Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire
  • omnibus

The Return of the Marines
Thomas Peralte
25 Aug 2021
🖨️ Print Article
The Return of the Marines
The Return of the Marines

It’s hard to teach an empire new tricks. Once again, the U.S. Marines invade Haiti “for the umpteenth time” under the guise of humanitarian assistance.

A battalion of U.S. Marines from North Carolina’s Camp Lejeune left for Haiti on Wednesday, August 18 under the pretext of aiding the victims of the disasters that struck the departments of Sud, Nippes and Grand’Anse: a 7.2 magnitude earthquake on Saturday, August 14, and heavy rains, winds, and floods from tropical storm Grace which swept through the country, particularly the Grand-Sud, on August 16 and 17, 2021.

The provisional death toll provided by the Civil Protection Agency currently stands at 2,189 and more than 12,000 people have been injured. According to the Agency, the earthquake destroyed more than 7,000 homes and damaged more than 12,000, leaving around 30,000 families homeless. Schools, offices and churches had also been demolished or severely damaged.

It is under this pretext that US marines will be deployed at the request of the US Agency for International Development and Task Force-Haiti. The Marines will join the international effort currently involving officials from the U.S. Embassy, other U.S. military services, and a Disaster Assistance Response Team (DART) deployed to Haiti on August 14.

“Once 420 sailors and around 200 Marines arrive, they will work together to bring aid to Haiti: clearing debris and reopening roads, search, rescue and evacuation of the wounded. We have a fleet surgical team on board that will be able to provide medical assistance,” said US Marine Corps Lt. Col. Cory Murtaugh.

Although the gringo marines do not need to make excuses to invade a country, in this case they used the pretext of being “nice” and “in solidarity” with the Haitian tragedy, and set foot in a countries which they have invaded several times and where they almost always control their leaders

According to one of the naval chiefs: “The troops could stay in Haiti for up to four months or more if necessary. The USS Arlington will be deployed with two MH-60 Seahawk helicopters, a surgical team and a landing craft. In addition, the United States is shipping the USNS Burlington Spearhead Class Expeditionary Fast Transport (T-EPF-10) which will also serve as a platform to launch drones for aerial surveillance, as well as two P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft.”

In this way, the Haitian people who have suffered one misfortune after another, between bad rulers and the forces of nature in the face of so many aggressions, will now have to face the arrogance and the repressive desire of the army of the dominant imperialist power of the region accustomed to killing, rape, and torture.

Haiti Liberté rigorously denounces this umpteenth Yankee landing under humanitarian pretexts to defile once again the Haitian soil of Dessalines, Péralte and Batraville. The Haitian people must remain vigilant, mobilized. If our country is faced with daily earthquakes and storms from our governments, it is because the United States has always imposed local lackeys on us not only to excessively destabilize the country, but also to safeguard and defend their hegemonic interests.

No to the US Navy in Haiti!

No to American imperialist domination in Haiti!

Long live the revolutionary struggle of the Haitian people!

*Originally published in the French edition of the Haiti Liberté, the largest Haitian weekly tri-lingual newspaper.

Haiti
Haiti Occupation

Do you need and appreciate Black Agenda Report articles? Please click on the DONATE icon, and help us out, if you can.


Related Stories

Editors, The Black Agenda Review
ESSAY: The Haitian Revolution and its Impact on the Americas, Michel-Rolph Trouillot, 1991
20 August 2025
“To understand the history of the Americas we must pay tribute to…Haiti.”
ELAPRE
There is no Revolution Without Revolutionary Consciousness
13 August 2025
Revolution requires more than violence—it demands collective awakening.
Black Alliance for Peace Haiti/Americas Team
Exporting Repression: Haitians And Kenyans Are Both Fighting Neo-Colonial Representatives of U.S.-Led Imperialism
30 July 2025
The U.S. exports repression like a global franchise, outsourcing violence while claiming benevolent intent.
Socialist Workers' Movement of the Dominican Republic
Fighting Apartheid in the Dominican Republic is Essential!
28 May 2025
Fighting apartheid in the Dominican Republic is essential to achieving redress for people of African descent in that country.
Black Alliance for Peace Haiti/Americas Team
The Black Alliance for Peace Calls for Resistance Against the Accelerating Imperialist War on Black/African Peoples in Our Americas
14 May 2025
Accelerating crises of imperialism in Haiti, Ecuador, and beyond highlight the urgent need for regional Pan-Africanist, anti-imperialist unity
Mildred Trouilot Aristide
Haiti And The Global Movement For Reparations
16 April 2025
Haiti Action Committee is honored to share the keynote address given by Haiti’s former First Lady Mildred Ar
Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti
Remembering Mario Joseph, BAI Managing Attorney
09 April 2025
The world has lost a champion of justice with the passing of Mario Joseph, a Haitian human rights lawyer who spent nearly three decades fightin
Clau O'Brien Moscoso , Austin Cole
The Struggle for a Zone of Peace Continues!: A Conversation with Austin Cole
26 February 2025
The newly launched U.S./NATO Out of the Americas Network activates local grassroots organizations across the region in an effort to m
Kit Klarenberg
USAID Exported CIA Balkan Terror to Haiti
26 February 2025
Nato Koury
Guantánamo Bay’s forgotten history of detaining Haitian migrants
19 February 2025
The threats by the Trump administration to detain migrants in Guantanamo Bay will not be the first time the United States has used the fac

More Stories


  • Jon Jeter
    From Jim Crow to Katrina to Gentrification, Tracing the Rise and Fall of New Orleans Working Class
    27 Aug 2025
    A forgotten history of cross-racial labor solidarity in 1890s New Orleans offered a glimpse of a potential future. Its deliberate destruction set the stage for the city's modern transformation into a…
  • Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright
    Synergy of the Sacrificed: Katrina and the Praxis of Imperial Domination
    27 Aug 2025
    Twenty years after Katrina, the disaster stands not as an anomaly but as a blueprint. Its aftermath reveals a template for imperial domination, where "natural" disasters become pretexts for…
  • ​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
    "Inequality in Kenya: View from Kibera" Documentary Premieres August 28
    27 Aug 2025
    Join political activist and Black Agenda Report’s contributing editor Ajamu Baraka and members of the Communist Party Marxist-Kenya on a trip to Kibera, Africa’s largest slum.
  • Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
    Ethnic cleansing called Katrina
    27 Aug 2025
    "Ethnic cleansing called Katrina" is the latest from BAR's Poet-in-Residence.
  • Jaribu Hill
    Solidarity, not Charity—End Jim Crow Recovery—Restore All Communities
    27 Aug 2025
    Jaribu Hill, Executive Director of the Mississippi Workers’ Center for Human Rights, recounts the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina on the Gulf Coast and the efforts to organize on behalf of the people.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us