwagary]

I have a strong feeling Haitians even in their worst position have had enough of US interference.

[throwayyy479087]

Correct. We should stay out of the whole thing, for the benefit of everyone.

[ss108]

> But who knows. I'm Monday Couch Quarterbacking this.

You should start a talk radio program or a podcast or something

[ergvgdvgrd]

Like how Baltimore is a law abiding paradise?

[hulitu]

"Operation Helping Hand "

[sasattack]

The cia arms both the gangs, why would they fight them

[krapp]

I don't know why you're getting downvoted, in a few decades we'll probably find out the CIA was behind all of this.