Page 321 - Encyclopedia Of Terrorism

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Puerto Rican Nationalist Terrorism———301

Harvard-educated Campos injected the movement wounding five members of Congress before running
with a “radical nationalism,” calling for “direct action” out of ammunition. By the end of the 1950s, as in the
to achieve the goal of national sovereignty. He pledged 1930s, the Nationalist movement had again lost
that for every nationalist killed, a continental American momentum, splitting into student organizations and
would die—a promise he kept. Police fired into a “grouplets” such as Accion Patriotica Revolucionaria
student protest at the University of Puerto Rico in (APR) and Movimiento 27 de Marzo.
October 1935; in February 1936, members of the
NPPR assassinated Colonel Frank Riggs, Puerto Rico’s THE FALN AND MORE
police commander.
The antiwar and anti-imperialist movements that
marked the late 1960s, coupled with the demise of
MOMENTUM LOST AND REGAINED
consensus on Puerto Rico’s commonwealth status,
The cycle of nationalist uprisings, government repres- led to a revival of militant Puerto Rican nationalism
sion, and nationalist retaliation continued through in the 1970s. In October 1974, Fuerzas Armadas de
the 1930s. Campos was arrested in March 1936; Puerto Liberacion Nacional (FALN) announced its presence
Rico witnessed massive demonstrations after his con- in the United States with a communiqué claiming
viction, culminating in what is known as the Ponce responsibility for bombings in New York City and
Massacre in February 1937, where police killed 30 Newark, New Jersey. In January 1975, the FALN per-
civilians and wounded more than 150 others. That petrated one of its bloodiest attacks, the bombing of
June, nationalists tried to kill both the judge who Fraunces Tavern, in which four died and more than 50
presided over Campos’s trial and Puerto Rico’s resi- were injured. As the FALN continued to bomb, in
dent commissioner. However, without Campos’s lead- August 1978, another militant nationalist group, the
ership, internal strife caused the movement to lose Macheteros (“machete wielders” in Spanish), sent its
much of its momentum. first communiqué, claiming responsibility for the
The 1940s were marked by less militant political death of a police officer in Puerto Rico. The two
actions. By 1945, a good portion of the nationalist groups joined forces in September 1979, in solidarity
party had drifted toward the moderate “common- for Puerto Rican independence by any means neces-
wealth” status, helping elect Luis Munoz Marin, sary. That October, the FALN and the Macheteros
leader of the Popular Democratic Party, as the first detonated bombs in Puerto Rico, New York, and
governor of Puerto Rico in 1948. Marin went to Chicago.
Washington, having formulated a “temporary” com- While the FALN conducted bombings in the con-
monwealth status for Puerto Rico in exchange for a tinental United States, focusing on government and
ratified constitution for Puerto Rico. By the end of the public buildings in New York and Chicago, the
decade, Campos was released from jail, and extreme Macheteros focused their activities on the islands of
nationalism began to resurface. Puerto Rico, bombing U.S. military installations and
On October 30, 1950, U.S. forces put down upris- draft offices and attacking military personnel. The
ings of more than 2,000 nationalists all over Puerto Macheteros were joined by other, smaller militant
Rico. Two days later, nationalists struck, for the first groups. In December 1979, the Macheteros, the
time, on continental U.S. soil. Oscar Collazo and Volunteer Organization for the Puerto Rican
Grisilio Torresola, two NPPR members, tried to assas- Revolution, and Armed Forces of Popular Resistance
sinate U.S. president Harry S. Truman. As the two men jointly attacked a U.S. Navy bus: two sailors died and
approached the Blair House, Truman’s temporary resi- 10 were injured. In January 1981, yet another nation-
dence, a gunfight erupted between them and Truman’s alist group, the Revolutionary Commandos of the
guards, leaving Torresola and one police officer dead. People, bombed post offices where men registered
Investigators found a letter from Campos on Torresola’s for the draft. In the subsequent communiqué, the
body, and though the letter did not refer explicitly to Revolutionary Commandos, who claimed that they
the assassination, it was enough to convict Campos a did not want to hurt postal employees or destroy cor-
second time. On March 4, 1954, militant nationalists respondence with their protest, tried to downplay the
struck again, carrying Puerto Rican flags they stormed seriousness of its actions by citing the smallness of
the U.S. House of Representatives armed with guns, the bombs.