Exclusive: US-backed Haiti anti-gang force in search of lead battalion

For U.S. security planners, the mission in Haiti couldn’t have been clearer. A primary task of the international force is to deploy in the Caribbean island nation to search, seize, and “kill” gang members, according to an early U.S. draft plan, known as a Concept of Operations, or CONOPS. But the blunt U.S. language rattled some of its potential partners, particularly Canada, which has been working closely with the United States to draw up a detailed plan for ending Haiti’s heavily armed gangs’ reign of terror in Port-au-Prince and other parts of Haiti. Instead, they settled on slightly less provocative language. The Gang Suppression Force, according to a preliminary summary of the CONOPS obtained by Devex, “aims to neutralize, isolate, and deter armed gangs.” The negotiation points to a larger question facing the United States, the United Nations, and other countries involved in planning to confront Haiti’s gangs. Is the UN-mandated force engaged in a largely law enforcement operation, with all the legal encumbrances that entails, or is it a classic armed conflict, which permits wider scope for lethal operations? The matter has particular sensitivity given the fact that so many of the gangs’ fighters are children. The U.N. Security Council resolution authorizes the suppression force to “take all necessary measures” to achieve its mandate, but is ambiguous about the legal framework governing the appropriate level of force. It states that international forces would be acting in accordance with “international law, including human rights law, as applicable,” which would normally apply to law enforcement operations. But it provides enough of a loophole to argue that some operations by the suppression force could be judged by a more permissive legal standard under the laws of war. Human rights advocates maintain the operation should be treated largely as a law enforcement mission. “We wouldn’t characterize the situation in Haiti as an armed conflict but as a devastating security crisis with criminal groups and so-called ‘self-defense’ groups engaging in widespread violence, kidnapping, sexual violence, among other serious crimes,” Louis Charbonneau, Human Rights Watch’s U.N. director, wrote in an email to Devex. “In tackling this violence and restoring security, all international forces and the Haitian police must adhere to international human rights law.” But others said it makes no sense to stand up a military force for a purely law enforcement job, noting that some of Haiti’s most powerful gangs wield military-grade equipment and operate under military-style command and control. “I don’t see how you can do combat with soldiers without calling it an armed conflict,” said Walter Dorn, professor of defense studies at the Royal Military College of Canada. “But I also don’t see that human rights law and international humanitarian law are going to be opposed to each other. They are complementary.” The distinction is far from symbolic. How it is ultimately resolved could impact the willingness of governments to commit forces for the U.S.-backed coalition. For instance, the U.N.-mandated force would wield broad legal authority to kill or detain gang members if they were classified as terrorists or enemy combatants. But if they were merely identified as criminals, they would enjoy greater due process rights. In addition, the force would be obliged to make an effort to arrest and hand them over to the local police to hold them in Haitian jails, which are woefully unfit to handle the job. “In a human rights law regime, the use of lethal force is allowed in very limited circumstances, such as self defense, the defense of a third party whose lives are in imminent danger and there are no other options,” William O’Neil, the U.N. high commissioner for human rights’ designated expert on the human rights situation in Haiti, told Devex in a phone interview.. The negotiations are playing out against a backdrop of growing U.S. military assertiveness in the region, with the Trump administration ordering lethal strikes against alleged Venezuelan drug traffickers, dismissing its own lawyers’ skepticism about the legality of treating suspected criminals like terrorists or enemy combatants in a time of war. The three-page summary notes that the U.S. has designated a number of Haitian gangs, including Viv Ansanm, as “terrorist organizations” which operate “as proto-insurgent movements.” “I think we can be grateful that the U.S. is not to be the lead nation,” Dorn told Devex in a phone interview. “There’s no way other nations would want to go into Haiti with their kinds of rules of engagement that the U.S. is applying for the Venezuela case.” Dorn said he believed it unlikely that a “risk-averse” Canadian government would authorize on-the-ground military forces in Haiti, but may be persuaded to provide air logistics capacity. But he also expressed confidence that the right mix of foreign troops could successfully defeat the gangs, noting that a U.N. mission, backed by intelligence, did just that nearly 20 years ago. Complicating matters, Haiti doesn’t possess the law enforcement infrastructure — including judicial, police, and detention capabilities — required to hold perpetrators to account. The U.N. Security Council resolution authorizes the suppression force to adopt “urgent temporary measures” to assist the Haitian police in maintaining public order, including the power to arrest and detain. Children swept up in arrests are to be separated from adult detainees. Officials familiar with the deliberations said the U.S. is showing some flexibility to strike a compromise. And there has been progress. On Tuesday, the standing group appointed a special representative for the mission, Jack Christofides, a veteran U.N. peacekeeping official. His selection has not yet been made public. The U.S. and its partners have yet to reach agreement on the final concept of operations, but they hope to have it ready before a Dec. 9 “force generation” meeting at the Canadian mission to the U.N., which is intended to secure commitments from governments to participate. Still, the summary echoes much of the language of a U.N. Security Council resolution that authorized the use of force to suppress the gangs. The Standing Group of Partners — which includes the U.S. Canada, El Salvador, Guatemala, Jamaica, Kenya, and the Bahamas — is tasked with providing strategic direction for the force. The U.S. and its partners have yet to name a force commander responsible for running day-to-day ground operations. Despite preliminary commitments by several countries to participate in the mission, the group has still not identified a nation willing to supply a battalion to spearhead the operation. Burundi and Chad pledged last week to contribute troops. The U.S. mission to the United Nations referred questions on the matter to the U.S. State Department. The State Department did not respond to a list of questions presented by Devex. A former French colony, Haiti has been roiled for much of its history by internal instability, U.S. occupation, and, more recently, troubled U.N. peacekeeping ventures, which have delivered cholera to the Caribbean island, but no enduring peace. The assassination of the late President Jovenel Moïse in July 2021 brought a new round of violence and created a power vacuum that has been filled by an array of heavily armed gangs. In October 2023, the U.N. Security Council established the Multinational Security Support, or MSS, mission in Haiti to confront the country’s gangs. The mission, which was led by Kenya with the participation of Belize, El Salvador, Guatemala, Jamaica, and the Bahamas, and largely funded by the U.S. and Canada, struggled to contain the gangs. In September, the Trump administration pushed through a U.N. Security Council resolution establishing a 5,500-strong gang suppression force. The resolution was adopted by a vote of 12-0 with three abstentions from China, Pakistan, and Russia. Speaking to the 15-nation council after the resolution’s passage, Mike Waltz, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, noted that the MSS force “lacked the scale, scope, and resources needed to take the fight to the gangs and restore a baseline of security in Haiti.” “Today’s vote sets that right,” he added. The new 5,500-strong mission, dubbed the Gang Suppression Force, would be “five times the size of its predecessor and with a strengthened mandate to go after the gangs,” he said. The summary obtained by Devex provides fairly sweeping authority to use force, saying that “key tasks include conducting offensive operations to neutralize gang leadership and disrupt resource flows.” It also acknowledges significant risks for the operation, including the prospect of “civilian casualties in densely populated urban areas” and the “use of children as fighters by gangs.” And it cites the “overcrowded and inadequate detention facilities” in Haiti and the “limited capacity of the Haitian judiciary to prosecute gang-related crimes.” The force’s key strategic priorities, meanwhile, are spelled out in the summary: • Neutralizing and isolating gangs through intelligence-led operations. • Security critical infrastructure and lines of communication. • Disrupting illicit trafficking and resources flow. • Enhancing Haitian SECFOR (security forces) capabilities through training and partnered operation. • Facilitating disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration, or DDR, programs through the U.N., with a focus on minors. • Protecting civilians and mitigating harm during operations.