Haiti is On the Front Lines of a Possible World War III

Over the past week, the world has lurched ever closer to the brink of World War III, as the U.S. empire continues its desperate attempts to turn back the clock of history and return to the unipolar world that existed before the new multipolar order came to full fruition with Russia’s “special military operation” in Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022 to stop the existential threat NATO expansion and provocations pose to it.

The Ukraine proxy war, however, is just the precursor to the real confrontation. The greatest challenge to U.S. world hegemony is, of course, China, which by most estimates has surpassed the U.S. as earth’s largest economy. As the Chinese Foreign Ministry explained in an unprecedentedly frank Feb. 20 statement entitled “U.S. Hegemony and Its Perils”, Washington “has developed a hegemonic playbook to stage ‘color revolutions,’ instigate regional disputes, and even directly launch wars under the guise of promoting democracy, freedom, and human rights. Clinging to the Cold War mentality, the United States has ramped up bloc politics and stoked conflict and confrontation. It has overstretched the concept of national security, abused export controls, and forced unilateral sanctions upon others. It has taken a selective approach to international law and rules, utilizing or discarding them as it sees fit, and has sought to impose rules that serve its own interests in the name of upholding a ‘rules-based international order.’”

Chinese President Xi Jinping has strongly condemned U.S. efforts to “contain, encircle, and suppress China.” Foreign Minister Qin Gang warned Washington to “step on the brakes” and not “go down the wrong road” to “conflict and confrontation” or there will be “catastrophic consequences.”

The increasingly blunt language of China’s leadership is matched by its diplomatic moves, such as the rapprochement it negotiated between Saudi Arabia and Iran last week, which dealt a tremendous blow to U.S. geopolitical strategy.

The next U.S. proxy war, as everyone can see, is over the Chinese province of Taiwan, which calls itself the “Republic of China.” Washington just approved sending another $600 million in military aid to Taiwan while it is training Taiwanese troops both on the island and in the U.S.. All this despite formally recognizing since 1979 that Taiwan is a part of China.

Now, both China (allied with Russia) and the U.S. (allied with Western Europe) are openly preparing for war, and there is a very great possibility, if not likelihood, that any confrontation would go nuclear, which would spell catastrophe for all life on the planet.

What does all of this mean for the planet’s 16 million Haitians?

Nuclear war would likely mean the immediate incineration of all inhabitants living in and around major U.S. and European cities, where millions of Haitian expatriates work and reside. Modern nuclear weapons are 100 times more powerful than the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki 78 years ago.

The people perishing in the initial blasts would end up being the lucky ones. The principal killer worldwide, other than the widespread radiation poisoning land and water, would be nuclear winter. This is caused when the mushroom clouds carry dust, soot, and debris high up into the stratosphere where it will blot out sunlight, sending the planet into deep darkness and another ice-age. Plants and crops could not be grown, and much of the earth’s population and wildlife would starve to death.

What does this apocalyptic possibility have to do with Haiti, and why is it on the front lines?

First of all, out of the earth’s 194 nations, Haiti is one of only 11 that recognize Taiwan as a sovereign nation. (As we go to press on Mar. 14, Honduras announced that it was shifting its recognition from Taipei to Beijing.) China has tried in the past to convince Haiti to drop that recognition, and in return, China has offered to give about $5 billion in aid to overhaul the infrastructure of Port-au-Prince, reconstructing the sanitation system, electrical grid, roads, schools, hospitals, ports, and other infrastructure. Under U.S. pressure, President Jovenel Moïse refused this development project. Meanwhile, the Dominican Republic severed 69 years of diplomatic relations with Taiwan in 2018.

Secondly, Haiti is on the brink of a social revolution. Haiti’s underclasses – the peasantry, proletariat, and lumpen-proletariat – are fed up with the misery to which they have been condemned and want a complete change of system, a revolution. This prospect has panicked the Haitian bourgeoisie, and also Washington.

This is not just because the U.S. doesn’t want to see another Cuba just south of Miami. It is also because North American exploiters and profiteers are guided by their insatiable thirst for profit. They need slave labor to maintain their high standard of living and therefore try to keep Haiti underdeveloped and a pariah state.

As the war with China approaches, all the China-based factories making so many of the products that Americans use – from cellphones and computers to clothing, toys, and kitchen utensils – will have to be made somewhere else… cheaply. That is why the U.S. needs to keep Haiti as a “shit-hole” and platform for cheap labor, the cheapest in the Western Hemisphere.

So Washington’s plan right now is to: 1) completely destabilize Haiti; 2) liquidate the slightest resistance, to the point of militarily invading under the pretext of overcoming the “gangs”; 3) place in power a puppet government in order to stop any popular, progressive movement that might implement radical change or drop recognition of Taiwan; and 4) set up more assembly plants to replace those that will go offline in China.

The imperative, however, is that nuclear war must be stopped if we are to save life on this planet. That is why Haïti Liberté has endorsed the huge Sat., Mar. 18 demonstration in Washington, DC demanding an end to Washington’s wars of aggression. This is matched by similar giant demonstrations now sweeping Europe.

“Capitalism carries war within itself like the cloud carries the storm,” Jean Jaurès taught us. We must get rid of U.S. imperialist domination. It is the only way for the world’s peoples to regain control of their governments and destinies. To reclaim life and peace is to reject and overcome the small cabal of capitalists, crooked politicians, and corrupt generals who hold the planet’s future in their hands.

This means that Haitians everywhere – both in Haiti and its diaspora – must join the global mobilization against the war, which already is bringing suffering to our country. At stake, at this critical moment in world history, is the future of the planet because, should nuclear war occur, no life will be spared.