Extended Anniversary

Two months ago when top Communists Mariano Balgos and Guillermo Capadocia left Manila for the mountain hideout of insurgent Luis Taruc, many a Filipino concluded that Taruc's Hukbalahap followers would soon be on the rampage again. Last week the crackle of Huk gunfire spread through troubled Luzon.

The Communist-led guerrillas chose March 29, eighth anniversary of the birth of the Huk movement, * to begin their raids. Between midnight and dawn, bands of well-armed Huks sprang on four towns in the provinces surrounding Manila.

Murdering, pillaging and sometimes burning, they followed hit & run tactics perfected against the Japs, slipped back to their mountains soon after daylight.

Indications that the anniversary celebration was to be an extended one came the following night as attacks increased in number and violence. By the fourth day, the Huks had killed 44 Constabulary troopers and civilians, wounded some 33 more and terrorized towns all the way from Nueva Ecija Province in Central Luzon to Batangas Province south of Manila.

In Manila, flooded with evacuees from surrounding provinces, jittery citizens discussed a gunfight in the suburbs, rumors that the city itself might be attacked. "To think," cried an office girl, "that Tyrone Power is in Manila! What will he think of the Filipinos? Why doesn't the President do something?"

The President, pale, pudgy Elpidio Quirino, was doing his best. Ignoring a strained heart and doctors' orders to stay in bed, he transferred direction of anti-Huk operations from the Constabulary to the Army. But while the Army was getting ready for a general offensive, the guerrillas struck again in four provinces, raided Zambales, scheduled location for filming the movie which had brought Cinemactor Power to the Islands.

Quirino, asserting bitterly that "no quarter will be shown" the Huks, may have taken some satisfaction this week in confirming a widely circulated report: Rebel Leader Taruc, he said, had indeed died recently. Assuming that Taruc was dead, however, most Filipinos also assumed that Communists Balgos and Capadocia had taken command of the Huks, found little comfort in the change.

*Originally known as the "Hukbo ng bayan laban sa hapon" (People's Army Against Japan), the Huk movement now has a new name, "Hukbo ng mapagpalaya sa bayan" (People's Liberation Army).

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.