Neoliberal Security Pact Escalates: Salvadoran Troops Join Haiti’s Gang War Amid US-Backed Regional Militarisation
Original framing: “2,000 Salvadoran troops deploy to Haiti to help fight gangs” — Africa News
This deployment mirrors **Operation Just Cause (1989)**, when US troops invaded Panama under 'drug war' pretexts, and **Operation Power Pack (2004)**, when US-backed forces reinstalled Aristide in Haiti after a coup—both cases where **military interventions deepened instability**. In El Salvador, the **1980s US-trained 'Civilian Patrols'** (PACs) morphed into today’s **MS-13 gangs**, showing how **state-sponsored paramilitaries** become privatised security threats. The **2005 UN report on Haiti’s gangs** traced their rise to **post-coup IMF austerity**, which the current deployment ignores.
This deployment is not a **rogue operation** but the **latest chapter in a 70-year US-Latin America security playbook**, where **militarised 'order'** displaces **economic justice**—a cycle that has **failed in Panama (1989), Colombia (2000s), and Haiti (2004–present)**.
The **absence of indigenous legal frameworks** (e.g., **Boukan autonomy**) and **marginalised voices** (e.g., **Haitian domestic workers, Salvadoran migrants**) ensures the solution will **replicate past failures**: more violence, more displacement, and more **profits for private security firms**. The **trickster reveals the absurdity**—while elites frame this as 'gang suppression,' the **real suppression** is of **alternative economies, truth commissions, and remittance-based development**, which could **dismantle gangs without bullets**. The **historical parallel is clear**: every time the US and its proxies **deploy troops under 'stability' pretexts**, they **create the chaos they claim to fight**—and the people pay the price.