Brazil’s role in Haiti’s Crisis

Só pra esclarecer: Brasil não tem nada de vítima; tem é culpa e uma grande responsabilidade por estra tragédia!! Exprtou o modelo de repressão carioca pro Haiti e deu nisso: se não tivesse terremoto, talvez tivessemos 100mil mortos de qq jeito, mortos pela MINUSTAH, ou que sabe, 100mil mulheres haitianas estupradas pelos “salvadores” brasileiros…

That the current crisis in Haiti has to be seen against the background of centuries long imperial domination is hardly a novel thing to say, though it ought to be repeated over and over again. A lesser known aspect of this is the role that Brazil has played in the imperialist project. The quote above is from my comrade Miguel’s facebook status, and reflects an attitude that could and should be wider amongst the Brazilian left. In 2004, when US troops moved into Haiti to exploit a political crisis and install a corrupt regime, it was to Brazil they turned to provide the ‘peacekeeping’ cover. Brazilian troops moved into Haiti as part of security measures, and, as Miguel puts it “exported the ‘Rio’ model of repression to Haiti”. Brazil has to be seen as not only complicit in but also as a perpetrator of the project that has made Haiti the state it is today.

I was in Brazil at the time. Lula had just been elected, and was riding fairly high on a wave of soft left feeling.  One of the reasons that this didn’t provoke such an outcry was a sense that Brazil, as a third world nation itself, couldn’t possibly be part of first world imperialism. Brazilian troops were there to help. Whilst this is more plausible than the idea that the British army, the Butchers of Aden and perpetrators of Bloody Sunday, could be a counterweight to the Americans, it’s not serious politics. Any understanding of how imperialism works has to understand the role played by proxies and allies of the US, and Brazil under Lula, despite the occasional rhetorical flourish, has proved itself a happy participant. So, when Lula makes calls such as this one, we should level at it the same charges of hypocrisy and cynicism we would level at Washington.