Illuminating the Arts-Policy Nexus 

Thank you for your thoughtful comments. Mr. Deibert is correct that Article 263 of the Haitian Constitution provides for an army. Legally, I suppose that it can be argued that the "Forces Armees d'Haiti" were technically only temporarily suspended by Aristide, though his December 1994 decree claimed to abolish the armed forces. Therefore, I respectfully disagree with you on the timing of the army's dissolution. I still believe that Aristide decreed the abolition of the army in December 1994, two months after his return and reinstatement as Haitian president. This occurred, as I clearly recall, right after army headquarters were stormed by soldiers whom he decided had decreed would be discharged and no longer paid. (Years later, some of them did obtain back wages). This attack killed at least four people. Johanna Mendelson Forman's essay, "Security Sector Reform in Haiti, published in "International Peacekeeping" (Vol.13, no.1) confirms the December 1994 abolition of the army: "This last component of the plan, to retain an army of 1500, was rendered null and void on 23 December 1994, when Aristide abolished the army and dissolved the officer corps and incorporated the remaining army members into the IPSF" (the Interim Public Security Force). The latter was a transitional police force created while the UN peacekeeping mission, composed mostly of US troops, provided army/defense services as the new National Civil Police (PNC in French) force was being created during 1994-1995 and which was inaugurated in April 1995, the date to which Mr. Deibert refers. Most, but not all, of the Haitian army's members were demobilized by April 1995, but some were vetted and allowed to join the PNC. By that same moment, most of the UN peacekeeping troops, other than engineering and police training missions remained and were renewed by the UN Security Council every 6-12 months until Aristide’s 2000 election and 2001 inauguration as president. The absence of UN troops during his term facilitated his violent human rights violations, which included extrajudicial executions of journalists and opposition figures, according to credible human rights groups. As I wrote, President Martelly could decree, just as Aristide decreed its abolition, the army’s reinstatement because of his constitutional authority, relying on Article 263. I certainly agree with Mr. Deibert that Haiti has no need for an army, given its other priorities and the threat such an army would pose to democracy and human rights protection in Haiti. Without UN peacebuilding and with a new army, the latter’s legacy and the political conditions that would exist would prompt some of Haiti's elites, which are well represented in the Martelly presidency, would feel legitimated to buy political influence from the amry, based on many historical precedents. There are problems with MINUSTAH, whose mission should not be indefinite. Prior to its departure, MINUSTAH’s shortcomings should be addressed and reforms. To force MINUSTAH out, presumably against the will of both foreign embassies and the UN, which still wants to train the PNC, is to invite the chaos that occurred during the Duvalier dictatorship by reinstating an institution which is likely to undermine democracy and unable to respond to the earthquake nearly as well as the US and MINUSTAH soldiers were able. (Would the new Haitian army have the equipment and logistical capability for such an operation; if it did, then it would be comsuming more than 100% of the current Haitian government's annual budget. Most countries rely on the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs to respond to natural disasters, which kill ten times as many people as are killed in wars by armies and their enemies.) Nor is the solution to get rid of MINUSTAH without finishing its PNC mentoring mission under UNPol, which would risk the chaos, not of Duvalier, but, this time of the second Aristide presidential term, which occurred when the police's neutrality was compromised by the absence of a UN peacebuilding mission and a president seeking a politicized police force. MINUSTAH should reform the national police force, which has been relatively apolitical and stabilizing under both of President Preval's terms, when UN missions were present, albeit in more modest form in the late 1990s than since 1994. For President Martelly to seek an army in order to get rid of MINUSTAH, as argued by Mr. Lucas, is to jeopardize the considerable progress that Haiti has made through international police cooperation, which has been difficult to discern since the January 12, 2010 earthquake and to invite attempts to overthrow or intimidate his elected government.