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The first TV reports played a critical role, giving the impression of widespread criminal mayhem. Matt Frei, the BBC reporter despatched from Washington, seemed on the point of hyperventilating as he brayed about the "violence" and need for "security". In spite of the demonstrable dignity of the earthquake victims, and evidence of citizens' groups toiling unaided to rescue people, and even a US general's assessment that the violence in Haiti was considerably less than before the earthquake, Frei claimed that "looting is the only industry" and "the dignity of Haiti's past is long forgotten".

Hell in Haiti as aid turns to occupation|30Jan10|Socialist Worker

I want to puke!

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Haiti Imperialism USA

Geographer Kenneth Hewitt coined the term “classquake” when examining the 1976 earthquake in Guatemala, because of the accuracy with which it hit the poor.
It cost the lives of 23,000 people. The classquake in Haiti today, in which at least 150,000 people have died, is even worse.
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- The earthquake was a natural event. Yet the scale of the suffering is about the way society is organised.
- Some 60,000 Haitians have set up a temporary shelter at the Pétionville golf club in Port-au-Prince. The US 82nd Airborne division polices every drop of water and morsel of food they receive.
- Lieutenant Brad Kerfoot said, “We told them we wouldn’t give any food away today, because of the way they behaved yesterday.
- “My soldiers and I think they’re ungrateful”.
- While hundreds of thousands starve and go thirsty, the US-controlled Port-au-Prince airport and neighbouring UN compound have ice-cold beers, internet access, food, blankets, generators and other aid relief from around the globe.
- The Haitian police are using the chaos after the earthquake to murder activists who oppose the present regime.

Jan

2010

The humanitarian myth | SocialistWorker.org

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Haiti Imperialism USA

Since the arrival of the troops, however, several aid missions have been prevented from arriving at the airport in Port-au-Prince, that the U.S. has commandeered. France and Caribbean Community have both made their complaints public, as has Médecins Sans Frontières on five separate occasions. UN World Food Program flights were also turned away on two consecutive days. Benoit Leduc, MSF's operations manager in Port-au-Prince, complained that U.S. military flights were being prioritized over aid flights. Now, U.S. ships have encircled Haiti in order to prevent refugees escaping and fleeing to the United States.
Not only has aid been obstructed and escape blocked, but what aid does arrive was at first not being delivered, and then only in small amounts. Some five days after the earthquake struck, BBC News reporter Nick Davis described how aid had just started "trickling through." While aid was arriving in Haiti "in large amounts," some "bottlenecks" prevented the bulk of it from being distributed.
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- In effect, the U.S. has staged an invasion of Haiti, under the pretext of providing security for humanitarian aid, and in doing so has prevented the delivery of humanitarian aid. With Haitians in a desperate condition, and the UN-supervised government in dire straits, Washington has sent the International Monetary Fund to offer a $100 million loan, on the proviso that public wages be frozen.
- For all the headlines, moreover, there is strikingly little actual violence taking place. Most of the stories of violence center on episodes of "looting," and most such instances involve desperate people procuring the means of survival. Aid workers also contradict the image of mobs on the attack purveyed by the media and U.S. officials. Abi Weaver, spokesperson for the American Red Cross, confirmed that "we haven't had any security issues at all."
- The paternalistic assumptions behind the calls for 'humanitarian intervention' have sometimes been starkly expressed. Thus, the conservative columnist Eric Margolis lauds the history of American colonial rule in Haiti: "[T]he U.S. occupation is looked back on by many Haitians as their "golden age." The Marine Corps proved a fair, efficient, honest administrator and builder. This era was the only time when things worked in Haiti."