[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1994, Book II)]
[September 15, 1994]
[Pages 1558-1561]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



[[Page 1558]]


Address to the Nation on Haiti
September 15, 1994

    My fellow Americans, tonight I want to speak with you about why the 
United States is leading the international effort to restore democratic 
government in Haiti.
    Haiti's dictators, led by General Raoul Cedras, control the most 
violent regime in our hemisphere. For 3 years, they have rejected every 
peaceful solution that the international community has proposed. They 
have broken an agreement that they made to give up power. They have 
brutalized their people and destroyed their economy. And for 3 years, we 
and other nations have worked exhaustively to find a diplomatic 
solution, only to have the dictators reject each one.
    Now the United States must protect our interests, to stop the brutal 
atrocities that threaten tens of thousands of Haitians, to secure our 
borders, and to preserve stability and promote democracy in our 
hemisphere and to uphold the reliability of the commitments we make and 
the commitments others make to us.
    Earlier today, I ordered Secretary of Defense Perry to call up the 
military reserve personnel necessary to support United States troops in 
any action we might undertake in Haiti. I have also ordered two aircraft 
carriers, the U.S.S. Eisenhower and the U.S.S. America into the region. 
I issued these orders after giving full consideration to what is at 
stake. The message of the United States to the Haitian dictators is 
clear: Your time is up. Leave now, or we will force you from power.
    I want the American people to understand the background of the 
situation in Haiti, how what has happened there affects our national 
security interests and why I believe we must act now. Nearly 200 years 
ago, the Haitian people rose up out of slavery and declared their 
independence. Unfortunately, the promise of liberty was quickly snuffed 
out, and ever since, Haiti has known more suffering and repression than 
freedom. In our time, as democracy has spread throughout our hemisphere, 
Haiti has been left behind.
    Then, just 4 years ago, the Haitian people held the first free and 
fair elections since their independence. They elected a parliament and a 
new President, Father Jean-Bertrand Aristide, a Catholic priest who 
received almost 70 percent of the vote. But 8 months later, Haitian 
dreams of democracy became a nightmare of bloodshed. General Raoul 
Cedras led a military coup that overthrew President Aristide, the man 
who had appointed Cedras to lead the army. Resistors were beaten and 
murdered. The dictators launched a horrible intimidation campaign of 
rape, torture, and mutilation. People starved; children died; thousands 
of Haitians fled their country, heading to the United States across 
dangerous seas. At that time, President Bush declared the situation 
posed, and I quote, ``an unusual and extraordinary threat to the 
national security, foreign policy, and economy of the United States.''
    Cedras and his armed thugs have conducted a reign of terror, 
executing children, raping women, killing priests. As the dictators have 
grown more desperate, the atrocities have grown ever more brutal. Recent 
news reports have documented the slaying of Haitian orphans by the 
nation's deadly police thugs. The dictators are said to suspect the 
children of harboring sympathy toward President Aristide for no other 
reason than he ran an orphanage in his days as a parish priest. The 
children fled the orphanages for the streets. Now they can't even sleep 
there because they're so afraid. As one young boy told a visitor, ``I do 
not care if the police kill me because it only brings an end to my 
suffering.''
    International observers uncovered a terrifying pattern of soldiers 
and policemen raping the wives and daughters of suspected political 
dissidents, young girls, 13, 16 years old; people slain and mutilated, 
with body parts left as warnings to terrify others; children forced to 
watch as their mothers' faces are slashed with machetes. A year ago, the 
dictators assassinated the Minister of Justice. Just last month, they 
gunned down Father Jean-Marie Vincent, a peasant leader and close friend 
of Father Aristide. Vincent was executed on the doorstep of his home, a 
monastery. He refused to give up his ministry, and for that, he was 
murdered.
    Let me be clear: General Cedras and his accomplices alone are 
responsible for this suffering

[[Page 1559]]

and terrible human tragedy. It is their actions that have isolated 
Haiti.
    Neither the international community nor the United States has sought 
a confrontation. For nearly 3 years, we've worked hard on diplomatic 
efforts. The United Nations, the Organization of American States, the 
Caribbean community, the six Central American Presidents all have sought 
a peaceful end to this crisis. We have tried everything: persuasion and 
negotiation, mediation and condemnation. Emissaries were dispatched to 
Port-au-Prince and were turned away. The United Nations labored for 
months to reach an agreement acceptable to all parties.
    Then last year, General Cedras himself came here to the United 
States and signed an agreement on Governors Island in New York in which 
he pledged to give up power, along with the other dictators. But when 
the day came for the plan to take effect, the dictators refused to leave 
and instead increased the brutality they are using to cling to power.
    Even then, the nations of the world continued to seek a peaceful 
solution while strengthening the embargo we had imposed. We sent massive 
amounts of humanitarian aid, food for a million Haitians and medicine to 
try to help the ordinary Haitian people, as the dictators continued to 
loot the economy. Then this summer, they threw out the international 
observers who had blown the whistle on the regime's human rights 
atrocities.
    In response to that action, in July the United Nations Security 
Council approved a resolution that authorizes the use of all necessary 
means, including force, to remove the Haitian dictators from power and 
restore democratic government. Still, we continued to seek a peaceful 
solution, but the dictators would not even meet with the United Nations 
Special Envoy. In the face of this continued defiance and with 
atrocities rising, the United States has agreed to lead a multinational 
force to carry out the will of the United Nations.
    More than 20 countries from around the globe, including almost all 
the Caribbean community and nations from as far away as Poland, which 
has so recently won its own freedom, Israel and Jordan, which have been 
struggling for decades to preserve their own security, and Bangladesh, a 
country working on its own economic problems, have joined nations like 
Belgium and Great Britain. They have all agreed to join us because they 
think this problem in our neighborhood is important to their future 
interests and their security.
    I know that the United States cannot, indeed we should not, be the 
world's policemen. And I know that this is a time with the cold war over 
that so many Americans are reluctant to commit military resources and 
our personnel beyond our borders. But when brutality occurs close to our 
shores, it affects our national interests. And we have a responsibility 
to act.
    Thousands of Haitians have already fled toward the United States, 
risking their lives to escape the reign of terror. As long as Cedras 
rules, Haitians will continue to seek sanctuary in our Nation. This 
year, in less than 2 months, more than 21,000 Haitians were rescued at 
sea by our Coast Guard and Navy. Today, more than 14,000 refugees are 
living at our naval base in Guantanamo. The American people have already 
expended almost $200 million to support them, to maintain the economic 
embargo. And the prospect of millions and millions more being spent 
every month for an indefinite period of time loom ahead unless we act.
    Three hundred thousand more Haitians, 5 percent of their entire 
population, are in hiding in their own country. If we don't act, they 
could be the next wave of refugees at our door. We will continue to face 
the threat of a mass exodus of refugees and its constant threat to 
stability in our region and control of our borders.
    No American should be surprised that the recent tide of migrants 
seeking refuge on our shores comes from Haiti and from Cuba. After all, 
they're the only nations left in the Western Hemisphere where democratic 
government is denied, the only countries where dictators have managed to 
hold back the wave of democracy and progress that has swept over our 
entire region and that our own Government has so actively promoted and 
supported for years.
    Today, 33 of the 35 countries in the Americas have democratically 
elected leaders. And Haiti is the only nation in our hemisphere where 
the people actually elected their own government and chose democracy, 
only to have tyrants steal it away.
    There's no question that the Haitian people want to embrace 
democracy; we know it because they went to the ballot box and told the 
world. History has taught us that preserving democracy in our own 
hemisphere strengthens America's security and prosperity. Democracies 
here are more likely to keep the peace and to stabilize

[[Page 1560]]

our region. They're more likely to create free markets and economic 
opportunity, and to become strong, reliable trading partners. And 
they're more likely to provide their own people with the opportunities 
that will encourage them to stay in their nation and to build their own 
futures. Restoring Haiti's democratic government will help lead to more 
stability and prosperity in our region, just as our actions in Panama 
and Grenada did.
    Beyond the human rights violations, the immigration problems, the 
importance of democracy, the United States also has strong interests in 
not letting dictators, especially in our own region, break their word to 
the United States and the United Nations. In the post-cold-war world, we 
will assure the security and prosperity of the United States with our 
military strength, our economic power, our constant efforts to promote 
peace and growth. But when our national security interests are 
threatened, we will use diplomacy when possible and force when 
necessary.
    In Haiti, we have a case in which the right is clear, in which the 
country in question is nearby, in which our own interests are plain, in 
which the mission is achievable and limited, and in which the nations of 
the world stand with us. We must act.
    Our mission in Haiti, as it was in Panama and Grenada, will be 
limited and specific. Our plan to remove the dictators will follow two 
phases. First, it will remove dictators from power and restore Haiti's 
legitimate, democratically elected government. We will train a civilian-
controlled Haitian security force that will protect the people rather 
than repress them. During this period, police monitors from all around 
the world will work with the authorities to maximize basic security and 
civil order and minimize retribution.
    The Haitian people should know that we come in peace. And you, the 
American people, should know that our soldiers will not be involved in 
rebuilding Haiti or its economy. The international community, working 
together, must provide that economic, humanitarian, and technical 
assistance necessary to help the Haitians rebuild.
    When this first phase is completed, the vast majority of our troops 
will come home, in months, not years. I want our troops and their 
families to know that we'll bring them home just as soon as we possibly 
can.
    Then, in the second phase, a much smaller U.S. force will join 
forces from other members of the United Nations. And their mission will 
leave Haiti after elections are held next year and a new Haitian 
government takes office in early 1996.
    Tonight I can announce that President Aristide has pledged to step 
down when his term ends, in accordance with the constitution he has 
sworn to uphold. He has committed himself to promote reconciliation 
among all Haitians and to set an historic example by peacefully 
transferring power to a duly elected successor. He knows, as we know, 
that when you start a democracy, the most important election is the 
second election. President Aristide has told me that he will consider 
his mission fulfilled not when he regains office but when he leaves 
office to the next democratically elected President of Haiti. He has 
pledged to honor the Haitian voters who put their faith in the ballot 
box.
    In closing, let me say that I know the American people are 
rightfully concerned whenever our soldiers are put at risk. Our 
volunteer military is the world's finest, and its leaders have worked 
hard to minimize risks to all our forces. But the risks are there, and 
we must be prepared for that.
    I assure you that no President makes decisions like this one without 
deep thought and prayer. But it's my job as President and Commander in 
Chief to take those actions that I believe will best protect our 
national security interests.
    Let me say again, the nations of the world have tried every possible 
way to restore Haiti's democratic government peacefully. The dictators 
have rejected every possible solution. The terror, the desperation, and 
the instability will not end until they leave. Once again, I urge them 
to do so. They can still move now and reduce the chaos and disorder, 
increase the security, the stability, and the safety in which this 
transfer back to democracy can occur.
    But if they do not leave now, the international community will act 
to honor our commitments; to give democracy a chance, not to guarantee 
it; to remove stubborn and cruel dictators, not to impose a future.
    I know many people believe that we shouldn't help the Haitian people 
recover their democracy and find their hard-won freedoms, that the 
Haitians should accept the violence and repression as their fate. But 
remember, the same was said

[[Page 1561]]

of a people who more than 200 years ago took up arms against a tyrant 
whose forces occupied their land. But they were a stubborn bunch, a 
people who fought for their freedoms and appealed to all those who 
believed in democracy to help their cause. And their cries were 
answered, and a new nation was born, a nation that ever since has 
believed that the rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness 
should be denied to none.
    May God bless the people of the United States and the cause of 
freedom. Good night.

Note: The President spoke at 9 p.m. from the Oval Office at the White 
House.