Combat· Banana Wars
Harllee Cordon Operations 1921-1922
The mopping-up that secured the gains of the second Caco war.
From late 1921 into the spring of 1922, Brigadier General William Harllee directed counter-bandit operations in the Hinche and Mirebalais districts of eastern Haiti, the rough country that had been the heart of the Caco resistance. The method was the cordon: coordinated movements of Marine and gendarme detachments to encircle a district and close in on the residual bandit bands trapped inside, running them down or driving them out rather than chasing them fruitlessly through the hills. The operations consolidated the suppression of the rebellion and cost some casualties among the Marines and gendarmes engaged. They were the unglamorous final phase of the Caco wars, the patient police work of clearing the last armed bands from the back country after the main rising had been broken, and they brought a measure of settled order to the long Haitian occupation.
Podcast episodes on Banana Wars
Record no. 511