Appointment in Haiti

Finally, after so much bluff and defiance, the Haitian dictator, Lt. Gen. Raoul Cedras, has been forced to return to his senses. He has decided to quit, calling off his plan to sacrifice the Haitians for his pride.

Former U.S. president Jimmy Carter, a moralist and statesman, deserves credit for making the planned military invasion of the small country unnecessary. Carter has not only saved the lives of Haitian people and American soldiers, he has also saved President Bill Clinton from his first serious threat from outside.

Before Carter returned home from the high-voltage mission, many circles in the Unites States had voiced concern that it would become bogged down in the trouble-prone country where military intervention seemed more feasible that any other method of giving democracy a chance. They said Clinton had not drawn a clear picture of how the deposed elected president, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, could survive. And with the Somalia morass fresh in the minds of millions of Americans, confidence in the possibility of a successful mission was not running high.

It is undeniable that any effort to restore democracy in Haiti by force could quickly prove an impossible mission. And failure would put Clinton, who is now waiting out a mid-term congressional election campaign, in hot water.

Now, with the U.S.troops landing on the island peacefully today, the question foremost in minds across the world is whether they will be able to uphold Aristide's government in the long- run. One might also wonder whether the fall of Cedras will deter other generals from deposing a democratically-elected leader in the future?

The trouble with this impoverished country -- where the land is insufficiently arable and the illiteracy rate is the highest in the world -- is that it has proven itself consistently capable of producing rich dictators. Haiti's 200 years of turbulent history of coups and counter-coups has done little to discourage generals from risking the gamble of seizing power in a bid at reaping the forbidden fruits of dictatorship.

The presence of U.S. troops there today will certainly be able to put any anti-Aristide resistance groups at bay. But what will happen when the American military withdraws?

Although it seems imperative for Aristide to purge the Cedras elements from the military who helped unseat him in 1991, as the elected president, who is also a Catholic priest, he is sure to find himself obligated to refrain from launching a vengeance campaign. Therefore, Aristide is facing a situation in which he clearly must commit himself to promoting reconciliation among all of his people -- as he has promised -- before his term ends in December next year.

Although America's uphold-democracy stance may seem commendable, the question remains as to whether this operation has proven that democracy can be implanted by force.

It seems to us that if the leaders in Washington -- who have on many occasions exhibited double-standard morality -- are sincere in their solemn pledge to save democracy from the jaws of power-hungry generals, they should give more serious thought to how to save Algerians, Nigerians, Bosnians and Myanmarese from the military hells in which they exist.