They Can Kill a Revolutionary, but They Can’t Kill the Revolution

10 October 2005

On Friday, September 23, scores of FBI agents surrounded a house in semi-rural Hormigueros, Puerto Rico. They attacked, and a sniper shot Filiberto Ojeda Rios, the Responsible General of Los Macheteros, a revolutionary organization fighting for the independence of Puerto Rico. Wounded, Filiberto was left to bleed to death before the Feds moved in the next day.

This assassination sparked a wave of protest in Puerto Rico while the standoff was still going on, a wave which has continued to grow in the weeks since. Though some news stories appeared in the US media, they faded fast. In fact, this murder was three stories.

Three Stories

The first is the immediate story of imperialist vengeance and arrogance. Filiberto Ojeda Rios had taken up arms against the colonialist occupiers of his homeland, and had been set free by Puerto Rican juries for charges stemming from actions which had appropriated millions of dollars from the likes of Wells Fargo, actions which had resulted in the wounding of an FBI agent and others. Still a target of the US, Filiberto had eluded capture for 15 years. The FBI chose to open their assault on the fugitive on the day of El Grito de Lares, the patriotic holiday celebrating the 1868 uprising against Spanish colonialism.

The second is the underlying story of Puerto Rican anger and resistance. Thousands gathered the first night in San Juan and other cities across the island. Politicians and public figures soon denounced the murder and its timing, not only independentistas but also leading folks from the Commonwealth and Statehood parties. Filiberto’s funeral motorcade was saluted by hundreds of thousands, as schools flying the Machetero flag emptied out. Anxious elected officials convened their own hearings on the crime.

The third is the unfolding story of broad-based actions and organization. Over the last decade the people of Puerto Rico have waged several rounds of struggle. The unsuccessful mass strike of 1998 trained them in mass civil disobedience. The successful battle to drive the US Navy off the island of Vieques followed, developing highly effective flexible tactics and the coordination of front-line struggle with building bases of support. This year, over 80% of the members of the Puerto Rican teachers union voted to uphold disaffiliation from the furious United Federation of Teachers, its US-based “parent,” and run their own union. Lessons and leaders from all of these struggles came to the fore as word of the standoff spread. Respected lawyers and doctors demanded to cross the FBI cordon and arrange a peaceful arrest; they were refused. When the FBI insisted that power to the besieged house be shut off, the head of the electrical workers union warned on radio and television that any member who did so would be thrown out of the union forever.

A Blunt Reminder

This historic moment should serve as a blunt reminder to the US left, as it is to the US ruling class, that Puerto Rico remains a captive nation under the heel of colonial domination. And as Mao Zedong pointed out, “Where there is oppression, there is resistance.” With the FBI’s murder of Filiberto Ojeda Rios, new fuel has been added to the burning flames of resistance in Puerto Rico.

The Freedom Road Socialist Organization extends its solidarity to the comrades of the Ejército Popular Boricua (Los Macheteros) who have lost a heroic leader and to the nationalists, revolutionaries and socialists gathered in the Frente Socialista of Puerto Rico who have played a crucial role in mobilizing the protests.

Finally Freedom Road urges all revolutionaries and socialists in the US (and we include ourselves in this) to shake off the too-common neglect by folks here of the Puerto Rican struggle and to do a few simple things.

1. Support the demands of the broad Puerto Rican left, including those for justice for the murder of Filiberto Ojeda Rios and also for the freedom of the Puerto Rican political prisoners/prisoners of war still held captive in US prisons.

2. Learn from the rich lessons provided by the movement in Puerto Rico. There are lessons in how the mass movements have rebuilt — using, summarizing and passing on experience and organization from one wave of struggle to the next. There are lessons in using contradictions, both among bourgeois political forces on the island and between them and their colonial masters, to advance the struggle, both in the electoral arena and outside of it. There are lessons for the task of refounding the US left in the Frente Socialista, an umbrella which includes most of the significant left groups in Puerto Rico and has since 1990.

3. Remind ourselves of the central importance and extraordinary power of struggles for national liberation in today’s world, not just in places like Iraq and the Philippines, but much closer to home. This is particularly worth emphasizing as Hurricane Katrina has just shown so clearly the oppression and the resistance of the African American Nation. These struggles take place at every level, from the creation of a counter-hegemonic culture to the defense of communities by any means necessary.

4. Look for and support the revival of national sentiment, militant activism and organization within the Puerto Rican diaspora inside the United States itself.

National Executive Committee,
Freedom Road Socialist Organization