Jungle of Snakes Read online

  The continuing insurgent re sistance bemused some: “It seems strange to Americans that the Filipinos—or so many of them—are bitterly opposed to our sovereignty. They must know it is likely to be a great improvement over former conditions . . . Nevertheless they fight on.” Critics of the administration asked, “Is it not time to confess the whole policy a hideous blunder?”16

  The Federal Party

  MacArthur’s decision for sterner war coincided with the peak of U.S. troop strength during the entire war. Freed from political worries and with the rainy season over, MacArthur began 1901 by committing 70,000 veterans to an offensive. His focus was the main island of Luzon. Win there, he argued, and the rest of the islands would fall into place. For the next seven months elite task forces conducted lightning assaults on insurgent bases. Conventional forces made larger sweeps through the jungles, swamps, and mountains that shielded the insurgents. In the countryside, American soldiers burned crops and buildings owned by suspected insurgent sympathizers. In the towns, the Americans made mass arrests, paraded the suspects in front of collaborators who identified the insurgents, and incarcerated the betrayed. Using investigative methods developed in La Union by William Johnston, the Americans purged the civil administration of insurgent sympathizers and broke up the shadow governments.

  Simultaneously, an important segment of the local population decided to put their lives on the line in support of the American cause. They called themselves the Federal Party. With the support of MacArthur and Taft, a prominent group of Manila ilustrados and former revolutionary officials formed the party in December 1900. The party’s basic plank was recognition that the Philippines was under U.S. sovereignty and belief that this was only a temporary state of affairs leading to eventual in dependence. Of course, their decision had a strong component of self-interest. The found-ers of the Federal Party had concluded that after McKinley’s reelection the Americans were in the Philippines for the indefinite future. Prolonged warfare would tear the islands apart, which was good neither for the nation nor for themselves. If against all odds the insurgents ultimately triumphed, the status of the ilustrados in society was still likely to change for the worse because the underclasses would demand more change. On the other hand, if the Americans triumphed, then those who had supported them would have a seat at the table during the national restructuring.

  While the Federal Party may not have been dominated by selfless patriots, its ranks included hundreds of very brave individuals. They traveled around the islands to speak out in favor of U.S. policies. They also used their contacts with the insurgency to try to convince insurgent leaders to give up. Increasing numbers of guerrillas, including some prominent senior officers, heeded the call of the Federal Party and came down from the mountains to surrender. They did all of this at considerable personal risk. Aguinaldo reacted to the rise of the Federal Party and the emergence of other collaborators by ordering their capture and trial by drumhead court-martial followed by execution.17 More broadly, anyone who held a position in the American civil administration continued to face punishment ranging from a $100 fine to death.

  In spite of increasing use of terror tactics against civilians, the insurgents found their support eroding. Because of the change in American strategy and the assistance of the Federal Party, as 1901 progressed the Americans enjoyed growing help from the civilian population. Guides became available when before there were none. Town dwellers denounced insurgent tax collectors. Rural people led Americans to supply caches. Filipino militia and police accepted the burden of defending themselves against revolutionary terror. Then, as if to confirm that victory was within reach, came the capture of the insurgent supreme commander, Emilio Aguinaldo.

  A Spectacular Raid

  Starting in the autumn of 1899, the time Aguinaldo decided to inaugurate guerrilla war, the Filipino leader became a marked man. American units vied with one another for the glory of capturing the insurgent leader. None surpassed the zeal of Batson’s Macabebe Scouts. “I hunted one of his Generals to his hole the other night,” Batson wrote his wife, “and captured all his effects as well as his two daughters.”18 Such relentless pursuit forced Aguinaldo to keep on the move. He and his small band of loyal staff endured exhausting treks across rugged terrain. They were often hungry, reduced to foraging for wild legumes supplemented by infrequent meat eaten without salt. Sickness and desertion reduced their ranks. Aguinaldo’s response was periodic exemplary punishments, drumhead courts-martial, firing squads, and reprisal raids against villages that either collaborated with the Americans or failed to support the insurgents. “Ah, what a costly thing is in dependence!” lamented Aguinaldo’s chief of staff.19

  Aguinaldo took solace from the occasional contact with the outside. In February 1900 he received a bundle of letters including a report that the war was going well with the Americans suffering “disastrous” political and military defeats. A correspondent in Manila affirmed that the people “were ready to drink the enemy’s blood.”20 The high command’s ignorance of outside events was startling. For example, Aguinaldo and his party learned from a visitor that five nations had recognized Philippine independence. However, his chief of staff reported that “we do not know who these five nations are.”21 Indeed, the chief of staff candidly recorded that since fleeing into the mountains “we have remained in complete ignorance of what is going on in the present war.”22

  During his exodus Aguinaldo was unable to exercise effective command of his far-flung forces. This did not change after he sought refuge in the remote mountain town of Palanan in northern Luzon. All Aguinaldo could do was write general instructions to his subordinates and issue exhortations to the Philippine people. His efforts had scant effect on the war. What was important was his mere existence. He was the living symbol of Filipino nationalism. In addition—and this mattered to the ilustrados who managed the war at the regional and local levels—as long as he remained free the insurgents could say that they fought on behalf of a legitimate national government.

  Aguinaldo’s efforts to maintain a semblance of command authority led to his downfall. In January 1901 an insurgent courier, Cecilio Sigis-mundo, asked a town mayor for help getting through American lines. His request was standard practice. The mayor’s response was not. He happened to be loyal to the Americans and persuaded the courier to surrender. Sigismundo carried twenty letters from Aguinaldo to guerrilla commanders. Two days of intense labor broke the code and revealed that one of the letters was addressed to Aguinaldo’s cousin. It requested that reinforcements be sent to Aguinaldo’s mountain hideout in Palanan. This request gave Brigadier General Fred Funston an idea.

  Funston interviewed Sigismundo to learn details about Aguinaldo’s headquarters (and, according to Aguinaldo, subjected him to the “water cure,” an old Spanish torture whereby soldiers forced water down a prisoner’s throat and then applied pressure to the distended stomach until the prisoner either “confessed” or vomited; in the latter case the pro cess started again).23 Palanan was ten miles from the coast, connected to the outside world by a single jungle trail. Although Americans had never operated in this region, obviously the trail would be watched. Funston conceived a bold, hugely risky scheme to capture the insurgent leader. He selected eighty Tagalog-speaking Macabebes who disguised themselves as insurgents coming to reinforce Aguinaldo. Funston armed them with Mauser and Remington rifles, typical weapons for the undergunned insurgents. To make the reinforcements seem more believable, four Tagalog turncoats performed the role of insurgent officers. To make the bait even more enticing, five American officers acted as prisoners and accompanied the column. Nothing if not personally brave—he had earned the Congressional Medal of Honor in 1899—Funston was one of the five.

  MacArthur approved of the desperate plan—his chief of staff wrote the secretary of war that he did not expect ever to see Funston again—and on March 6, 1901, a navy gunboat sailed from Manila Bay to deposit the raiding party on a deserted Luzon beach sixty straight-line miles
from Palanan. So began the most celebrated operation of the guerrilla war. No mission like this could unfold seamlessly. A harrowing 100-mile trek that called upon physical stamina and quick-witted improvisation brought the column to Palanan on March 23, 1901. To allay any possible suspicions, Funston sent runners ahead to deliver two convincing cover letters. They were written on stationery that had been captured at an insurgent base. Not only did they bear the letterhead “Brigade Lacuna” but they were signed by the brigade’s commander, an officer whose writing Aguinaldo was certain to recognize. In fact a master Filipino forger who worked for the Americans had signed the letters. The letters informed Aguinaldo of the impending arrival of the reinforcements he had requested along with a special bonus of captured American officers.

  While Funston and his fellow officers hid in the nearby jungle, the column’s sham insurgent officers went ahead. A last obstacle remained: the unfordable Palanan River. Two “officers” crossed in a canoe and gave instructions for the Macabebes to follow. The two “officers” approached Aguinaldo’s headquarters to see a uniformed honor guard formed to greet them. The cover letter had done its work. Aguinaldo was completely deceived. For a very nervous thirty minutes the two “officers” regaled the insurgent commander with stories about their recent ordeal. Finally the Macabebes arrived. They formed up across from the honor guard as if in preparation to salute Aguinaldo. Then at a signal they opened fire at the startled headquarters guards. Inside Aguinaldo’s headquarters, the two “officers” seized Aguinaldo. Meanwhile, Funston and his band emerged from the jungle to take charge. The effect of the surprise was so overwhelming that Funston’s commandos managed to escape with their prize and rendezvous with the waiting gunboat.

  Funston took Aguinaldo to Manila, where MacArthur treated him with great courtesy, even to the point of having his staff dine with the insurgent leader. Within a few days Aguinaldo was exploring terms of surrender. Within a month he issued a proclamation calling on all insurgents to surrender and for Filipinos to accept United States rule.

  In a campaign suffering from slow and indeterminate results, Aguinaldo’s conversion was something concrete. MacArthur and the War Department took full advantage, proclaiming the incident the most important single military event of the year. Among the skeptics were the midshipmen of the Naval Academy standing in the left-field bleachers at the first Army-Navy baseball game ever played. Arthur MacArthur’s son Douglas was Army’s left fielder. The midshipmen heckled Douglas with the chant:

  MacArthur! MacArthur!

  Are you the Governor General Or a hobo?

  Who is the boss of this show?

  Is it you or Emilio Aguinaldo? 24

  Indeed, the claim that Aguinaldo’s capture was decisive overstated the facts. Instead, although it was not clearly apparent at the time, MacArthur’s stern policies had already begun to erode insurgent strength significantly. While his conversion did inspire the surrender of five prominent insurgent generals, and hundreds of soldiers either turned themselves in or ceased active operations, his removal from the scene had little practical impact for many insurgents. They were accustomed to recognizing the authority of their local commanders. Those commanders, in turn, had been acting like regional warlords for some time and consequently were used to a high level of autonomy.

  Aguinaldo’s capture was a brilliantly conceived and boldly executed coup. As had been the case when Otis proclaimed victory after dispersing the regular insurgent forces, senior American leaders anticipated a prompt end to the war. Unfamiliar with the ambiguous nature of counterinsurgency, they again overestimated the value of a single “decisive” success. On July 4, 1901, as MacArthur neared the end of his tour of duty in the Philippines, he reported that the armed insurrection was almost entirely suppressed. The army had squashed armed resistance in nearly two thirds of the hostile provinces. In the United States a pleased President McKinley began a domestic victory tour designed to heal the sharp political divisions created by the war.

  Again the general commanding the field forces and the commander in chief were wrong. The insurgency survived the loss of its leader and persisted for more than another year.

  FOUR

  The Policy of Destruction

  The Response to Massacre

  IT FELL TO MACARTHUR’S SUCCESSOR, Major General Adna Chaffee, to bring the war to a close. When he assumed command in September 1901 it appeared that the endgame was in hand. Chaffee identified three remaining areas where the insurgents were active: southwestern Luzon, Samar, and Cebu. Chaffee was perfectly happy to cede control of everywhere else to the Philippine Commission and get out of the pacification business. The velocity of this transition was a problem. An officer serving in Samar, one of the lingering trouble spots, caustically questioned whether the time for civil government had really arrived given the commissioners still required strong security detachments around their Manila residences. He complained that the Filipinos “cannot be conquered, civilized, and taught to love us in a year.”1 He concluded that it was a mistake for impatient Americans to force the expansion of civil government in places where security was problematic.

  Chaffee cared not. In his view, for too long junior officers had operated outside the scrutiny of their betters and it was time to reel them in. With the guerrilla war all but won, he wanted soldiers to return to real soldiering. Then, “like a clap of thunder out of a clear sky,” came the Balangiga Massacre on September 28, 1901.2

  The small port of Balangiga was on the southern coast of Samar. Samar, in turn, was the home island of a ferocious, untamed insurgency. To date, small American garrisons had seldom ventured inland from their coastal enclaves and were ignorant of all that transpired outside range of their Krag-Jorgensen rifles. The mayor of Balangiga had invited an American garrison to protect his town from Moro pirates. Better American intelligence would have revealed that pirate raids against coastal Samar had all but ended more than fifty years earlier. Instead, Company C, Ninth U.S. Infantry, came to Balangiga to provide security. Company C was a veteran outfit. One soldier had served aboard Dewey’s flagship, the Olympia, at the battle of Manila Bay. Most had fought insurgents on Luzon and all had traveled to China to fight the Boxers. But their return to the Philippines and occupation of Balangiga was not happy. The company commander, Thomas Connell, was insensitive to local mores. He insisted that the villagers work to trim back the jungle to eliminate concealment, he tried to ban the popular cockfights, and he attempted to keep his men from fraternizing with young girls. Ugly incidents of abuse and rape ensued. To limit conflict with the villagers, Connell forbade any save his sentries from carry ing weapons. Meanwhile, the village mayor informed the insurgents about the Americans’ habits and routines.

  Around midnight on September 26, numerous women began delivering small caskets to the central church. A suspicious American sergeant glanced inside one casket, saw a child’s body, and allowed the women to pass. Although he noted that the women wore heavy clothes in spite of the warm night, the sergeant was well aware of his captain’s demand for strict conduct in the wake of the rape incidents, so he did not investigate further. Had he done so he would have found that the clothes concealed machetes and that the caskets actually held drugged children lying atop hidden weapons.

  On Sunday morning, an apparently friendly Filipino police chief paused to chat with a sentry and then seized his rifle and shot him. The church bells began pealing, the signal for bolomen to emerge from hiding to cut down the remaining sentries. Simultaneously several hundred machete-wielding men emerged from the church to overrun the officers’ quarters and murder the Americans in their beds. Connell leaped from a window into the street, where insurgents hacked him to death in full view of his regulars. The first surge killed some fifty soldiers. A sergeant rallied thirty-eight survivors around the arsenal, including eight too hurt to fight, and managed to fight off the bolomen. They made their way to three dugout canoes to begin paddling to the nearest American post while pursued by insurgents as
well as swarming sharks attracted to the blood seeping into the water. Only six regulars escaped unharmed. A total of fifty-nine were killed and twenty-three were wounded.3 It was the heaviest American loss of any action during the entire war.

  The next day came the American reprisal. After a gunboat blasted Balangiga with Gatling guns and cannon fire, an infantry column stormed ashore. They beheld the mutilated bodies of their comrades. They saw a trench filled with the Filipino casualties from the previous day’s action. Apparently the Americans had interrupted the burial service. A patrol caught twenty unarmed men and the officer in charge handed them over to the six unharmed American survivors. The six proceeded to gun down the prisoners. After burning the town the Americans departed.

  In the United States, a hysterical press promoted an atmosphere of panic by calling the massacre a Philippine version of Custer’s Last Stand. In Manila, the civilian commissioner Taft retained a balanced perspective. He recognized the event as a discouraging blow but told the secretary of war that “there will be no shadow of turning from the course we have marked.”4 The military man, Chaffee, exhibited less balance. The massacre seemed to fly in the face of the claim by the Philippine Commission and the Federal Party that the insurgents were on their last legs. Instead, Chaffee listened to his intelligence service, which now reported that the insurgents were regrouping in preparation for widespread uprisings in January 1902. Their warnings convinced Chaffee that he was sitting on a powder keg that was about to explode.

  In this climate of high emotion and fear, Chaffee insisted on a harder war against the remaining insurgents. As a twenty-two-year-old second lieutenant, he had participated in Sheridan’s razing of the Shenandoah Valley in 1864. Given that a policy of massive property destruction was acceptable against fellow Americans, Chaffee saw no reason it should not be used against Asians. To fight this harder war, he called upon two hard men. He assigned Brigadier General J. Franklin Bell, his most accomplished counterinsurgency general, to squash the rebels in Luzon’s Batangas Province once and for all. To remote Samar he sent Brigadier General Jacob Smith.