The US’s Long War Against Puerto Rico

Media coverage of Puerto Rico focuses on unpayable debt. It steers clear of Puerto Rico as colony. Yet an off- and – on independence struggle has continued there for at least 150 years. A tipping point came in 1950 when Nationalist Party launched armed rebellion. It failed, and independence agitation subsequently has lagged due to repression, swelling emigration to the United States, and Puerto Ricans’ growing economic distress and dependency.

Nelson A. Denis’s book, War Against All Puerto Ricans: Revolution and Terror in America’s Colony,  lays bare Puerto Rico’s colonial status. He looks much more at U. S. repression than other historical markers of a troubled relationship. As proclaimed by the book’s title, repression really means U. S. war. The island police chief E. Francis Riggs spoke words appearing there as he explained why his police in 1935 had just murdered four residents of Río Piedras.

Denis’s vivid language succeeds in highlighting the horror marking U. S. counter-insurgency actions against the Nationalists, who were moving toward open revolt. A comprehensive survey of facts and events becomes a rich history. Denis’ portrayal of obsessed, flamboyant, and even bizarre personalities is particularly memorable. The narrative gains dramatic effect through the author’s device of serially presenting seemingly unrelated reports without making correlations. Then connections become clear as the climax approaches.

“This is not a pretty story,” cautions Denis, adding that, “If it helps you to understand the world in which we live, then I have done my job. The rest is up to you.” Indeed, he gets high marks for elucidating U. S. methods for moving from theft of a homeland to depriving Puerto Ricans of their cultural, economic, and political autonomy. Not least, this valuable book sends a reminder to U. S. anti-imperialists that a genuine U. S colonial subject lies close at hand.

The emotional intensity of Denis’ narrative may stem in part from a personal connection. His mother had migrated from Puerto Rico, and the FBI in 1962 entered the family’s New York apartment and seized his Cuban – born father, who was then deported. Denis was eight years old and never saw his father again. That was why he became a lawyer, he explains. Over the course of 40 years he sought out first-hand information from former Puerto Rican Nationalists and other independence activists. He eventually gained access to mountains of U. S. intelligence files on Puerto Rico.

Pedro Albizu Campos, president of Puerto Rico’s Nationalist Party from 1930 on, is the book’s central figure. In fact, Denis says, “the story of Albizu Campos is the story of Puerto Rico. It is also the story of empire.” Orphaned and poor, Albizu was the first Puerto Rican to attend Harvard College and was valedictorian of his law school class there. He spent 25 years in prison and dedicated his life to Puerto Rican independence. The book presents convincing evidence that radiation torture in prison hastened his death in 1965. The story is of both tragedy and heroism.

As reported by the author, sugar cane production dominated the island economy in the 1930s; four U.S. companies owned half the arable land. Albizu led an island-wide strike of sugar workers in 1934. That and mounting Nationalist Party agitation triggered repression. Puerto Rico’s militarized police, the FBI, and U. S. Army collaborated in carrying out  surveillance, intelligence gathering, and assaults on meetings and rallies. Massacres, assassinations, and disappearances ensued. In 1936, U.S. authorities imprisoned Albizu, who in 1937 began serving a ten-year sentence at the Atlanta federal prison. He spent the last three years of his term lodged in a New York hospital.

Albizu returned in 1947 to a Puerto Rico burdened by economic troubles, pervasive fear, and an oppressive U. S. military. Nationalist Party recruitment was down. The island police, FBI, and Army intelligence shared secret police dossiers on 100,000 Puerto Ricans. Some 75,000 were under surveillance. A “gag law” criminalized even possession of a Puerto Rican flag.

“For the past fifty years, the United States has been at war with Puerto Rico,” Albizu declared in June 1948. Not only do “they that steal our land,” but they also “sterilize our women [and] inject us with cancer and tuberculosis.” Denis elaborates on those manifestations of war. In July Albizu announced that, “Our country is past speeches. Puerto Ricans have to fight for their liberty with all arms at their disposal.”

The climax came when the Nationalists launched armed assaults against symbols of authority. By the time the revolt began on October 28, 1950, informers had already alerted the police and army as to rebel plans. Thousands of U.S. troops descended on cities. Fighter planes bombed Jayuya and Utuado. Nationalists on a suicide mission struck at the governor’s residence. Two Nationalist Party members died trying to murder President Harry Truman. He had offended Nationalists by dismissing their rebellion as an “incident between Puerto Ricans.” Albizu was arrested and sent to La Princesa prison where would spend 14 years, almost his entire remaining life.

Little optimism appears in these pages as to eventual national independence. In fact, Cubans preparing for their independence war against Spain had counted on parallel Puerto Rican movement toward independence. Members of Jose Marti’s Cuban Revolutionary Party even devised Puerto Rico’s flag. Why did the two paths diverge?

In 1898 when the United States was taking over remnants of Spain’s colonial empire, Cubans had already fielded two armies in two independence wars. Fighting for social justice and independence, they defeated Spain’s army. Such a record promised no good for U.S. aspirations to own Cuba. By contrast, in Puerto Rico the door was open.

W.T. Whitney Jr. is a retired pediatrician and political journalist living in Maine.

More articles by:W. T. Whitney

by W. T. Whitney

The US’s Long War Against Puerto Rico

New book recounts history of Chinese in Puerto Rico

Prof. Jose Lee Borges has published a book entitled "Los Chinos en Puerto Rico" (The Chinese in Puerto Rico), the first ever written about the Asian minority on the island.

In an interview Tuesday with EFE, the Miami-born son of a Chinese father and Cuban mother said the book offers "an intelligent, compassionate look at what it meant to be Chinese in Puerto Rico" from the time two centuries ago when they were forcibly shipped here as prisoners from Cuba, their first destination after leaving the Far East.

The book includes an introduction in which Borges tells of his childhood and "the concept of being Chinese," followed by four chapters about the Asian workers who were made prisoners in Cuba, then sent to Puerto Rico where they went back to being laborers, and how the Puerto Rican press portrayed the Chinese.

Borges, 41, said that most of the information he found and published afterwards in his book came from 10 years of wide-ranging research at the General Archive and National Library of Puerto Rico.

He said that the first group of Chinese - 350 people - came to the island as construction workers on the Puerto Rico Central Highway, specifically on the stretch from Caguas to Cayey through the island's interior.

"Foremen in Puerto Rico even said that without Chinese labor, the highway could never have been completed," according to Borges, who will hold his book presentation this Thursday at the old City Hall of Caguas.

These Chinese first emigrated to Cuba from their own country to escape the conflicts of the 19th century Opium Wars, then came to Puerto Rico.

The first who went to Cuba were hired to work on sugar plantations, and though, according to Borges, they were said to have worked a maximum of 12 hours a day, in most cases the big landowners made them work even longer.

"But when they went to work on the plantations, the owners didn't pay them and many began to take revenge. They ended up as prisoners, and while serving their sentences, were often sent to Puerto Rico which was in need of a workforce," the professor of history and humanities said.

"Once they had served their sentences, they stayed in Puerto Rico and began to establish Chinese restaurants," Borges said, like the one opened on Calle Tanca in Old San Juan in 1890.

Borges noted that most of the 17,000 Chinese currently living in Puerto Rico work in the approximately 600 restaurants offering Chinese fare.

He recalled that his father also owned a Chinese restaurant in Puerto Rico.

The book, over 400 pages long with 50 photos, includes the portrait of a Chinese man working at Culebrita Lighthouse, one of the 15 lookout posts that were used by the U.S. military in Puerto Rico, and whose construction was begun in 1882 and was completed in 1886. EFE

By Jorge J. Muñiz Ortiz

New book recounts history of Chinese in Puerto Rico

How will Puerto Rico win its freedom?

PUERTO RICO is the oldest, largest and by far the most important U.S. colony. That makes it a litmus test for the U.S. left. We will succeed or fail very largely by our determined and consistent opposition to U.S. imperialism.

Puerto Rico is a political hostage to the U.S. Congress, which unilaterally decreed that it is an "Associated Free State" or commonwealth. Congress can change this status anytime without consulting a single Puerto Rican. Currently, Puerto Rico can't even deal with its $72 billion public debt crisis without congressional permission.

Nelson A. Denis' compelling account The War Against All Puerto Ricans tells Puerto Rico's story largely through the lens of Pedro Albizu Campos, the founder and president of the Nationalist Party of Puerto Rico, and of the 1950 revolt that he led.

Denis documents the systematic discrimination and repression inflicted on the Puerto Rican people:

-- In every public school in Puerto Rico, classes were taught in English--a language none of the students could understand. Speaking Spanish was strictly forbidden.

-- It was a felony to own or display a Puerto Rican flag, to speak in favor of independence, or to print, publish or distribute any pro-independence material.

-- In Ponce, on Easter Sunday 1937, police opened fire with machine guns on a peaceful Nationalist Party procession, killing 17 unarmed civilians and wounding 200 more.

The Ponce massacre was a reaction to the Nationalist Party's successful leadership of a sugar cane workers' strike that shut down the island's sugar industry for a month. The Nationalists organized the Association de Trabajadores de Puerto Rico (Workers Association of Puerto Rico.)

Albizu spoke to mass rallies and finally negotiated a contract that doubled the workers' wages. During the strike, he turned down a $150,000 bribe and an offer to make him the colonial governor of Puerto Rico.

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AFTER THAT, Albizu and the Nationalist Party were marked for extinction. On October 18, 1950, they were forced to launch what was supposed to be a simultaneous revolt in five cities throughout the country. The Nationalists had long believed that Puerto Rico could only be freed by armed struggle. They refused, on principle, to run in colonial elections.

The party had its own armed wing, the Cadets of the Republic, who were trained in marching, filed tactics and survival. Without weapons, they could only train with wooden guns. Young women were enrolled in a nursing corps, the Daughters of Freedom.

A wave of arrests and assassinations forced the Nationalists to start the rising before they were ready. It soon became clear that they had been infiltrated at a very high level. Albizu recognized that, if he delayed further, he would be in prison, together with all the leading Nationalists and many, if not most, of the rank and file. He believed he had to start the revolt before the movement was wiped out.

Unfortunately, the colonial forces were much better prepared than the revolutionaries. As Denis writes, "The plan's only flaw was that the Americans had already heard about it." The police and National Guard were ready and willing to shoot down the rebels.

"The October 30th uprisings in Arcebio, Mayaguez, Ponce and Naranjito were a disorganized mess," Denis continues. "With the hurried order to start the revolution, everything happened too early or too late."

In San Juan, the capital, the revolt descended into a desperate attempt to kidnap or assassinate the colonial governor, Luis Muñoz Marin. The plan was to hold him hostage, call every newspaper and demand Puerto Rican independence. As usual, the National Guard was waiting. The raid quickly became a suicide mission--only one man survived, and he had 19 bullet wounds, with five bullets still inside him when he was finally captured.

As Denis tells it, the Nationalists knew perfectly well that they could never win a war against the U.S. They only hoped to hold out long enough to grab the world's attention and get the UN to pressure the U.S. to free Puerto Rico. This displayed an enormous naiveté about world politics in 1950. Even more than today, the UN was the creature of U.S. foreign policy. There was absolutely no chance that it would stand with Puerto Rico against the U.S. government.

Still the U.S. Army only suppressed the rising by deploying 5.000 troops and bombarding two towns. After it was defeated, thousands of nationalists were arrested, and Albizu was imprisoned for 25 years.

While he was in prison, Albizu was subjected to lethal radiation, which finally killed him. It may seem like a farfetched conspiracy theory to state this, but it has been amply documented through medical reports, the testimony of his fellow prisoners and even government documents. While it may never be conclusively proved, there is more than enough evidence to show that Pedro Albizu Campos was, as Denis says, "atomically lynched."

After the risings' bloody suppression, the Nationalists tried to assassinate President Harry Truman. Later, Lolita Lebrón and two Nationalists opened fire on the House of Representatives, wounding five members of Congress. Liberals and conservatives, Democrats and Republicans--all competed to denounce the attempted assassinations. Today, they would call the Nationalists terrorists.

As usual, they had nothing to say about the violence against the Puerto Rican people. They were certain that the fate of a few politicians was far more important than all the Puerto Ricans killed, tortured and maimed by U.S. imperialism.

Assassination, like any other tactic, has to be judged by whether it helps to win the revolution's goals. If the Nationalists had succeed in assassinating Truman, his vice president, Alben W. Barkley, a nonentity who has been lost to history, would have taken over. If they had killed some congressmen, other hacks would have replaced them. In either case, Puerto Rico would have been no closer to freedom.

Socialists oppose this strategy precisely because it doesn't bring freedom any closer. Still, we understand that we and the freedom fighters who are driven to these kinds of tactics are on the same side against the oppressors.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

THE WAR Against All Puerto Ricans is a fascinating and vital work. Nelson Denis is a great storyteller, and he has a wonderful story to tell. His book is anything but dry-as-dust history. It's as compelling and easy to read as the best popular fiction.

The book is much stronger because Denis doesn't pretend to be impartial between U.S. imperialism and Puerto Rican freedom. Albizu is his hero, and he's not afraid to show it. It should get the very wide readership it richly deserves. At a time when Pedro Albizu Campos and the Puerto Rican revolution have been all but buried by the establishment, this book can make a critical contribution to the cause of Puerto Rico.

Still, its conclusion is disappointing. Instead of a call for freedom, Denis ends with the words from a Joni Mitchell song:

They paved paradise

And put up a parking lot

With a pink hotel, a boutique

And a swinging hot spot

"Don't it always seem to go

That you don't know what you've got

'Til it's gone

"They paved paradise

And put up a parking lot

They paved paradise

And put up a parking lot.

These are, of course, beautiful lyrics. But if the rest of the book shows us anything, it's that Puerto Rico must have its independence. Otherwise, it will continue to be a U.S. puppet with no control over its present much less its future.

Independence without socialism would turn out to be a hollow victory. The U.S. multinationals would continue to rule Puerto Rico. They would keep getting richer while the Puerto Rican people kept getting poorer. The Puerto Rican propertied classes, like propertied classes everywhere, long ago made their peace with imperialism. They're perfectly happy to go on being junior partners, enjoying crumbs from the table.

If Puerto Rico is ever going to be free, it will be when the working classes lead the fight. They have nothing to gain from imperialism but continued misery. They alone have the power and the numbers to make all the difference.

But all these are decisions for the Puerto Rican people themselves. Our part, here in the U.S., is to support their struggle and do our best to combat U.S. imperialism.

Perhaps the best place for socialists in the U.S. to start is with the movement to free Oscar López Rivera, a Puerto Rican political prisoner who has served 34 years of a 75-year sentence for "seditious conspiracy," including 12 years in solitary confinement.

While we fight for his freedom, we can take inspiration from what López Rivera said before he was sentenced: "If I am standing here today, it is not because I lack the courage to fight, but rather because I have the courage to fight. I am certain, and will reaffirm, that Puerto Rico will be a free and sovereign nation."



Pedro Albizu Campos in 1936 (Associated Press)



"There will be war to the death against all Puerto Ricans." -- E. Francis Riggs, chief of police of Puerto Rico

How will Puerto Rico win its freedom?