<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://cdn.thecollector.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/why-did-us-occupy-haiti-1.jpg" alt="American Marines in Cap-Haïtien; Haiti map and flag" width="1200" height="690" />
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The US occupation of Haiti is a clear example of how history is composed of multiple interconnected layers. While no single reason can be identified for the US decision to occupy the island nation, overlapping political, strategic, and economic interests, as well as a rooted belief in colonialism, ultimately led US troops to control the Caribbean country between 1915 and 1934.
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<h2>Haiti’s Troubled Independence</h2>
<figure id="attachment_169835" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-169835" style="width: 1200px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://cdn.thecollector.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/Battle-Palm-Tree-Hill.jpg" alt="Battle Palm Tree Hill" width="1200" height="712" /><figcaption id="caption-attachment-169835" class="wp-caption-text">Battle of San Domingo, January Suchodolski, 1845. Source: Wikimedia Commons</figcaption></figure>
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Saint-Domingue, the western part of the island of Hispaniola, was colonized by the French in the 17th century and soon became the jewel of the empire as one of the most important producers of sugar, coffee, and other agricultural products. In reality, this productivity was based on exploitation within a system of segregation in which political and economic power were concentrated among white colonists while slaves, the majority of the population, were subjected to intense and brutal working conditions. By the end of the 19th century, the ideals of the <a href="https://www.thecollector.com/did-french-revolution-spark-democracy/">French Revolution</a> deeply permeated the island territory—not even <a href="https://www.thecollector.com/who-was-napoleon-bonaparte-emperor-of-the-french/">Napoleon</a> could prevent it.
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In 1804, <a href="https://www.thecollector.com/major-players-in-the-haitian-revolution/">independence was proclaimed</a>, renaming the territory Haiti, a Taíno indigenous name that means “mountainous land.” Haiti became the second nation in the Americas to achieve independence, only after the United States. It was also the first country in Hispanic America and the Caribbean to separate from its colonial masters, provoking a domino effect on the rest of the continent and, given that most of its inhabitants, <a href="https://www.thecollector.com/what-was-the-transatlantic-slave-trade/">formerly slaves, were of African descent</a>, it can also be considered the first republic of people of African descent.
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This was a cause for concern for the United States, particularly for southern plantation owners, as Haiti was the first modern nation to rise from an enslaved past and challenge colonialism. Despite its independence, the country would remain in the sights of colonial powers, particularly the United States, due to its proximity.
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<h2>France’s Imposed Debt</h2>
<figure id="attachment_169836" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-169836" style="width: 1200px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://cdn.thecollector.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/National-bank-haiti.jpg" alt="National bank haiti" width="1200" height="744" /><figcaption id="caption-attachment-169836" class="wp-caption-text">National Bank of Haiti, Port-au-Prince. Source: Wikimedia Commons</figcaption></figure>
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France imposed a ransom of 150 million francs as a condition for recognizing Haiti’s independence; even after paying for its freedom with blood, the French demanded this exorbitant amount of money, which forced Haiti to take out multiple international loans with enormous interest rates that would take 122 years to finish paying off.
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Every franc sent across the Atlantic could have been used to create institutions and infrastructure or circulate among the inhabitants—in other words, to rebuild the country. Instead, the new nation’s resources served to benefit foreign interests, plunging the country into a spiral of debt and crisis as well as perpetuating its economic dependence.
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In theory, Haiti was an independent nation, but in practice, colonial dynamics were maintained. This system of economic exploitation disguised as financial agreements is a form of renewed colonialism known as financial neocolonialism. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/20/world/french-banks-haiti-cic.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The French bank Crédit Industriel et Commercial was the greatest beneficiary of the debt</a>; they received so much in commissions, interest, and charges that in a few years the profits of the French shareholders exceeded the Haitian government’s budget for public works throughout the country.
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The United States was very aware of the great economic advantages of maintaining the debt and how it allowed for economic domination over Haiti, providing great interests and privileged access to income. So vital was it that, months before the planned US invasion, a small group of Marines entered the country’s national bank and left with 500,000 dollars in gold; days later, this money was in a Wall Street vault. Controlling the debt meant being able to use Haiti as a cash register.
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<h2>US Strategic Interests</h2>
<figure id="attachment_169837" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-169837" style="width: 1200px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://cdn.thecollector.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/panama-canal.jpg" alt="panama canal" width="1200" height="744" /><figcaption id="caption-attachment-169837" class="wp-caption-text">Completion of the Panama Canal construction, 1914. Source: Canal de Panamá</figcaption></figure>
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At the beginning of the 20th century, the United States was positioning itself as a world power by pursuing an expansionist policy in Latin America and the Caribbean, supported by positions such as the <a href="https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/monroe-doctrine" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Monroe Doctrine</a> and its extension, the Roosevelt Corollary. These doctrines were based on the idea that the Western Hemisphere should be free from European influence, and therefore, the <a href="https://www.thecollector.com/manifest-destiny-doctrine-19th-century-america/">United States had the right to intervene</a> in the internal affairs of countries in the region to maintain stability and protect its interests. The control of Haiti was fundamental to consolidating its regional influence by protecting strategic maritime routes and securing its economic interests.
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The occupation was part of a broader strategy to safeguard the <a href="https://www.thecollector.com/invasion-of-panama-operation-just-cause/">Panama Canal</a>, a key point of international commerce and the movement of military troops. The construction of the canal, by shortening distances and reducing travel times, boosted commerce with Europe and Asia, strengthening the American economy. Moreover, it was a symbolic way of projecting US power to the rest of the Western Hemisphere.
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The US, with its <a href="https://www.thecollector.com/the-banana-wars-how-the-us-plundered-central-america/">expansionist policy</a>, maintained an eye on all relevant Caribbean matters in order to maintain stability and minimize risks to its new commercial routes. For example, wresting control of Puerto Rico after the <a href="https://www.thecollector.com/the-spanish-american-war-domination/">Spanish–American War</a> provided it with a military and strategic base in the Caribbean. The large sums invested in Cuban sugar plantations provided an economic benefit but also demonstrated the political and commercial influence of the island. The US also exerted control over the Dominican Republic’s import taxes, which limited the influence of other actors and ensured that it alone enjoyed the benefits of commerce.
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<figure id="attachment_169838" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-169838" style="width: 1200px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://cdn.thecollector.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/Roosevelt-Rough-Riders-hill.jpg" alt="Roosevelt Rough Riders hill" width="1200" height="679" /><figcaption id="caption-attachment-169838" class="wp-caption-text">Colonel Roosevelt and his Rough Riders at the top of the hill they captured, Battle of San Juan, by William Dinwiddie, 1898. Source: Library of Congress</figcaption></figure>
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Due to its strategic importance as a potential naval base, the US feared that some European imperialist power might decide to take Haiti. In 1868, President Andrew Johnson <a href="https://2001-2009.state.gov/r/pa/ho/time/wwi/88275.htm" target="_blank" rel="noopener">suggested the annexation of the island of Hispaniola</a>, made up of Haiti and the Dominican Republic, to secure a US defensive and economic stake in the West Indies. From 1889 to 1891, Secretary of State James Blaine unsuccessfully sought to lease Mole-Saint Nicolas, a city on Haiti’s northern coast that could provide a strategic location for a naval base. In 1910, President William Howard Taft granted Haiti a large loan in the hopes that Haiti could pay off its international debt, thus lessening foreign influence. The attempt proved futile due to the enormity of the debt and the internal instability of the country.
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France, due to the debt, held a certain level of power over Haiti&#8217;s trade and finances, but what was most concerning for policymakers in the United States was the growing presence of Germans in Haiti since the beginning of the 20th century. <a href="https://archive.org/details/unitedstatesoccu0000schm/page/n3/mode/2up" target="_blank" rel="noopener">German merchants began establishing trading branches in Haiti</a>, quickly dominating commercial business in the area. In addition, they married Haitian women from the most important mulatto families of the nation, defying the Haitian laws that prohibited foreigners from owning land; this, in addition to the acquisition and control of properties within the country, allowed them to integrate into society, strengthening their economic and social position.
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<h2>The Formal Invasion</h2>
<figure id="attachment_169839" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-169839" style="width: 1200px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://cdn.thecollector.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/US-Marines-search-Haitian-rebels.jpg" alt="US Marines search Haitian rebels" width="1200" height="799" /><figcaption id="caption-attachment-169839" class="wp-caption-text">US Marines search for Haitian rebels in 1919. Source: The Black Alliance for Peace</figcaption></figure>
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Since its independence, Haiti has been marked by chronic political instability, factional struggles, institutional weakness, and economic crises. However, the final straw was a cycle of coups, fragmentation of power, and caudillismo. Between 1911 and 1915, <a href="https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780761802303/page/790/mode/2up" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Haiti had six presidents</a>. Following the brutal lynching death of President Jean Vilbrun Guillaume Sam, the country plunged into a power vacuum that further aggravated the chaos.
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The US Department of State had already made the decision to occupy Haiti and simply waited for this moment, the perfect pretext for the invasion. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/20/world/haiti-wall-street-us-banks.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">According to its justification</a>, the country was so poor and unstable that it could not fend for itself; if not the US, some other power would intervene. Secretary of State Robert Lansing also described the occupation as a civilizing mission to end “anarchy, savagery and oppression” in Haiti, convinced that, as he once wrote, “the African race lacks all capacity for political organization.”
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In July of 1815, troops disembarked and occupied the capital, expanding the country’s military presence and establishing martial law that suspended civil guarantees, established absolute military control, and disarmed the population. With the occupation, a <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/25088421.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">new and dark chapter opened</a> in Haitian history: one of military repression and neocolonial exploitation, lasting nearly two decades.
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<h2>The Legacy of Haitian Intervention</h2>
<figure id="attachment_169834" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-169834" style="width: 1200px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://cdn.thecollector.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/American-Marines-defending-entrance-gate.jpg" alt="American Marines defending entrance gate" width="1200" height="647" /><figcaption id="caption-attachment-169834" class="wp-caption-text">American Marines defending the entrance gate in Cap-Haïtien, 1915. Source: Wikimedia Commons</figcaption></figure>
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In Haiti, the wounds of colonialism have been reopened with each intervention, deepening a scar that dates all the way back to Christopher Columbus’s arrival in America, when its population was enslaved to work on plantations and in mines and verged on extinction. Independence was ultimately merely the illusion of freedom; it did not bring an end to the plundering, with the enormous fine imposed by France taking more than one hundred years to recover from.
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Chronic political instability served as evidence of the lack of institutions and the disarticulation of the country, one hundred years after its independence. The US did nothing but take advantage of the situation under the pretext of providing stability. The US takeover was nothing more than another link in a long chain of interventions designed to secure its strategic and economic control of the region. The intervention only reinforced the neocolonial model of institutions that have continued compounding poverty and corruption throughout the twentieth century.
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Colonialism was perpetuated through debts, military interventions, and economic manipulation. Many historians have wondered how things would be if Haiti had not been plundered by foreign powers, international banks, and its own leaders since independence. Today, classified as one of the poorest countries in Latin America, Haiti invites reflection on the extent to which such misery and instability have been the direct result of external interference disguised as aid, reopening old wounds that endure to the present day.

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