The unstable situation in Haiti, where elected president Jean-Bertrand Aristide had been ousted from office by the military in September 1991, presented another regional problem. The United States pressured the military government to restore Aristide. In July 1993, the Haitian military regime agreed to reinstate Aristide by October 30, 1993, but then refused to step down. In October, in an effort Clinton approved even though Aspin opposed it, the United States sent the USS Harlan County carrying 200 troops to Port-au-Prince, Haiti's capital. Met by a hostile mob of armed Haitians, the ship turned away without attempting to undertake its mission, which the Pentagon described as an effort to professionalize the Haitian military and undertake civil assistance projects. Some observers attacked Aspin for not taking a harder stand in the administration against an action he opposed and then aborting the effort in the face of local opposition.