This is part 4 of my 4 part series on Haiti, we’ll finish up with Moise’s story and talk a little bit about the current situation in Haiti and what I think will probably happen. Haiti has a wild history with a lot of foreign actors involved. If you’re more interested in a accurate telling of the history, historian Mike Duncan did a 19 part podcast series going through the whole thing (link).
Alright, let’s get back to the show.
Death & Taxes
On the morning of July 7th 2021, a group of assailants raided the home of president Jovenel Moise. As they made their way and breached the property, they screamed “DEA!” over a megaphone multiple times. Feigning authority is always a good psychological trick. Jovenel was alleged to be a participant in the drug trade, this trick was to fool the public. Jovenel’s security team would of still fired on the attackers, DEA or not they don’t have any authority over a president. Unfortunately, Jovenel’s security team was compromised. Some of them were missing that night and the few that were present stood aside and let the attackers through.
Jovenel was severely beaten then shot, his wife sustained minor injuries in the attack.
The assailants left Jovenel’s house with bags of money, documents and other valuables. Jovenel was allegedly holding between $45 million and $53 million in cash. Holding these amounts in cash raises eyebrows on what “business” the US backed president was really in, but this was never fully investigated.
After the raid, Haitian authorities initiated a manhunt for the assailants. Be advised, from this point on the story get’s way too blurry for my taste. It’s alleged that Haitian police got into several gunfights with the assailants killing four. Eventually the Haitian police cornered most of them in a property and arrested them. The hunt continued and within 30 days 44 suspects had been arrested, 18 of them being Columbian mercenaries that were allegedly in Haiti to do security work. Some elite Haitian businessmen were also arrested in connection to the assassination:
Samir Handal - arrested by Interpol in Turkey but Turkey rejected an extradition request from Haiti and released him.
Rodolphe Jaar - arrested in the Dominican Republic, extradited to the US and got a life sentence for conspiracy and material aid.
Jovenel’s wife Martine Moise was also indicted for complicity.
To this day, the mastermind behind the assassination in still unknown.
I’m reluctant to fully believe all of this as fact because of the corrupt nature of the Haitian police. Presidential protection falls under the national police of Haiti (PNH), they betrayed their own president and stood by as he got assassinated. This same police force cannot be trusted as a reliable source of information. From the day this assassination happened I knew we would never figure out who was behind it, the Haitian police would most likely try to interfere with any meaningful investigation. Don’t get me wrong, there are still very good Haitian police officers fighting the good fight to this day and stacking “gang member” bodies as we speak but… They’re the few.
Aftermath and Today
After Moise got assassinated he was replaced by his Foreign Minister Claude Joseph. Claude requested security aid from the US and UN but was rejected. This would have been a great opportunity for the US to put a lid on this situation early and get rid of the gangs but they choses not to most likely for “optics”.
8/10 members of Haiti's Senate chose the Senate speaker Joseph Lambert as the interim President and Ariel Henry as the interim Prime Minister. Again, the Haitian government process was interfered with by the “international community” and they chose to recognize Ariel as the president instead and even told him to form his government. One reoccurring theme with any story involving Haiti is how weak they are to foreign interference.
Today, 80% of Haiti’s capital city Port-au-Prince is controlled by gangs/warlords. Ariel Henry was pressured to step down by the US state department/ “international community”. A meeting took place in Jamaica on March 11th with CARICOM (Caribbean Community) and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken to decide who would be in Haiti’s interim government. The US also pledged an additional $100M for a multinational force to deploy to Haiti.
Final Thoughts
The fix for Haiti is pretty simple from my perspective. The invasion is the correct move because Haiti is essentially a failed state. The US needs to establish security there by getting rid of the gangs or dimmish them significantly. Let Haiti have their own elections and don’t interfere with their process like they’ve done repeatedly in the past. You do this so that the candidate that get’s elected actually has popular support and not just a US pick. The US loves to play empire but they’re actually really bad at it, just look at Afghanistan as an example. The US is really good at killing but their State Department seems to be really incompetent, so unless they can revamp it they should probably stick to just killing. Putting criminals and highly corrupt individuals in power in a weak state further weakens that state and eventually it will plunge into chaos. These kind of people might advance your interest initially but eventually will blow up in your face due to that same lack of integrity. This should be elementary school teaching but a lesson hopefully learned(probably not) in blood for the US state dept.
Get military advisors to train a capable force in Haiti over time, help them cull any new “gangs” that pop up and live happily ever after. Haiti is a very small country, it’s not the Sahel, this is a relatively easy task.
But… I think this make too much sense :)
This was an outstanding series. The dynamics are complicated but it’s an absolute shame what foreign meddling has done to Haiti. Even if 95% of the MSM stories regarding the country are false, like widespread cannibalism, the remaining 5% is enough to make Haiti a living hell for most of her citizens.