Image source, AFP via Getty Images
Since a group of Salvadoran soldiers belonging to an international coalition was ambushed in Haiti on October 18, questions about the case have only multiplied.
First came President Nayib Bukele's claim that they were taken as "hostages" by the criminal groups that control the capital, Port-au-Prince, and its surroundings almost entirely.
Added to this was an ultimatum: either they were delivered alive or they would face a large-scale military operation. "We have already put an end to the gangs in El Salvador, and we can also put an end to you," the president warned them.
But the search and rescue operations undertaken then by the multinational mission and reinforced with a contingent of special forces sent from El Salvador appear to have had no results.
More than a week later, the identity of the soldiers, their whereabouts or their condition remain unknown.
And meanwhile, the discovery of several charred bodies has been reported in the area in which the soldiers lost track. While President Bukele has rejected the responsibility for missing Salvadorans, the organization they are part of, the Gang Suppression Force (GSF), said it is "not in a position" to draw conclusions yet.
"This is the first time in years that a security incident in Haiti has had — and will continue to have — international repercussions of this magnitude," says Romain Le Cour, director of the Haiti Observatory of the Global Initiative organization (GI-TOC), when asked by BBC Mundo about it.
These are the keys to understanding a crisis that is growing by the moment.
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1. What is known about the Salvadoran soldiers missing in Haiti
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At noon on October 18, four Salvadoran military technicians were attacked in the Santo neighborhood, in Croix-des-Bouquest, a town located north of the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince, and controlled by gangs.
The soldiers, whose identity has not been made public, belong to the Gang Suppression Force (GSF), a multinational body deployed in the Caribbean country to combat the prevailing violence.
Their armored vehicle was attacked with firearms and explosives, forcing them to flee, the Armed Forces of El Salvador (FAES) reported that same Sunday.
According to the agency, troops of other nationalities carrying out operations against criminal gangs in Haiti tried to provide help, but were also targeted by gunfire.
"Multiple attempts to approach by land and air have been made, but these have been hindered by the intensity of the clashes and the security conditions in the area," FAES stated.
Since then, the whereabouts of the Salvadorans and what condition they are in have been unknown. But both President Bukele and some analysts specialized in Haiti suggest that the criminals who dominate the area would have taken them hostage.
"Although Santo, where the attack occurred, is under the control of Chen Mechan, the powerful 400 Mawozo gang also operates nearby and sent reinforcements as soon as the fighting began," said Da Rin, a Haiti analyst with the International Crisis Group, an organization that analyzes violence in more than 60 countries and conflict zones.
"The Salvadorans could have been handed over to this gang, which has greater combat capabilities," he added.
In an article published on Saturday afternoon, The New York Times reported that some charred remains found on the outskirts of Port-au-Prince could be those of the Salvadoran military.
Although the American media added that, due to their poor condition, they would have to undergo tests to determine their identities.
The report cited four sources, including the humanitarian aid group Hero Client Rescue, which had been "hired to recover the bodies."
The Salvadoran president, Nayib Bukele, was quick to react. In a message published that same night he denied that it was the Salvadoran soldiers.
"They are not our men. An NGO delivered human remains at the airport, claiming that they belonged to our four airmen," he wrote on the social network X.
"The remains correspond to a child, a man considerably taller than our airmen, and a person wearing part of an army uniform that is not ours. Identification cards and military uniforms from other countries were also found among the remains," he added.
Meanwhile, in a video published Sunday and directed at Bukele, the gang leader known as Lanmò San Jou, whose name translates as "Death does not know what day it will come," stated that the four Salvadorans are dead. He described their deaths as the result of "a mistake" after they entered territory controlled by a neighboring gang and the hitmen opened fire.
BBC Mundo, which could not independently verify the video, consulted the Presidency of El Salvador if there had been progress in the investigation or operations on the ground, but so far had no response.
image source, Reuters
The GSF, meanwhile, has preferred not to draw conclusions yet.
In a statement published hours after Bukele's tweet, the international force stressed that it is not "in a position to confirm that said remains correspond to missing personnel."
He also added that he remains "firm and determined" in his mission, and that he will offer more information "through official channels once there is verified data."
"President Bukele's reaction must be understood in light of what he has put at stake in this case," interprets Romain Le Cour, director of the Haiti Observatory of the Global Initiative organization (GI-TOC).
"From the beginning he posed it as a hostage situation and promised to bring the four men back alive. Acknowledging their death would call into question the premise of the operation he started," the expert tells BBC Mundo.
"The GSF's response was more measured and avoided taking a position, which, at this stage and given the uncertainty, is probably the most appropriate. Only an official forensic process can establish the facts. Until then, competing public narratives are of no use to anyone," he concludes.
2. What is the Gang Suppression Force and what does El Salvador contribute to it?
The Gang Suppression Force (GSF) was created by the United Nations Security Council in October 2025.
It was born to replace the Multinational Security Support Mission (MMAS), led by Kenya, which failed in its attempt to quell violence in the Caribbean nation.
The GSF has faced difficulties in achieving full deployment. Conceived as a force of 5,500 troops, it currently barely reaches 2,000, originating from countries such as Mongolia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Jamaica, Sri Lanka and Chad.
The sending of Salvadoran troops to Haiti was conceived after President Bukele publicly expressed in March 2024 his willingness to provide assistance to the Caribbean country, as long as the UN Security Council issued a resolution, the host country endorsed it, and there was financing for the operation.
After El Salvador and Haiti signed an agreement in this regard before the Organization of American States (OAS) in October of that year, the Salvadoran Legislative Assembly established the legal framework for sending personnel to the Caribbean country.
The deployment on the ground began in January 2025, with the arrival in Haiti of a group of eight aviation specialists, followed by a contingent of 70 soldiers on February 4 of that year, as reported by international agencies and media in the region.
Under the name of Task Force Libertad II, Salvadoran personnel—made up of aviation and operational support experts—perform roles that include medical evacuations and transfer of the wounded, as well as the protection of aircraft, vehicles and other resources of the international contingents.
To continue these tasks, the Legislative Assembly approved a transitional law that extends the permanence of the military mission for an additional 12 months until October 2027.
"Our mission consists solely of pilots and technical personnel, whose main job is to carry out medical evacuations and save lives, not to wage war," Bukele said in a message posted on X on Wednesday.
"However, they were kidnapped in a cowardly manner while they were returning after buying food at a local market," he added.
"This gang suppression mission illustrates very well how the international community understands Haiti," Juan Martínez tells BBC Mundo, who since 2023 has focused his research on Haiti, focused on the dynamics of criminal governance and civil resistance.
"They have sent to resolve the probably most serious governance crisis that we have seen in recent decades in Latin America to a group of very poor countries, whose law enforcement agencies have very serious accusations in inter-American and international courts of human rights violations," explains the anthropologist and journalist.
"That expresses a very deep logic of what the world believes Haiti deserves," he says.
3. What is the situation in Haiti
Haiti has been mired in a serious crisis for years that worsened after the assassination in 2021 of its then president, Jovenel Moïse.
Since then, the gangs have expanded their territorial domain. They now control more than 80% of the capital, Port-au-Prince, and have left most of the State institutions inoperative.
The gangs operate under the control of Viv Ansanm, the largest confederation of criminal groups ever seen in the region, according to anthropologist Juan Martínez, and have carried out dozens of massacres, some of which have left hundreds dead.
"Gangs are increasingly resorting to kidnappings and indiscriminate violence to deter security force operations and pressure authorities to negotiate," explains Diego Da Rin, of the International Crisis Group.
"In Kenscoff, a gang recently killed dozens of people and kidnapped around 50 more, threatening to kill them if security forces attacked their positions," adds the expert.
Violence by armed gangs has displaced a record 1.5 million people in recent years, in addition to leaving more than 5,700 dead and injured from January to mid-September, and more than 230 people kidnapped, according to the United Nations.
However, the assault on Salvadoran troops is the first of its kind against international forces and occurs at a time when Haiti is preparing for its first general elections in more than a decade.
Scheduled for December 13, its completion remains in doubt.
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4. What does the "rescue" operation that Bukele decided to reinforce consist of?
The GSE reported on Friday that Nayib Bukele's government had sent a military "contingent" to Haiti to collaborate in the search for the four Salvadoran soldiers who remain missing.
He added that the operations were being carried out "in close coordination with the Haitian National Police and other relevant operational partners," and called on residents of the Santo neighborhood to avoid areas where these are taking place.
Although no further details were given about the reinforcements, The Miami Herald reported that "100 soldiers from El Salvador's special forces" had arrived in the country on Thursday.
Since then, according to the American media, several flights with personnel from El Salvador have landed in Haiti and by Saturday the number would have reached 450 personnel.
The Salvadoran government has not confirmed it, but this Tuesday Bukele retweeted a message stating that the Colombian Air Force is participating in the transfer of Salvadoran personnel to Haiti.
The deployment takes place after Bukele urged criminal organizations to release the "hostages." However, it leaves a series of doubts for those who understand the Haitian panorama.
"Under what command do the Salvadoran special forces operate and with what rules? How does the GSF now coordinate with the Haitian police and its task force, which includes the private military company Vectus Global and carries out drone attacks?" asks Le Cour, of the Global Initiative.
BBC Mundo asked GSF about the possible progress of the search and rescue operation, how many troops are involved in it and if it has left any victims. He also requested comment on the process of identifying the remains found on Saturday, but has not received a response so far.
Meanwhile, Bukele seems firm in his decision.
"I want you, the gang leaders, to understand one thing very clearly: the attack is nothing compared to what is coming if we do not recover the four hostages alive," he warned them with a message in X.
"We already put an end to the gangs in El Salvador, and we can end them too."
5. Can Bukele export his war against gangs to Haiti?
Already in March 2024, Bukele assured that his government could solve Haiti's growing crisis of violence and that it would only need "a resolution from the UN Security Council, the consent of the host country and cover all the expenses of the mission."
That provoked a whole series of criticisms, similar to the reactions that his ultimatum to Haitian criminal groups has now generated.
There are those who have closed ranks with the Salvadoran president, such as his Dominican counterpart, Luis Abinader, who published the following message in
However, there are several voices that warn the Salvadoran president that the Haitian gangs have nothing to do with the gangs that he managed to dismantle with his heavy-handed policy that has as its cornerstone a state of exception that has been in force for four years and a maximum security prison.
Those also known as gangs originated in the United States in the 1980s, within the Central American diaspora, and arrived in Central America as a result of mass deportations.
"They were divided into relatively autonomous cells called cliques, and for years they gave great importance to a symbolic framework that had to do with tattoos, a kind of caló and a long list of identification symbols," explains anthropologist Martínez in a video published together with the Dromómanos journalistic project.
"They were very violent and kept the Salvadoran population under their yoke for at least two decades," continues Martínez, who investigated their dynamics for years.
"Since the mid-90s, they established a system of reciprocal attacks: 'You attack me, I attack you again.' And a series of extortion systems that targeted the most vulnerable sectors," he adds.
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However, they never had significant military capabilities or war weaponry, something that contrasts with Viv Ansanm (from Haitian Creole Vivre Ensemble, "to live together"), the coalition of gangs that GSF faces in Haiti.
"Haiti's criminal groups have assumed a profile closer to that of militias. They maintain and govern territories that extend for hundreds of kilometers, collect taxes from the population and commerce, control roads and checkpoints, and possess military-grade weapons and ammunition," notes Le Cour, of the Global Initiative.
Added to this is an "overwhelmed" police force and a justice system that does not work," adds the expert. But above all, he emphasizes that these groups "do not act alone."
"They are sustained thanks to political, economic and, in some cases, security actors, who support them when it suits them. However, these networks remain largely untouchable: very few have been investigated and almost none are prosecuted," he concludes.
Given this scenario, "El Salvador can send half an army, but they are going to eat them like chickens," Santiago Riverón, the mayor of Dabajón, a Dominican municipality bordering Haiti, said last week in statements to the Listín Diario newspaper.
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"At this time, and knowing how things are resolved in Haiti, the chances of these soldiers still being alive are minimal, so there is no possibility of negotiating anything. Therefore, what is proposed is an armed confrontation between troops from El Salvador and the gangs (...)," Humberto Salazar, an analyst and former member of the Dominican Liberation Party, wrote in X.
Faced with comments of this type, Bukele responded on Friday in X, saying that he will continue with the plan without taking them into account.
"Many messages, analyzes and comments like this, ensuring that the gangs in Haiti are not like those in El Salvador; that they are bloodthirsty, that they are heavily armed, that no one has been able to defeat them, that all the missions have failed, that we are falling into a trap, that we do not know what we are facing, that it will be our ruin, that we are on the way to our Waterloo," he began by saying.
"But when God grants us victory, the same people who say all that today will change their speech. They will say that it was always easy, that anyone could do it, that the gangs in Haiti were not as dangerous as they thought."
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