Rebels in Haiti were going house to house yesterday,

arresting supporters of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide

and looting their possessions. The capital, Port-au-Prince,

remained in government hands, but the nation’s

second-largest city, Cap Haitien, was held by the

insurgents. The situation is clearly becoming dire. The

United States needs to take the lead in protecting the

Haitian people from the growing anarchy around them. There

is much that Washington could do.


Only the slimmest hope remains for salvaging an

international mediation effort that began last weekend. If

it cannot be revived, there is a strong likelihood that the

country’s raging political crisis could ultimately be

resolved by brute force. Abrupt and violent changes of

government have been a regular feature of Haitian politics

over the years and are among the main reasons that Haiti

has never developed stable democratic institutions.


Mr. Aristide is no beacon of democratic principles, but he

was freely elected to a five-year term that is not

scheduled to run out until February 2006. It would have

been better if all sides had accepted the proposed

compromise that would allow him to stay in office while

sharing power with the opposition.


Most, but not all, of the responsibility for the failure to

reach an agreement lies with the leaders of Haiti’s

nonviolent political opposition. They argued that with

popular anger against Mr. Aristide running so high, they

could accept no compromise that did not cut short his

presidency.


That public anger is largely Mr. Aristide’s fault, because

of a succession of betrayals of his original democratic

promises. By failing to end a long impasse over flawed

parliamentary elections, he has effectively shut down

Parliament and now rules by decree. He has politicized the

police and courts and uses special police brigades and

armed gangs of his supporters to terrorize civilians and

break up opposition demonstrations.


Yet the opposition’s unwillingness to stand up to the

former army leaders and opposition thugs now demanding Mr.

Aristide’s departure – and their failure to back a

compromise that would have been strongly supported by

Washington and other mediating countries – is a troubling

sign. It suggests that these politicians may not have the

toughness needed to make sure that any armed ouster of Mr.

Aristide does not lead to a rapid restoration of the same

discredited forces that ruled Haiti before he came to

power. These include thuggish leaders of the country’s

officially disbanded army and the murderous paramilitary

groups that supported military rule. Some of these elements

have already re-entered Haiti from the neighboring

Dominican Republic.


There is still time for the political opposition to

reconsider its rejection of compromise before the armed

rebels impose their own new tyranny.


Whether or not the opposition comes to its senses, Haiti’s

people deserve protection. More than 70 lives have already

been lost. The United States should quickly offer to build

up the current force of 50 marines who arrived Monday to

protect the American Embassy and make it the core of a

multinational stabilization force that would also include

soldiers from France, Canada and Latin America. Haiti’s

army was dissolved in 1994, and a modest international

military force could go a long way. It should be in place

before armed rebel elements grab power for themselves.


Once a stabilization force is established, an American-led

international effort should be mounted to train

professional, politically independent police officers and

judges. It was the absence of such institutions that

allowed Mr. Aristide to create a new authoritarianism

behind a democratic shell. American police training

programs during the Clinton administration did not reach

far enough or last long enough to succeed. Washington

should also make it easier for Haiti to earn its way out of

poverty by eliminating the American rice subsidies that

have contributed to pricing poor Haitian rice farmers out

of the market.


Developing a durable democracy in this deeply impoverished

country, which has no history of strong, independent civic

institutions, will take plenty of time and effort. Failure

to begin that effort now will surely result in future

revolts, future dictators and future tides of desperate

refugees headed for American shores.

Originally: Hour of the Gunmen in Haiti

Rebels in Haiti were going house to house yesterday,

arresting supporters of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide

and looting their possessions. The capital, Port-au-Prince,

remained in government hands, but the nation’s

second-largest city, Cap Haitien, was held by the

insurgents. The situation is clearly becoming dire. The

United States needs to take the lead in protecting the

Haitian people from the growing anarchy around them. There

is much that Washington could do.


Only the slimmest hope remains for salvaging an

international mediation effort that began last weekend. If

it cannot be revived, there is a strong likelihood that the

country’s raging political crisis could ultimately be

resolved by brute force. Abrupt and violent changes of

government have been a regular feature of Haitian politics

over the years and are among the main reasons that Haiti

has never developed stable democratic institutions.


Mr. Aristide is no beacon of democratic principles, but he

was freely elected to a five-year term that is not

scheduled to run out until February 2006. It would have

been better if all sides had accepted the proposed

compromise that would allow him to stay in office while

sharing power with the opposition.


Most, but not all, of the responsibility for the failure to

reach an agreement lies with the leaders of Haiti’s

nonviolent political opposition. They argued that with

popular anger against Mr. Aristide running so high, they

could accept no compromise that did not cut short his

presidency.


That public anger is largely Mr. Aristide’s fault, because

of a succession of betrayals of his original democratic

promises. By failing to end a long impasse over flawed

parliamentary elections, he has effectively shut down

Parliament and now rules by decree. He has politicized the

police and courts and uses special police brigades and

armed gangs of his supporters to terrorize civilians and

break up opposition demonstrations.


Yet the opposition’s unwillingness to stand up to the

former army leaders and opposition thugs now demanding Mr.

Aristide’s departure – and their failure to back a

compromise that would have been strongly supported by

Washington and other mediating countries – is a troubling

sign. It suggests that these politicians may not have the

toughness needed to make sure that any armed ouster of Mr.

Aristide does not lead to a rapid restoration of the same

discredited forces that ruled Haiti before he came to

power. These include thuggish leaders of the country’s

officially disbanded army and the murderous paramilitary

groups that supported military rule. Some of these elements

have already re-entered Haiti from the neighboring

Dominican Republic.


There is still time for the political opposition to

reconsider its rejection of compromise before the armed

rebels impose their own new tyranny.


Whether or not the opposition comes to its senses, Haiti’s

people deserve protection. More than 70 lives have already

been lost. The United States should quickly offer to build

up the current force of 50 marines who arrived Monday to

protect the American Embassy and make it the core of a

multinational stabilization force that would also include

soldiers from France, Canada and Latin America. Haiti’s

army was dissolved in 1994, and a modest international

military force could go a long way. It should be in place

before armed rebel elements grab power for themselves.


Once a stabilization force is established, an American-led

international effort should be mounted to train

professional, politically independent police officers and

judges. It was the absence of such institutions that

allowed Mr. Aristide to create a new authoritarianism

behind a democratic shell. American police training

programs during the Clinton administration did not reach

far enough or last long enough to succeed. Washington

should also make it easier for Haiti to earn its way out of

poverty by eliminating the American rice subsidies that

have contributed to pricing poor Haitian rice farmers out

of the market.


Developing a durable democracy in this deeply impoverished

country, which has no history of strong, independent civic

institutions, will take plenty of time and effort. Failure

to begin that effort now will surely result in future

revolts, future dictators and future tides of desperate

refugees headed for American shores.