The failure of our policy in Ukraine and the greater Middle East gets plenty of news coverage, while the failure of our policy in Haiti isn't as well known.
The U.S. has been robbing Haiti since 1914, when U.S. Marines literally marched into the National Bank of Haiti and stole $500,000 worth of gold, which they then turned over to what would become Citibank. The following year we invaded and occupied Haiti for 19 years on the excuse that they couldn't pay their foreign debts.
Our failure extends from 2004 up to today.

“They messed it up deeply,” James Foley, a retired career diplomat and former U.S. ambassador to Haiti, said in an interview about the Biden administration’s support for Henry. “They rode this horse to their doom. It’s the fruit of the choices we made.”

The embattled prime minister left Haiti 10 days ago and has since crisscrossed the world — from South America to Africa to New York and now Puerto Rico — all while staying silent as he tries to negotiate a return home that seems increasingly unlikely.

The Biden Administration invested heavily in PM Ariel Henry, but Henry resigned today. This caused Kenya to put the plan of sending a 1,000 man police force to Haiti on hold.
Just a few days before president Jovenel Moïse was assassinated, Henry was named by Moïse to replace interim prime minister Claude Joseph. Unlike Joseph, not a single Haitian had ever voted for Henry, and parliament had not approved Henry's promotion. Despite this the U.S. pressured Joseph to step down.
It later turned out that Henry helped plan Moise's assassination.

Probably the most misunderstood element of Haiti's current instability is the gangs and the wealthy elites who support them.

Over the past decade, leaders connected with the Pati Haïtien Tèt Kale (PHTK) have consolidated power by hollowing out State institutions and strategically aligning themselves with criminal gangs. Former President Jovenel Moïse, as part of his efforts to undermine any opposition, allowed gang attacks on neighborhoods where opposition ran strong. When Moïse was abruptly assassinated in 2021, the “Core Group” of western ambassadors and international representatives urged Henry to assume the role of prime minister. Under Henry — who is widely viewed as illegitimate – public authorities have been largely absent or in collusion with gangs as they used brutal methods, including repeated massacres and widespread kidnapping of civilians, to take control over Haiti’s territory and resources.

So who is left? Who are the top candidates to lead Haiti? The list is not promising.

Guy Philippe, a former coup leader who led the paramilitary overthrow of President Jean Bertrand Aristide in 2004. Philippe, 56, recently finished serving a six-year prison sentence in the U.S. on drug trafficking-related charges and was deported to Haiti in November. Since his return, he has been calling for Prime Minister Henry’s ouster, joining forces with members of an armed government environmental agency that has emerged as a paramilitary group.

Jimmy Chérizier, the leader of the G9 Family and Allies gang alliance goes by the nickname “Barbecue.” During press conferences he is armed and often dressed in camouflage gear and sporting a beret. Human-rights groups have linked him to a host of violent attacks and massacres, which he has denied. Chérizier, 47, has warned that if Henry doesn’t step down there will be “civil war that will lead to genocide.”

Jean-Charles Moïse, also known as Moïse Jean-Charles. An outspoken leftist leader who recently called on Haitians to “destroy the country” if Henry doesn’t leave power. Jean-Charles, 56, thrives on theatrics — he’s known for riding a horse during protest marches — and promotes his opposition to U.S. involvement in Haiti. His supporters fly the Russian flag as well as the red-and-black flag of the Duvalier dictatorship that ruled Haiti for decades.

Durin Duret, Jr. A judge on Haiti’s Court of Appeals who was appointed in 2014 to lead the investigation into former President-for-life Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier when he made a surprise return to Haiti from exile in France. In 2021, human-rights activists and lawyers accused Duret of denying justice in Haiti to victims of the brutal regime, noting that he had not submitted his reports on Duvalier’s crimes to the court of appeals.

Haitian Finance Minister Patrick Boisvert, who Henry tapped as interim prime minister when he left for Kenya, is now nominally in charge. He has declared a month-long state of emergency in the Port-au-Prince region and banned all public protests, raising concerns that his focus is on quelling public uprisings rather than controlling the gangs.
Something that is very hard to miss is that all of these decisions are being made in Jamaica, in New York, in Europe. Everywhere but in Haiti.
“It’s really up to the United States and CARICOM to really identify who’s got to run that place and then give them the resources to run it and the political muscle to run it.”
- former U.S. Under-Secretary of State Thomas Shannon, 2023