The Punitive Mexican Expedition V
Respect
the rights of others is peace
Benito Juárez García
Ex Presidente de México
Hello, readers. I apologize for taking so long in continuing this series. And I apologize for the last post: it was incomplete and poor quality. So, I present a revised version of it. I hope you find it useful and please me making coments and recomending it.
PART FIVE
A soldier stands before the damaged houses of Columbus after Villa's ride.
On March 9th
1916, very early in the morning, General Francisco Villa and his troops crossed
the border of Palomas, Chihuahua into Columbus, New Mexico. This action will
unchain a series of events that nearly started a new war between México and the
United States which could be a total disaster not only for the international
relations between both countries, but a deadly hit to the Revolution and its
social project south of the border.
Along the armed fight in México, the
US was concerned –as always do, about a social fight that may jeopardize its
own social stability, even when it happens thousands of miles away. But that’s
its right to believe that or anything alike. So, making use of its right to
protect its own homeland, President Taft deployed, on April 1911, 16 000 troops
in the Texan border with México in a supposed “war game” and called them the
Maneuver Division that was dissolved on August 1911. It might be its intention
to secure the border for rides of those “bandits” of south. These troops remained
stationed in all the crossing points but many of them were at El Paso-Juárez
area. As I stated early in this series, Ciudad Juárez was –and it is yet, a
major border for the pass of trades, people and, in the period we’re talking
about, ammunition.[1],[2]
These troops were those that, during the Battle of Ciudad Juárez, menaced
Madero to invade México if any bullet shoot by the revolutionaries hit a wall
at El Paso.
During the revolt of Carranza
against Huerta, the US Government issued an arms embargo for México effective
for both factions in struggle.[3]
This embargo was maintained until 1914 when President Wilson lifted it to be
able to help Carranza kicking Huerta from Palacio Nacional. As a part of the
homeland security maneuvers the US maintained in their borders, there were
battle ships in the coasts of the marine ports of Veracruz and Tampico under
the command of admirals Franklin R. Fletcher (Veracruz) and Henry T. Mayo
(Tampico). It was in the last where Mexican police arrested two drank sailors
from the USS Dolphin.[4]
The sailors were set free soon but the American Government asked Huerta a
gunfire salute as a desagravio.
Huerta acceded only if the courtesy was given in return and President Wilson
felt deeply offended. Funny thing: you come to my house and behave as a
caveman, I ask you for retribution but you fell I am disrespecting you and you demand an apology from me. Ha. Anyway, the incident did not go
further than that.
US Navy troops at Veracruz, México
But, despite the diplomatic exit to
this issue, American troops landed in Veracruz under the premise that a German
ship loaded with guns to support Huerta had anchored in the port. Seven hundred
and eighty seven sailors and marines took the custom office on April 21, 1914.
Obviously there was a battle between the powerful war machine of the US and the
people of Veracruz leaded by the Mexican Navy officers. The American losses:
(…) were four killed and twenty wounded on April 21 and thirteen killed
and forty-one wounded on April 22. We
have no accurate casualty number for the Mexican troops, but it was reported
that between 152 and 172 were killed and between 195 and 250 were wounded.[5]
By the end of that month, the Army’s
Fifth Infantry Brigade under the command of Brigade General Frederick Funstone
took the control of the city of Veracruz. It was said that its intention were
to “restore” order in town (an order they have broken, by the way) but it’s
more likely to me that they were preventing the entrance of revolutionary
troops in the city as a preparation for Huerta’s departure to Europe. As
American troops landed in Veracruz, Huerta made not any attempt to fight them.
Any attempt at all. This was not because he was busy fighting Carranza but he
was either using the American troops or allied whit American Government
preparing his departure and did know that Carranza, even when he has the guts,
had no the power to support two war fronts, one in Veracruz and one in northern
border that would rise when he attack the troops in Veracruz. So Huerta played
a good card: allowing the presence of American army in the Gulf of Mexico coast
let Carranza unable to pursuit him and let Carranza busy preventing an American
invasion across the Texan Border. Clever guy, indeed.
And, what about the US?
It is very unlikely that US
Government did not know about the imminent fall of Huerta. As Yockelson writes:
On July 15, 1914, Huerta resigned from the office of president and moved
to Spain. The Fifth Infantry Brigade
left Vera Cruz (sic) on November 23rd,
and the U.S. government agreed that Carranza and his de facto government could
use the city as their capital.[6]
So, the US was playing its role in
the control of the new Mexican revolution.
The ride itself is a very dark
issue. Nobody knows or nobody has ever talked clearly about this action neither
in the Mexican nor in the American side. The versions of this attack have been
historically spotted with adhesion or aversion that goes beyond the character
(Villa himself) and relay on historical background. It’s hard in any case to
see Villa as a character in a play named Mexican Revolution. Villa has the
particularity of rise love or hate wherever he is been read, wherever he is
remembered.[7]
No man that fights, lives, dies or wins a Revolution is merely a character but
some are just names in the road, faces in the wind, words in a book. Villa was
not one of these. Dear, no. The figure of Pancho Villa is that of a man that
represents the best and the worse of human kind, depending on what light is
used to read him. For some people, Villa is the incarnation of the justice, of
equally taken into practice after he gave the nameless a reason to believe that
they have a place in Earth. He took people from their lethargy and put them in
the rail of working (in this case, fighting) for their rights, but more than
that, he showed with example how to do so. Very often he was in the front of
the cavalry charges, in the line of fire, making holes and refusing alcohol
(indeed, he was abstemious. Despite the drunken and badass Villa that Mexican
movies have ever shown, Villa did not like to drink. When he first meet Zapata,
southern general wanted Villa to drink cognac with him; Villa agreed only to be
polite but almost chocked himself at the first taste, surprising Zapata and his
followers). He was a man that, once ended the struggle, in the years he ruled
Canutillo Hacienda, some hbistorians say, went every morning to the school he made for the child of
the farmers and, if any child missed to attend that day, Villa himself went to
the house of such child to find out the why. On the other hand, Villa has often
been called bandit, robavacas,
murderer, theft, even terrorist.[8]
He has been attributed to be a coldblooded murderer, polygamous (this is true,
indeed. No way to help him. He married at least 26 times and had nearly 30
children even when his very principal wife was Mrs. Luz Corral), drunk and
violent person (false the first, true the second). But the fact is that
Villa y el villismo, un
movimiento y un personaje sobre los que tanto se ha escrito son, al mismo
tiempo, uno de los episodios de la Revolución más defectuosamente conocidos.[9]
Let it be so. We are moving to
another thing, the counterpart of this story. That would mean the consequences
of Villa’s ride on American side of the border and the characters that were
involved in them.
Columbus, NM, was a small town near
the border was hometown of nearly 350 people, mixing American and Mexican,
garrison of 13th US Calvary Regiment commanded by Colonel Herbert J.
Slocum in Camp Furlong since 1912. The 13th Cavalry had served in
Philippines six years before and was stationed in the border since 1911.[10]
13th Calvary Regiment at Camp Furlong, Columbus, NM
Not a
strategic border crossing point, nor a trade post or a water supply facility,
it seemed attractive to Villa perhaps (only he could tell us) because being a
military post it was an sensitive point to hit and awake the US military
machine and make US Government to pressure Carranza. Villa could attack at El
Paso but he was not suicidal kind: attacking El Paso would be as senseless as lumbering
in the yards of EPA building, because there were a bigger and better geared
army under command of General John J. Pershing, named Black Jack. The ride let
a number of eighteen deceases, both civilians and military from American side. It
is said that the Mexican casualties were around the hundred.[11]
Following the extremely detailed chronicle
of Sharp,[12] Private
Fred Griffin was the first to become aware of the presence of Villa and his troopers
and gave the alert. Colonel Slocum was not in Camp Furlong the moment of the
attack, but in Deming, NM. He was called by phone. One hour after the ride he was
back in Columbus and ordered the pursuit of villistas into Mexican territory.
His army, leaded by Major Frank Tompkins (1868–1954) entered México somewhat
twelve miles southbound but went out of ammo, so they had to return to New
Mexico without capturing Villa or any of his troops. Yockelson writes:
The raid, however, could hardly be considered a victory for Villa and
his men. Besides killing a small number
of soldiers and civilians, his men came away with a few horses and a meager
amount of loot from the stores and homes of the town.[13]
This pretentious way of doing
History… Could hardly be considered?!
We will see.
Lets pretend you, kind reader, are
General de División Francisco Villa and you want to invade a fictitious town
named Columbus to generate a rise of American army against you to see what kind
of response it generates in your once ally and now detractor President Carranza
(of course, it’s a fictitious President). So you take the best of your man,
something around 480 let’s say and let the historiographers to speculate the
actual number, and cross the border. Nobody has seen you and those who have,
pretended not to because you are kind of popular between them. You do not want
to be captured, indeed. So, you get to your target at a dark hour, silent as a
jackal, alert as a rabbit. Your men shout Viva
Villa!, spiting fire. If you wanted, you could kill half (maybe a quarter) of
population. Instead of that, you and your troops kill some military and some
civilians (collateral damage it’s named when we talk about bombing a fictitious
village in Middle East) and pretend to be just a foray taking some meager and
ammunition and setting in fire the armory. Then, when your surprised target is
still organizing a response, you run away southbound and hide in the desert and
the sierras. You have accomplished all of your objectives: crossing the border
unnoticed, getting near the target, hitting it, minimal or null casualties in
your side, bonus meager, running back and, most important, rising the anger of
American army to test Carranza’s statements about his relation to American
Government putting him in the crossroad of fighting them back or allowing them
to step into México.
If that is not a very successful
ride, a very victory, I do not know what to name it.
[1] It seems, however that this is
happening again. As we all know and has been proved recently, the vast majority
of the weapons used by the drug cartels comes from the US and cross into México
through this point. If it’s certainly true that the weapon dealers in the US
are not responsible for the use the buyers give to the product they sale (what
else can they be used for but killing people?), the drug demand in the US is a
problem in all the countries drugs are produced and consumed outside of the US. Let me stand this clear: drug use
in the US is very high but saying that this is the only cause of the violence
in México is just a way of justifying the ineptitude and the corruption of the
Mexican Government that has let the drug dealers to “work” for many years under
the protection and the pleased sight of the authorities. The problem is not
that Americans uses drugs –as Mexicans do, but that this fact aside the high
demand of a product whit so high profit margin in a country as corrupt as
México is the perfect combination to lead to violence as we are living. But we
should use references and sources of information for that. To criticize foreign
politics of other countries is not my favorite sport; I enjoy baseball much
more. Now, get back to the point.
[2] Last Tuesday April 17th
2012, a truck belonging to US trailer Demco Co. was held in the International
Crossing Border Bridge Córdova-Américas in Ciudad Juárez carrying a shipment of
nearly 250 thousand cartridges trying to get into México even when there is a
clear prohibition to carry guns and ammunition into México from the US. The US
DOT showed that the Company has a very good record regarding its operations and
that their drivers are among the best in the Country. The driver of this truck
said he was driving from Tennessee into Arizona carrying ammunition to tactical
weapons AR-15 and AK-47 and that he mistook a detour that leaded him into
México. He was trying to return to the US, on the bridge, when he was detained
by Mexican Army and Federal troopers. It could be a mistake, alright. But, how
to explain that the Company has not US federal permission to carry ammunition
across American territory? That means that the driver could not carry gunpowder
contained into the bullets even in America, how come he had more than a quarter
million bullets in his trailer? And how come that he gave a wrong turn into
México loaded with the preferred bullets used by the drug cartels? Delicate
issue, isn’t it? (They lie: enterprise has not permission to carry bullets, by
Redaction, Norte de Ciudad Juárez, Newspaper, frontal and inner pages, Saturday
April 21st, 2012, No. 7969, year 22).
[3] At the beginning of
Maderismo, President’s brother Gustavo Adolfo Madero begun a commercial
relation with a well known lawyer from New York named Sherburn Gillette
Hopkins. This man made active campaign in favor of the revolutionaries in the
power spheres in Washington and New York, getting economic support for the
revolutionaries and making easy for them to get weapons and ammunition. Of
course, this was not for free. He will receive, at the end of the Revolution,
the sum of 50 thousand USD in payment for his services. Pretty good profit in a
country that has not money enough to feed the countryman. Hopkins was a
business men and helped not only Madero’s regime, but Villa’s revolt,
Carranza’s regime and Adolfo de la Huerta as he had defeated Carranza in the
late Revolución Constitucionalista (Rosas A, Dólares y Armas, Relatos
e Historias en México, Año 1, No. 6, Febrero de 2009, pag. 44-50).
[4] There were eight USS Dolphin ships in the US Navy
between 1777 and 2007. Those ships were: USS Dolphin (1777), cutter, in 1777; USS Dolphin, schooner, 1821 to 1835,; USS Dolphin brig, 1836 to 1860; USS Dolphin gunboat 1885 to 1921, this is the one that seem to be
the related to this story; USS Dolphin fishing, 1917; USS Dolphin patrol, 1918; USS Dolphin submarine, 1932 to 1945; USS Dolphin research and development submarine, 1968 to 2007. The
Dolphin gunboat is the heaviest candidate, anyhow. If anyone has major
information about this issue, I hope you can share it. Thank you.
[5] Yockelson M, The United States Armed Forces
and the Mexican Punitive Expedition: Part 1, Prologue, Fall 1997, Vol.
29 No. 3
[6]
Yockelson M, Op. cit.
[7] Allow me to share this: early in
2004, when I was a medical intern in Monclova, Coahuila, I went in a short
travel to Cuatro Ciénegas, hometown of General Venustiano Carranza. For sure,
my friends and I went to the Casa de Carranza Museum, the place where
Venustiano lived until he added to the Revolution. I remember we were received
in the door by a thin woman in purple clothes and makeup. With certain
theatrical gravity she leaded us through the house showing and explaining that
General Carranza did sleep here, that he did eat there, that he used to read
over there and so on. The house didn’t seemed as spectacular as I expected (I
was a younger man and hoped to ear trumpets as the woman showed us the place
where a Mexican person named in History books lived) but let me a great feeling
of being part of that travel. At the end of the tour, we signed the visitor’s
book and I wrote that I came from Ciudad Juárez. When the woman read that, her
face changed and became pale white increasing her purple lips. Courtesy died.
He named me villista (and she stated very clear that the word was an insult)
and pursued me to the door. I’d feel worried because I didn’t know what to
expect in a town where I supposed everybody will love Carranza. But nothing
happened. I leaved the house and leaved the town in one piece. Years after
that, a patient of mine born in Cuatro Ciénegas told me that the woman was not
granddaughter of Carranza as she said, and that she always does that to people
from Chihuahua. “It is part of local folklore”, he said. Funny thing to
remember, terrifying thing to live.
[8] There is a series made by History
Channel hosted by Paco Ignacio Taibo II about Villa and villismo. In one of
those episodes, Taibo visits the supposed house in which Villa lived during his
stay in El Paso, Texas. Walking down the street, Taibo II asks a couple of
residents of the area if they were aware that Villa lived in that street. They
said no. Taibo asks’em if they know the history about Villa and one of the
neighbors (a lad no more that 18 yo) says that Villa was a terrorist. Why that
aversion? Perhaps because the same reasons that made a centroamerican call
gringo to any American or the same reasons any South American President wearing
camouflage uniform states against the US calling them imperialistas: it is what is expected them to do and they do not
even stop to think if they have the proper arguments to do what they are doing.
[9]
Salmerón-Sanginés P, La división del
Norte en la historiografía de la Revolución (1917-1994), tesis de
Licenciatura en Historia, México, Facultad de filosofía y Letras, Universidad
Nacional Autónoma de México, 1997, p. 1
[10] The Army Historical
Foundation, Army History Center, consulted on http://www.armyhistory.org/ahf2.aspx?pgID=877&id=382&exCompID=56
, June 27th, 2012
[11] Sharp JW, Pancho Villa raids
Columbus, in www.desertusa.com/mag07/feb07/villa.html,
consulted June 27th, 2012
[12]
Sharp JW, Íbid.
[13]
Yockelson M, Op. cit.
