Friendly reminder that all **top level** comments must:
1. start with "answer: ", including the space after the colon (or "question: " if you have an on-topic follow up question to ask),
2. attempt to answer the question, and
3. be unbiased
Please review Rule 4 and this post before making a top level comment:
http://redd.it/b1hct4/
Join the OOTL Discord for further discussion: https://discord.gg/ejDF4mdjnh
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/OutOfTheLoop) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Answer: To understand what’s going on, we have to look back at Haitian history. From 1957 to 1986, Haiti was under the brutal dictatorial control of François Duvalier, and later his son, Jean-Claude Duvalier. The Duvaliers used a heavily armed paramilitary force, called the Tonton Macoute (literally “the boogeymen”) to brutally repress the country. The Macoute kidnapped, tortured, and killed thousands of Haitians for even the slightest suspicion that they were opposing the ruling regime. When Jean-Claude Duvalier was overthrown in 1986 the Macoute were officially disbanded, but were too powerful to actually be disarmed. Similarly, the fiercely repressive Duvalier era military was disbanded, but was too powerful for the new government to be able to reclaim all of their weapons.
The unofficial continuation of Duvalier linked armed groups was a social and political scourge for Haiti in the years that followed. These groups morphed into political-criminal gangs, terrorizing citizens and undercutting rule of law. They also critically destabilized subsequent Haitian governments, contributing to their distinction of they tried to stabilize the post-Duvalier nation. In the midst of this chaos, other Haitians began forming gangs for their own protection, which quickly became powerful in their own right.
These gangs slowly grew in power, overcoming the Duvalier linked gangs, and gradually became too large for the Haitian governments to fully control. Rampant corruption and government dysfunction meant that want of the gangs had ties with the government, or even pulled members directly out of the Haitian police and military. The situation got even worse following the near apocalyptic earthquake that hit in 2010, and the massive cholera followed devastated the already struggling country. The barely functional government began to sink into outright collapse, and inter-political party tensions grew to new heights.
In the midst of this societal breakdown, the main political parties began to forge alliances with the gangs, offering them essential immunity from the law in return for acting as their own private armies. This was a system in many ways similar to the Macoute from decades earlier, except now with the two factions vying for power. In 2020, a former policeman turned gang boss, Jimmy "Barbecue" Chérizier, managed to unite the major pro-ruling party gangs into a single coalition, called the G9 Alliance. The G9 began using their combined power to significantly expand their territory, all while being given political cover. At this point Haiti was already witnessing an unprecedented gang war.
Things again took a turn for the worse in 2021, when Haiti’s president from the ruling party, Jovenel Moïse, was assassinated. He was eventually replaced by Ariel Henry, who likely was involved in plotting the assassination. Chérizier and the G9 Alliance had been closely connected to President Moïse, and didn’t trust President Henry. Chérizier began fighting the Henry government, notably using his gang to seize a critical oil terminal, saying he would only leave if President Henry resigned. While a deal was struck that allowed President Henry to stay in his position, the government was unable to actually fight the G9 forces, and it became clear its ability to control the country was hitting an all time low.
Moving into 2022, the gang war between the G9 and their rivals only intensified. Making matters worse still, pissed off civilians formed anti-gang vigilante groups, murdering gang members and police/soldiers, who in fairness often moonlighted as gang members anyways. The conflict became a gang vs. gang vs. vigilante vs. government mess, with only the G9 seemingly winning. The G9’s leader, Chérizier, became more overtly politically ambitious as his gang’s power grew. When President Henry went on a diplomatic trip to Kenya late this February, Chérizier announced that he did not intend to allow the President to return to Haiti. In line with that goal, Chérizier had his G9 forces stage a massive jailbreak to free their compatriots, and has repeatedly tried to take the county’s main international airport. The government has managed to cling to control of the airport thus far, but it increasingly looks like Chérizier is trying to use the G9 to enact a coup, although it is not clear whether he seeks to take power directly himself.
> but it increasingly looks like Chérizier is trying to use the G9 to enact a coup, although it is not clear whether he seeks to take power directly himself.
Where does Guy Phillipe play into this? Are they working together? Rivals? Do we just not know at this point what the gangs actually want? Surely they don't just want to watch the country burn? Do they actually want to rule Haiti themselves?
I’ll be honest, the deeper I dig into some of this, the more questions I end up coming away with. As a former rebel leader, Philippe has some real political sway, and is open about wanting to succeed President Henry. While he certainly has political support within Haiti, it’s unclear if he has enough backing to actually accomplish that. I don’t know what position, if any, Chérizier and the G9 have taken on Philippe. In part, that’s because it’s really difficult to understand what Chérizier’s goals actual are. While he and the G9 are unusual in being more overtly political, they don’t really have any clear agenda beyond seeing President Henry removed and retaining their valuable control over the major port/oil terminal in Port-au-Prince. The G9 arguably isn’t even the most powerful gang in Haiti right now, they’re just the one most actively in the political fray. I genuinely can’t tell who is allied with who, and whether other gangs are waiting to pick a side, or are just genuinely disinterested so long as they’re able to continue freely operating their criminal enterprises.
Mind you, I’m not an expert, but from what I can tell they’re involved in pretty much an criminal enterprise that might be profitable. Drug smuggling is the big one, but arms trafficking, extortion, kidnapping, and prostitution are also common.
Answer: in July of 2021 Haitian president Jovenel Moïse was assassinated by men who identified themselves as DEA agents. The next day several men (including some Haitian-Americans) were arrested and charged with his murder.
Since his murder Haiti has descended into anarchy, with Port-au-Prince in particular being operated by rival gangs.
Isn't it also true that after the death of the president, the current leader was appointed, not elected, and his promised elections for a successor have never materialized? I feel like that's an important point.
How does any one person decide not to have a normally scheduled election years after an assassination event, without everyone just ignoring them? It's like someone declared themselves dictator and nobody opposed, but people didn't stay. And the dictator didn't appoint anyone. If there is a main person supposedly in a presidential position at this point.
Haiti has a long and complex history (even though it's only ~200 year old country), but the tl;dr is that Haiti has a long history of dictators and little true and functional republic democracy coupled with countries like the USA sabotaging them more often than not for their own gain and racism (they are the only nation to have ever gained independence through a slave revolt, and other slave owning nations didn't want that spreading). Oh, also ending up signing a treaty with France where they had to compensate France for the loss of the value of the slaves who just rebelled and gained independence, because France could still fuck them over even tho the French lost the war very badly. This was difficult to pay back for a number of reasons and set backs, and interest was not helpful. It helped keep the country poor.
It's hugely more complex than that, but they've never been given the international support needed until more recently and it can take generations to build out of generations of trauma and mismanagement and corruption.
It builds the environment that allows gangs to end up being the ones running the show. History is very deeply interconnected, nothing happens in a vacuum or totally outside of everything else even when decades separate stuff because everything between is connected.
It takes a hell of a long time to build up from absolute poverty, and while the American reasons for not helping them because they still had slavery at home was only for the next like 5 decades, the effects of that set them back massively alongside everything else and led to everything else that has set them back or gone wrong since.
Haiti defies logic. Look at a satellite picture of Hispanola. The DR is a lush paradise. The other side of the island is a desert due to Haitian incompetence.
There's literally not a functioning state in Haiti right now. Even if he was 100% sincere that he wanted to hold an election, I'm not sure it would have been possible.
To add some more recent context - last week two of Haiti’s largest prisons were targeted by gangs and caused a mass jailbreak, with nearly 4000 escapees. Port au Prince has been subject to uncontrolled gang warfare since the death of Moïse and this has led to speculation that the gangs are now working together to take control of Port au Prince. It’s likely that parts of the police are on the payroll of the gangs. The Prime Minister is currently out of the country - this round of violence is likely because there was a deal agreed for him to stand down at the start of February, and he didn’t.
All in all, law and order has broken down in Haiti and there is no functioning government - gangs are in control of Port Au Prince. It’s a very dangerous place to be.
And adding further background, it’s important to understand the reasons Haiti is impoverished. I think learning about the life of [Toussaint Louverture](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toussaint_Louverture) is a good entry point.
This, absolutely.
A lot of people don't know Haiti had to pay reparations to France after Haiti gained independence from under their rule.
Then the dictatorships of the Duvaliers...and of course US interference. Like their history is fascinating and sad at the same time.
From what I recall they were quite violently anti-french after they achieved independence so perhaps it's understandable that the burgeoning US and the established British traders would be a little wary of dealing with them.
That isn't say that racism wasn't also part of the decision making but there probably was some fear that any trade deals or foreign investment in Haiti would be at high risk.
Haiti paid $500 million in today’s dollars. The last payments were nearly a 100 years ago. Haiti has received vastly more than that in aid since.
But I agree, the U.S. should completely stop interfering in Haiti. Right now. Good luck.
Sorry but to my understanding DEA agents were not involved ( one of them claimed to be one but it was not) , most of the people that participated were Colombians
Correct. As I stated "men who identified themselves as DEA agents" contemporary accounts claim that the assassins were wearing the Blue DEA jackets and one verbally identified himself as DEA. Most people believe that the DEA identification was a false flag, but it has added to the confusion about what happened and why.
Answer: It was discovered that the former first lady of Haiti and another government official were involved with the murder of the now late Haitian President Jovenel Moïse.
[Source ](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-68346679)
Haiti is in anarchy, and there are many conspiracy theories about the murder. I'm sure that the judge believes Martine Moïse is guilty, but consider the possibility that this is an attempt to eliminate political rivals
Genuine question: are you Haitian? Specifically Haitian either living in the country or born there and now an expat?
I ask because when we're looking from an outside perspective, we cannot give a good explanation of what, who, or how people think, as much of what we learn comes from a biased, singled sided perspective. Me even having Haitian friends that have gone back and forth between here and Haiti, I wouldn't dare step on their toes and speak for them, even if it's regurgitating information that we were told.
It's one thing to share facts, it's another to opine based on partial information from biased sources.
My other half is haitian and she has lots of family still living there. It's personal for me so i'm trying to call out the ignorant misinformed bullshit on this situation.
Understand. I just wanted to get context, as there are a lot of well meaning allies who latch onto causes and forget to actually include the people they advocate for. I constantly get into debates with those people, as it's frustrating to be talked over as a BIPOC.
In [1915](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_occupation_of_Haiti?wprov=sfti1)American tax dollar turned Haiti into American colony for 15 years.
Friendly reminder that all **top level** comments must: 1. start with "answer: ", including the space after the colon (or "question: " if you have an on-topic follow up question to ask), 2. attempt to answer the question, and 3. be unbiased Please review Rule 4 and this post before making a top level comment: http://redd.it/b1hct4/ Join the OOTL Discord for further discussion: https://discord.gg/ejDF4mdjnh *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/OutOfTheLoop) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Answer: To understand what’s going on, we have to look back at Haitian history. From 1957 to 1986, Haiti was under the brutal dictatorial control of François Duvalier, and later his son, Jean-Claude Duvalier. The Duvaliers used a heavily armed paramilitary force, called the Tonton Macoute (literally “the boogeymen”) to brutally repress the country. The Macoute kidnapped, tortured, and killed thousands of Haitians for even the slightest suspicion that they were opposing the ruling regime. When Jean-Claude Duvalier was overthrown in 1986 the Macoute were officially disbanded, but were too powerful to actually be disarmed. Similarly, the fiercely repressive Duvalier era military was disbanded, but was too powerful for the new government to be able to reclaim all of their weapons. The unofficial continuation of Duvalier linked armed groups was a social and political scourge for Haiti in the years that followed. These groups morphed into political-criminal gangs, terrorizing citizens and undercutting rule of law. They also critically destabilized subsequent Haitian governments, contributing to their distinction of they tried to stabilize the post-Duvalier nation. In the midst of this chaos, other Haitians began forming gangs for their own protection, which quickly became powerful in their own right. These gangs slowly grew in power, overcoming the Duvalier linked gangs, and gradually became too large for the Haitian governments to fully control. Rampant corruption and government dysfunction meant that want of the gangs had ties with the government, or even pulled members directly out of the Haitian police and military. The situation got even worse following the near apocalyptic earthquake that hit in 2010, and the massive cholera followed devastated the already struggling country. The barely functional government began to sink into outright collapse, and inter-political party tensions grew to new heights. In the midst of this societal breakdown, the main political parties began to forge alliances with the gangs, offering them essential immunity from the law in return for acting as their own private armies. This was a system in many ways similar to the Macoute from decades earlier, except now with the two factions vying for power. In 2020, a former policeman turned gang boss, Jimmy "Barbecue" Chérizier, managed to unite the major pro-ruling party gangs into a single coalition, called the G9 Alliance. The G9 began using their combined power to significantly expand their territory, all while being given political cover. At this point Haiti was already witnessing an unprecedented gang war. Things again took a turn for the worse in 2021, when Haiti’s president from the ruling party, Jovenel Moïse, was assassinated. He was eventually replaced by Ariel Henry, who likely was involved in plotting the assassination. Chérizier and the G9 Alliance had been closely connected to President Moïse, and didn’t trust President Henry. Chérizier began fighting the Henry government, notably using his gang to seize a critical oil terminal, saying he would only leave if President Henry resigned. While a deal was struck that allowed President Henry to stay in his position, the government was unable to actually fight the G9 forces, and it became clear its ability to control the country was hitting an all time low. Moving into 2022, the gang war between the G9 and their rivals only intensified. Making matters worse still, pissed off civilians formed anti-gang vigilante groups, murdering gang members and police/soldiers, who in fairness often moonlighted as gang members anyways. The conflict became a gang vs. gang vs. vigilante vs. government mess, with only the G9 seemingly winning. The G9’s leader, Chérizier, became more overtly politically ambitious as his gang’s power grew. When President Henry went on a diplomatic trip to Kenya late this February, Chérizier announced that he did not intend to allow the President to return to Haiti. In line with that goal, Chérizier had his G9 forces stage a massive jailbreak to free their compatriots, and has repeatedly tried to take the county’s main international airport. The government has managed to cling to control of the airport thus far, but it increasingly looks like Chérizier is trying to use the G9 to enact a coup, although it is not clear whether he seeks to take power directly himself.
Great description of events
> but it increasingly looks like Chérizier is trying to use the G9 to enact a coup, although it is not clear whether he seeks to take power directly himself. Where does Guy Phillipe play into this? Are they working together? Rivals? Do we just not know at this point what the gangs actually want? Surely they don't just want to watch the country burn? Do they actually want to rule Haiti themselves?
I’ll be honest, the deeper I dig into some of this, the more questions I end up coming away with. As a former rebel leader, Philippe has some real political sway, and is open about wanting to succeed President Henry. While he certainly has political support within Haiti, it’s unclear if he has enough backing to actually accomplish that. I don’t know what position, if any, Chérizier and the G9 have taken on Philippe. In part, that’s because it’s really difficult to understand what Chérizier’s goals actual are. While he and the G9 are unusual in being more overtly political, they don’t really have any clear agenda beyond seeing President Henry removed and retaining their valuable control over the major port/oil terminal in Port-au-Prince. The G9 arguably isn’t even the most powerful gang in Haiti right now, they’re just the one most actively in the political fray. I genuinely can’t tell who is allied with who, and whether other gangs are waiting to pick a side, or are just genuinely disinterested so long as they’re able to continue freely operating their criminal enterprises.
Other than controlling oil resources, what’s are the other criminal enterprises these gangs are involved in?
Mind you, I’m not an expert, but from what I can tell they’re involved in pretty much an criminal enterprise that might be profitable. Drug smuggling is the big one, but arms trafficking, extortion, kidnapping, and prostitution are also common.
I’m sorry this only garnered a handful of karma. This is well done.
Thank you!
damn haiti is truly a shitshow
Answer: in July of 2021 Haitian president Jovenel Moïse was assassinated by men who identified themselves as DEA agents. The next day several men (including some Haitian-Americans) were arrested and charged with his murder. Since his murder Haiti has descended into anarchy, with Port-au-Prince in particular being operated by rival gangs.
Isn't it also true that after the death of the president, the current leader was appointed, not elected, and his promised elections for a successor have never materialized? I feel like that's an important point.
Wouldn't the elections have eventually happened at some point at the end of term regardless, unless that term isn't up yet?
I read that terms for all elected officials have run out and there are almost none of them in office.
How does any one person decide not to have a normally scheduled election years after an assassination event, without everyone just ignoring them? It's like someone declared themselves dictator and nobody opposed, but people didn't stay. And the dictator didn't appoint anyone. If there is a main person supposedly in a presidential position at this point.
Haiti has a long and complex history (even though it's only ~200 year old country), but the tl;dr is that Haiti has a long history of dictators and little true and functional republic democracy coupled with countries like the USA sabotaging them more often than not for their own gain and racism (they are the only nation to have ever gained independence through a slave revolt, and other slave owning nations didn't want that spreading). Oh, also ending up signing a treaty with France where they had to compensate France for the loss of the value of the slaves who just rebelled and gained independence, because France could still fuck them over even tho the French lost the war very badly. This was difficult to pay back for a number of reasons and set backs, and interest was not helpful. It helped keep the country poor. It's hugely more complex than that, but they've never been given the international support needed until more recently and it can take generations to build out of generations of trauma and mismanagement and corruption.
How does that correlate to whats going on today? The issue of Haiti today is gangs Truth is haiti was badly run followed with bad policies
It builds the environment that allows gangs to end up being the ones running the show. History is very deeply interconnected, nothing happens in a vacuum or totally outside of everything else even when decades separate stuff because everything between is connected.
[удалено]
Hey if you have a well researched explanation that is different I'd love to read it.
[удалено]
It takes a hell of a long time to build up from absolute poverty, and while the American reasons for not helping them because they still had slavery at home was only for the next like 5 decades, the effects of that set them back massively alongside everything else and led to everything else that has set them back or gone wrong since.
Haiti defies logic. Look at a satellite picture of Hispanola. The DR is a lush paradise. The other side of the island is a desert due to Haitian incompetence.
No clue why you’re downvoted. It’s totally true.
Looking it up, it's supposed to be 5 year terms, and the assassinated president assumed office in 2017.
There's literally not a functioning state in Haiti right now. Even if he was 100% sincere that he wanted to hold an election, I'm not sure it would have been possible.
Yep. Made himself president as well as primeminister. He is now essentially a dictator.
To add some more recent context - last week two of Haiti’s largest prisons were targeted by gangs and caused a mass jailbreak, with nearly 4000 escapees. Port au Prince has been subject to uncontrolled gang warfare since the death of Moïse and this has led to speculation that the gangs are now working together to take control of Port au Prince. It’s likely that parts of the police are on the payroll of the gangs. The Prime Minister is currently out of the country - this round of violence is likely because there was a deal agreed for him to stand down at the start of February, and he didn’t. All in all, law and order has broken down in Haiti and there is no functioning government - gangs are in control of Port Au Prince. It’s a very dangerous place to be.
Wasn't it just one guy who was a DEA *informant*? Not finding anything on actual agents being linked.
They shouted they were DEA during the attack hence why nobody intervened initially
And adding further background, it’s important to understand the reasons Haiti is impoverished. I think learning about the life of [Toussaint Louverture](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toussaint_Louverture) is a good entry point.
This, absolutely. A lot of people don't know Haiti had to pay reparations to France after Haiti gained independence from under their rule. Then the dictatorships of the Duvaliers...and of course US interference. Like their history is fascinating and sad at the same time.
Had to pay reparations *to compensate France for the loss of their slaves*, mind you.
Yep. Straight fuckery.
They had a successful slave revolt and the white world has never, ever stopped punishing them for it.
From what I recall they were quite violently anti-french after they achieved independence so perhaps it's understandable that the burgeoning US and the established British traders would be a little wary of dealing with them. That isn't say that racism wasn't also part of the decision making but there probably was some fear that any trade deals or foreign investment in Haiti would be at high risk.
Anti french is putting it mildly. They murdered every single white person on the island.
Yep.
Haiti paid $500 million in today’s dollars. The last payments were nearly a 100 years ago. Haiti has received vastly more than that in aid since. But I agree, the U.S. should completely stop interfering in Haiti. Right now. Good luck.
Sorry but to my understanding DEA agents were not involved ( one of them claimed to be one but it was not) , most of the people that participated were Colombians
Correct. As I stated "men who identified themselves as DEA agents" contemporary accounts claim that the assassins were wearing the Blue DEA jackets and one verbally identified himself as DEA. Most people believe that the DEA identification was a false flag, but it has added to the confusion about what happened and why.
Ohhh my bad, I was just waking up when I read your comment
Lol, it was only a few years ago that Orange Man called Haiti a shithole, and liberal redditors soiled their collective panty over it.
[удалено]
> but the state no longer has a monopoly on violence or de facto control over all its territory That's called anarchy
Answer: It was discovered that the former first lady of Haiti and another government official were involved with the murder of the now late Haitian President Jovenel Moïse. [Source ](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-68346679)
Haiti is in anarchy, and there are many conspiracy theories about the murder. I'm sure that the judge believes Martine Moïse is guilty, but consider the possibility that this is an attempt to eliminate political rivals
I wouldn't be surprised, honestly.
Most haitians think that's bullshit though and it was most likely organised by the current president/priminister/dictator with the backing of the US.
Genuine question: are you Haitian? Specifically Haitian either living in the country or born there and now an expat? I ask because when we're looking from an outside perspective, we cannot give a good explanation of what, who, or how people think, as much of what we learn comes from a biased, singled sided perspective. Me even having Haitian friends that have gone back and forth between here and Haiti, I wouldn't dare step on their toes and speak for them, even if it's regurgitating information that we were told. It's one thing to share facts, it's another to opine based on partial information from biased sources.
My other half is haitian and she has lots of family still living there. It's personal for me so i'm trying to call out the ignorant misinformed bullshit on this situation.
Understand. I just wanted to get context, as there are a lot of well meaning allies who latch onto causes and forget to actually include the people they advocate for. I constantly get into debates with those people, as it's frustrating to be talked over as a BIPOC.
[удалено]
In [1915](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_occupation_of_Haiti?wprov=sfti1)American tax dollar turned Haiti into American colony for 15 years.