Culture and Life

by Rob Gowland

Haiti: cocaine transit point

One question being asked about the US-run coup in Haiti is why 
would the US bother about such a poverty-stricken flyspeck? After 
all, according to Associated Press, after Haiti paid US$32 
million in arrears to the Inter-American Development Bank last 
July, it left just US$3 million in the country's reserves.

Poor or not, however, Haiti has three strong points of appeal for 
the US Government. First there's the claim of tradition: 
organised crime and sweatshop business have both had a close link 
with the island for many years.

Under the Duvalier dictatorship, people who formed or joined a 
trade union or demonstrate an "anti-big-shot" bias would be dealt 
with by the dreaded Ton Ton Macoutes. Although they filled the 
same role as Hitler's Storm Troopers, the Macoutes were modelled 
more on Al Capone's hoodlum gangs.

Union organisers or just vocal union members would be hacked to 
death with machetes in front of their families. If workers became 
infected with progressive ideas about their rights, the Macoutes 
would burn out a group of workers' homes, to terrorise the rest 
into submission.

Far from intervening against this terroristic regime, succeeding 
US administrations supported it, just as they supported the 
military regimes that eventually succeeded it.

The people of Haiti were so poor and so terrorised that the 
country actually ran a lucrative trade in exporting blood! It has 
frequently been used for mass testing of new and unproven drugs 
for the US "ethical drug" industry.

The second point about Haiti to arouse intense US interest is its 
close proximity to Cuba. This is something of a double edged 
sword: while Haiti would be a convenient jumping off point for 
military or even terrorist attacks against Cuba, any developing 
ties between Haiti and Cuba could spread the Cuban "infection" 
throughout the Caribbean.

Under Aristide, Haiti had in fact developed strong ties to Cuba, 
with considerable benefits for the Haitian people. A 535-member 
Cuban medical brigade was distributed right across the country, 
bringing health care to some 75 percent of the population.

In the areas covered by the Cuban doctors, the mortality rate for 
infants under 12 months dropped from 80 to 28 per 1000 live 
births, and that for children under five from 159 to 39 per 1000 
live births. The maternal mortality rate dropped from 523 to 259 
deaths per 100,000 live births.

More than 370,000 Haitians — 80 percent of them children — have 
been vaccinated by the Cuban teams. It is estimated that nearly 
86,000 human lives have been saved by the Cuban health workers in 
Haiti.

Cuba also established a School of Medicine in Haiti, staffed by 
Cuban professors, to train Haitians to continue the work begun by 
the Cuban medical teams. At the time of the coup, 247 young 
Haitians were studying there. Another 372 are studying medicine 
as scholarship students in Cuba itself.

Moreover, a radical Cuban-designed literacy program that uses 
radio was successfully introduced with the help of 20 Cuban 
literacy specialists. To date, under this program, 110,000 
Haitians have learned how to read and write.

In addition, the Darbonne sugar mill complex was rebuilt with 
Cuban technical help, and at the time of the coup was working on 
its fourth sugar harvest with the help of 30 Cuban experts. The 
complex generated employment and guaranteed electricity during 
harvest time for the area's population, who previously did not 
enjoy that service.

None of this would have gone down well in Washington, where the 
concept of giving aid without strings simply doesn't make sense.

Which brings us to the third point about Haiti that would make it 
of interest to the US: its position as a transhipment point in 
the oh-so-lucrative drug trade.

The drug trade indeed is a hugely profitable source of capital, a 
multi-billion dollar business that links organised crime and 
"legitimate" business in the funding of commercial takeovers, 
political parties and clandestine intelligence operations alike.

It is an indispensable source of finance for developed capitalist 
countries and not one that they are going to leave under the 
control of others. Just as Afghanistan and Kosovo are "crucial 
links in the transit (trans-shipment) of narcotics from the 
Golden Crescent, through Iran and Turkey, into Western Europe" 
(Michel Chossudovsky, Centre for Research on Globalisation), so 
Haiti is an important link in the cocaine transit trade from 
Colombia to Florida.

The US already has troops in Afghanistan, Yugoslavia (Kosovo) and 
Colombia. Now it has them in Haiti.

Wherever there are strategic or highly profitable resources, 
there you will find the US seeking to gain control over those 
same resources. Whether it is heroin produced in Afghanistan or 
cocaine produced in Colombia, the US aims to control it for 
greater profit.

The close integration of the US intelligence community, organised 
crime and the drug trade has been an open secret for years. It 
became a scandal only when it was revealed that the CIA had 
bought the support of the Nicaraguan Contras by aiding them to 
introduce crack cocaine into black communities in the USA.

Even then, it was quickly swept under the carpet and the 
journalist who uncovered the story, Gary Webb of the San Jose 
Mercury News, was ultimately forced out of his job.

As Michel Chossudovsky has noted; "The protection of this trade 
[the cocaine transit trade] has a bearing on the formation of a 
new narco-government [in Haiti], which will serve US interests" 
(US Sponsored Coup d'etat: The Destabilisation of Haiti).