1972, April 22 – July: (The Economic Revolution’s Primary Beneficiary: Aid Projects Parceled Like Prizes, Cambronne as the Premier, the First Anniversary at …

1972, April 22 – July: (The Economic Revolution’s Primary Beneficiary: Aid Projects Parceled Like Prizes, Cambronne as the Premier, the First Anniversary at the Cimetière, the U.S. Military Assessment Team, and the Académie Militaire Reopened After Eleven Years): Aid projects began to be parceled out to various countries like prize job assignments — the French were to tackle yet again a road for Jacmel, the Canadians the road to the Cap, the list endless. As in the time of Antoine Simon, the smell of money was in the air, of pots-de-vin judicieusement distribués. The fly in the ointment was that most if not all incoming aid seemed at some point to pass through the hands of the man becoming known around Port-au-Prince as the Premier — a post not provided for in the Haitian constitution. Tourists disembarking at the François Duvalier jet airport were greeted with a picture of the latest président-à-vie emblazoned with his quote: my father made the political revolution — I will make the economic revolution. To many in Port-au-Prince, it seemed the primary beneficiary of the economic revolution was one of its main fighters — Cambronne himself. On April 22, 1972, expectant crowds gathered outside the Cimetière to watch the Jeune Leader mark the first anniversary of Papa Doc’s death; after taps was played, the convoy roared back to the land of the living as quickly as it had arrived at the city of the dead. Cambronne’s March pilgrimage to Washington bore fruit in July: an ambiguously named technical team of U.S. officers whose mission was to assess the future needs of the Haitian Armed Forces slipped quietly into Port-au-Prince. That same month, in a move that would have gotten no approval from the newest occupant of the Duvalier mausoleum, the Académie Militaire was reopened after an eleven-year hiatus, albeit only with carefully vetted officer candidates. Port-au-Prince and selected pockets of the rest of Haiti seemed to be waking up — new hotels were opening, old ones refurbished as hoteliers saw occupancy rates unknown in fifteen years, and the telephone system, long dormant, had been coaxed back to life by Canadian engineers who in their thoroughness saw to it that even an infamous leak in the roof of the Central Telephone Exchange was repaired. Quietly, many Haitians who had spent years abroad began returning, at first as visitors, then as residents — those shoved onto Pan American flights by tonton macoutes had little hope of returning while a Duvalier occupied the Palais, but others for whom exile had been more a matter of prudence than necessity now found the climate far more to their liking and returned, often with fortunes and families fledged abroad.