As the state Department explained, Haitians were “inferior people” and “It was obvious that if our occupation was to be beneficial to Haiti and further her progress it was necessary that foreign capital should come to Haiti…[and] Americans could hardly be expected to put their money into plantations and big agricultural enterprises in Haiti if they could not themselves own the land on which their money was to be spent.” Thus it was out of a sincere desire to help suffering Haitians that the United States forced them at gunpoint to allow U.S. investors to take over their country in an “unselfish intervention” carried out in a “fatherly way” with no thought of “preferential advantages, commercial or otherwise” for ourselves (New York Times).
— Noam Chomsky (HOPES AND PROSPECTS)
