American statesman Lyndon LaRouche repeatedly identified a U.S. commitment to help Haiti develop as a moral imperative for the United States, a test of what kind of nation the United States and its people want it to be in the world. Excerpts of two such statements follow, the first from 2004, the second from 2010, in the wake of the unprecedented earthquake disaster. Both still stand as guidelines for how to approach Haiti today, and his 2010 admonition about that no “patch the system” approach will work, being equally applicable to Afghanistan now: the goal of assistance must be to secure “a nation’s ability to maintain itself.”

In March 2004, LaRouche was asked about the Haitian political crisis of the time in an interview with a New York state radio program. LaRouche answered:

“…The United States has a relationship with Haiti, going back to our struggle for independence. Haiti has been essentially destroyed many times over. I mean, the country is destroyed, even compared to the adjoining region of the island. We have done the worst with that area. It’s not a problem with [recently ousted President] Aristide, or this guy, or that guy. The problem is, the United States has never accepted, in recent times, its moral responsibility to help the Haitians put their country back together again. That is our responsibility. We keep blaming them.

“The way we treat the Haitians who are fleeing from that territory into Florida—it’s horrible! It’s wrong! We have to take a positive moral attitude on this thing, and we have to work with the nations of the region, to say —and to tell the Haitians—‘We are determined that you should have your independence, and you shall have development, and you shall have medical care, and the ability to live.’

“We do it not only for the Haitians, we do it for ourselves. We do it, because we want to be the kind of country that does that kind of thing: Where a great injustice exists, we are the kind of country that will offer to help….

“Remember, Haiti established itself as a Republic, which at one point was modeling itself on the idea of the United States. So, this got it special hatred…. Of course, the problems that are occurring in other parts of the Caribbean are not much better; but they’re not quite as bad, either. And the Haitian thing, is the thing that really sticks in my craw: This is the worst example of a rotten policy from the United States. There are other policies that are bad, but this is the absolute worst.

“In my view, you always go to the worst case, to set a policy. In your own country, you look at the poorest layer of our population, and say, ‘Will this policy work for their children and grandchildren?’ And if it works for the poorest ones, justly, then it’ll probably work for everyone—as Franklin Roosevelt defined that: Always go to the ‘forgotten man.’ Take the person who’s the greatest victim, of injustice or neglect, and start there; and prove that you are really for the general welfare of people, by showing you’re willing to face that problem. Look it in the eye, and talk about curing it.” https://larouchepub.com/eiw/public/2004/eirv31n12-20040326/eirv31n12-20040326.pdf

The following was LaRouche’s initial call for the U.S. to commit to a 25-year development treaty with Haiti, from a Jan. 30, 2010 webcast, only weeks after a 7.0 magnitude earthquake had killed, maimed, left homeless or displaced close to a third of the nation’s people:

“What should be done is the following, in my view. First of all, the government of the United States should make a contract with the government of Haiti. And the contract is for the reconstruction of the economy and system of the nation of Haiti….

“You cannot apply a band-aid to Haiti. And you cannot bring in many other countries, because the objective is, if the country is going to be viable, coming out of this mess, you have to have a sovereign Haiti. So, the contract has to be essentially, a United States treaty agreement, a treaty agreement to re-establish the efficient sovereignty of the nation of Haiti, after the destructive effect of this and preceding difficulties.

“What’s the big deal, after all? It’s a small nation, of people who have been subjected to all kinds of terrible history; who have been promised this, and betrayed, and promised that, and betrayed, and promised and betrayed. Never delivered. It’s in a group of national territories which has also tended to be somewhat of a mess, in one way or the other. So, therefore, it’s a model approach. We say, ‘Okay, we make a contract with the government, as a treaty agreement, between the United States and Haiti, to assure the rebuilding of their country, in a form in which it will actually be a functioning country which can survive.’

“It’s going to take a quarter-century to get that job done. You’ve got to change a lot of things. But the one, the most important thing to change, is the attitude which presently prevails, around the world in dealing with things like this. It’s called ‘fix-it,’ ‘patch the system.’ My view is, you have to leave a viable system behind. Don’t patch it and walk away. Make a contract and say, ‘Well, you’re a small country. We can absorb the burden. We’re going to work with you, under the protection of the United States, to make sure you come out of this successfully.’ Not merely successfully, in the sense of solving the immediate crisis, which was done before; it didn’t work too well. We have to follow through: We have to think about a nation’s ability to maintain itself, not to be maintained from time to time because of internal crises, or because of an act of nature.

“And that’s the kind of relationship we should have with nations, so let’s go back and have it. We used to do this, you know, in the immediate post-Civil War period in the United States. We used to have ex-military, from both the Confederate Army and the Union Army, travel overseas, as to Egypt, to build up the system of that country. Until the British got us kicked out of there, we did a fine job, and then the British turned it into something else.

“But in our Constitutional structure, in our tradition, a country right next to ours, Haiti, just a few drops across the street, is in terrible condition, as part of a divided island territory, where problems tend to run across the border. Help them! Not just because you want to help them, but because you want to reaffirm a standard of morality in international affairs. And our commitment must be, to make sure we’re not just going to promise something—we’re going to get it done. And if we get it done, and it’s successful, it will be good for all of us.”

https://larouchepub.com/lar/2010/webcasts/3705jan30_qanda.html