Insurgency In Peru: The Shining Path CSC 1988 SUBJECT AREA General WAR IN THE MODERN ERA SEMINAR Insurgency in Peru: The Shining Path Major James V. Huston, USMC 11 May 1988 Marine Corps Command and Staff College Marine Corps Combat Development Center Quantico, Virginia 22134 TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Abstract i Table of Contents ii Introduction 1 Chapter I: The Nature of Society 4 Chapter II: The Nature of the Insurgency 25 Chapter III: The Nature of Government 66 Chapter IV: Conclusions 97 Endnotes 100 Bibliography 105 Appendix A: Key Chronological Events 112 Appendix B: Key Characters and Groups 114 Appendix C: Article from Los Angeles Times, April 30, 1988 116 MAPS Political Boundaries and Terrain Elevation 6 Economic and Agricultural Features 13 Abstract INSURGENCY IN PERU: THE SHINING PATH by Major James V. Huston, United States Marine Corps, May 11, 1988. The Sendero Luminoso, or Shining Path insurgency in Peru is an attempt by a dedicated and fanatical group using particularly violent means to overthrow the existing government and substitute its own peculiar form of Maoist/Incan revolutionary comunity in its place. This study will identify the seriousness of the problem, give a brief overview of the historical, political, and social setting in which it takes place, and analyze the insurgency utilizing current U.S. counterinsurgency doctrine as a framework. Sources for this study include published studies of the insurgency and articles from both U.S. and Peruvian newspapers and magazines. State and Defense Department personnel provided valuable assistance, and a great deal of information was obtained from Peruvian military personnel at Quantico and in the Washington D.C. area. Although the Peruvian Security Forces are containing the insurgency militarily, combined with political and economic woes currently besetting the country, it poses a serious threat to the stability of the government. It will take much time and effort to eradicate the insurgency and it remains to be seen if the Peruvian government possesses the will and resources to do so. INTRODUCTION "Todo empez como jugando," "Everything started as if playing" go the words of a popular Peruvian song. That description seemed to aptly characterize the beginnings of the armed insurgency of the Partido Communista del Peru Sendero Luminoso, or Communist Party of Peru, Shining Path. The burning of some ballot boxes, dead dogs hanging from electrical poles, a few bombs here and there, gave no clue to the geometrical growth and dimensions that the actions of this group would reach. From the remote highland department of Ayacucho, the assassinations, bombings, and attacks on representatives and symbols of established authority here spread to a national level and gained worldwide fame, or infamy, for the name of Sendero Luminoso. The study of Sendero Luminoso is a "hot" topic today in the media, academia, and defense studies, because it has proved to be a resilient, dedicated threat to the Peruvian government for over eight years. Opinions of "experts" on the insurgency are in demand because Sendero, which appears to be unconcerned about world opinion, is a very secretive organization. Unlike many other revolutionary movements, they have not opened themselves up to journalists, and have printed only a few pamphlets primarily aimed at reinforcing the morale and ideological dedication of their own members and supporters. The majority of what has been published on the origins, ideology, and organization of the group leans heavily on studies of its leaders before they went underground. There is, of course, a plethora of news articles on their almost daily acts of violence, and many speculative articles and editorials in the Peruvian news media.1 Information on counterinsurgency efforts is equally hard to come by. The armed forces are generally closed-mouth about their tactics due to their desire not to give away information to the insurgents and to their sensitivity to charges of human rights violations. Journalists are generally not allowed into areas of conflict against the insurgents. This study of Sendero has the same limitations; a heavy reliance on an examination of the ideology and actions of the leaders before they went underground, articles and news reports of U.S. journalists and academicians who have visited the country since the beginning of the insurgency, access to a limited number of Peruvian news magazines, and interviews with U.S. State and Defense Department officials. There is little detailed information of an unclassified nature published on the tactics of the insurgents and the counterinsurgency efforts. I did have the good fortune to interview some members of the Peruvian armed forces who have been involved in the counterinsurgency campaign. Because of the sensitive nature of some of the information, these sources must remain nameless. I have used the framework for analysis of an insurgency provided in U.S. Army Field Circular 100-20, the most current U.S. doctrine for low intensity conflict. The regional context and root causes of the insurgency are examined in the nature of society, followed by an examination of the nature of the insurgency, the nature of the government and its response, and finally, some conclusions on the threat the insurgency poses to the stability of the government. Chapter I THE NATURE OF SOCIETY The Republic of Peru, on South America's Pacific coast, is a country of strong contrasts that are both societal and physical. Great extremes in geography and climate are mirrored in societal gaps between a relatively small elite with power, education, and wealth, and the great majority beset by poverty, isolation, and disease. The rugged mountains and dense jungles which have given so much information to scientists and delighted tourists have proved a barrier to economic development and have isolated much of Peru's population from the capitol, Lima, and the government which has its seat there. Peru is the fourth largest country in Latin America, ranking after Brazil, Argentina, and Mexico; it has an area of about a half-million square miles. The nation has three distinct regions; the coast, the highlands, and the Amazon region, referred to as the Costa, the Sierra and the Montana by the Peruvians. The Costa constitutes only 11% of the country's territory, but has about half the population of 20 million mainly concentrated around Lima, the capitol city. It contains the most productive agricultural lands and the bulk of the industry, also mainly centered around Lima. The Sierra is the rugged, mountainous central portion of Peru, part of the Andes mountain range, and has about 40% of the population. Although only a small percentage of the land is arable, the people gain their livelihood mainly from agriculture and livestock. There are large deposits of copper, lead, zinc, silver, and other minerals which are mined, but the rugged terrain makes their exploitation difficult. The construction of roads and railroads is laborious and expensive and once built they are often blocked by avalanches or washouts. The high altitudes (some peaks surpass 21,000 feet and most of the passes are over 14,000) make life difficult for unacclimatized persons, and the primary system of transportation to and from the coast is by air.* The southern highlands, particularly around the department of Ayacucho where the insurgency had its origins, will be the subject of further discussion later. The Montana constitutes two-thirds of Peru's land surface and lies east of the Andes in the Amazon basin. The region has only about 10% of the country's population, being isolated by the Andes mountains and the dense jungle which covers most of it. Its main contribution to the country's economy has been the discovery of oil in the *See map on following page. Click here to view image north, which has also been difficult to exploit due to the prohibitive terrain. Peru has a population of around twenty million people. The society is divided into three principal ethnic groups, white, mestizo, and Indian, which correspond roughly to the elite, middle, and lower classes, and are more sociocultural than racial. The whites are the elites of the Peruvian society and comprise about 10 to 15% of the population. Although many whites trace their descent from early Spanish settlers in Peru, as in most of Latin America, "money whitens." Mestizos and Indians who comprise the rest of the population (except for blacks and orientals who make up less than one per cent) cannot be differentiated by appearance alone. In general, mestizos are persons of varying degrees of indian ancestry who are accepted as middle class participants in the Hispanic culture of the nation. Indians are generally considered to be aboriginal people not assimilated into national life -- they wear different clothes and speak little or no spanish. The last census which measured the population by ethnic group was in 1940, which showed 53% to be white or mestizo and 46% to be Indian.2 The population of Peru has increased radically since then, however, and there is considerable ambiguity about who is Indian. There is no doubt, however, that in the minds of most Peruvians to be an Indian is to be inferior, and the term Indian is often used pejoratively. Indians who adopt western dress, learn Spanish, and assume middle class jobs are often called cholos, which also has some pejorative connotations. Most "Indians" in Peru live in the central and southern Sierra and speak Quechua or Aynara, the languages of the Incas. A small percentage consists of tropical forest tribal groups which inhabit the Amazon basin region. Peru's population has been changing rapidly over the past thirty years. Literacy levels have gone from below 50% to over 75%. Gross national product per capita jumped from $526 in 1960 to $1,294 in 1981. Total population increased from 9.9 million to 17.7 million between the 1961 and 1981 censuses.3 Barriers to voting, including sex and literacy, have been abolished. The major effect of these changes has been to bring into the national system a much larger percentage of the total population. Thus, the vast majority of Peru's citizens are in a position to make demands on the government, and a government's staying power has been increasingly dependent on its ability to respond to the concerns of Peruvian citizenry. An explosive issue to Peruvians now and throughout their history has been land. Although Peru has a great territorial expanse and relatively few inhabitants, it is badly overcrowded. Almost 40% of the population gains its livelihood from agriculture, but only about 3% of the nation's surface is suitable for cultivation, and until the 1960's that land was distributed very inequitably. Four-tenths of one percent of the families owned more than three-quarters of the land, which included well over half of the country's best soil.* The greatest disparity existed in the Sierrra, where the vast majority of the farmers lived. More than four-fifths of the land was held in large haciendas of over 11,000 acres by a few wealthy families. Many of the rest of the farmers either worked for the landowners in exchange for the use of a small parcel of marginal land, or owned very small farms as freeholders or part of an indigenous community. Farmers living in the Costa fared somewhat better than those of the Sierra. Although here, too, the majority of the land was in the hands of few families or foreign families which owned large plantations. Many farmers were unionized wage-workers. Wages and working conditions overall were superior to those in the Sierra. The uneven distribution of land conformed to the *Peru is divided into departments which correspond to states in the U.S., and provinces which correspond to counties. general pattern of inequity that divided Peru into two sectors. One was modern, urban, and prosperous, the other rural, backward, and desperately poor. Nowhere is this more evident than in comparison between the capitol city and the southern highlands. Modern Peru is concentrated in the urbanized department of Lima and the adjacent province of Callao. Rural, backward Peru is typified by the southern highland department of Ayacucho.4 Although Peru has a territory larger than Washington, Oregon, California and Nevada combined, over 6,000,000 live in Lima.* Three-quarters of the country's doctors are in Lima, 76% of the telephones, 80% of the banking offices, and 90% of the private investment. In Lima, 60% of families have clean water, sewage systems, and electricity. In Ayacucho, only 1 out of 43 has indoor plumbing. While the nation's infant mortality rate is 127 per 1,000, the rate in Lima is 56 per 1,000. 5 Government is Peru's largest employer and the government's employees are concentrated in Lima. Of 25,000 in the Ministry of Agriculture, more than half work in the capitol! In the City of Ayacucho, the capitol of the department, there are only 1,000 telephones in a population of over 100,000. *I have been given estimates by Peruvians that the population of Lima has swollen to about 10 million due to refugees fleeing from the fighting in the highlands. Water and electricity are rationed, and although there are seven television channels in Lima, only the government station reaches Ayacucho with any clarity. In the entire department of Ayacucho, there are only 50 miles of paved roads. To understand the dichotomy which makes up modern Peru and is to a large extent the root cause of the insurgency, one must trace back through history to the pre-Incan period, and the common threads that run through Peruvian history of authoritarianism and a feeling that Peru is special and unique. Peru was the site of the center of a vast Incan empire with its capitol at Cusco, which means "naval of the universe" in Quechua. After the Spanish conquest the seat of colonial power for most of South America was established in the more favorable coastal climate of Lima, which the Spaniards called the "city of kings" and endowed with beautiful churches, imposing buildings, and works of art. The Incas acquired their vast empire through a combination of military might and skillful diplomacy. The advanced civilization which the Spanish conquerors encountered had been developing for thousands of years under separate tribes and kingdoms. The Incans unified the Andean tribes and kingdoms in the 15th century, making them more efficient through their organizational and administrative skills.* However, the basic characteristics of Andean society existed long before the Incan conquest. The ayllu was the basic social unit, beyond the family. This was a localized group or village that possessed a territory held in common by all the married men. The villages were governed by a headman, and in time of war all able-bodied males formed a village militia. This form of community has been idealized and touted as a pure form of communism by many, including Sendero Luminoso. Political, economic and social organization was much more complex than this, though, in the Incan empire and the kingdoms that preceded it. They were anything but democratic, being governed by small elites with absolute authority vested in the ruler. The Incan emperor was the state, with the elite appropriating the surplus production of the economy while the ordinary people became poorer. Many of the people of the Incan empire welcomed the Spaniards as deliverers, only to find that they had exchanged one oppressor for another. Francisco Pizarro landed in Peru with about 180 followers in 1532. In a year, with superior tactics, steel swords and horses, clever diplomacy and the help of discontented tribes, Pizarro brought down the mighty Incan *See map on following page. Click here to view image empire. The despoilation and exploitation of the Indiana and their lands which ensued have shaped the structure of Peruvian society until today. The principle device which Spain used to reward the conquistadores and consolidate the empire was the encomienda, which gave individuals religious and civil authority over Indians in certain areas and the right to extract tribute from them. Although this did not include rights to the native's lands, the encomenderos used their wealth, political influence and control over the Indians to usurp their lands. Other lands belonging to rebellious Incan nobles were simply taken over and distributed to deserving servants of the Spanish crown. The church also acquired huge tracts, as did the crown itself and various municipal governments. The Indians suffered severely from the usurpation of their land, the tribute system, and a system of forced draft labor, called the mita, under which all male Indians were to spend a portion of their time engaged in labor beneficial to the king. This took place in a variety of industries, the most dreaded of which was mining, where many Indians died from the miserable working conditions and exposure to mercury or carbon monoxide poisoning. The encomienda, other land grants, and the subjugation and exploitation of the Indian served as the basis for the unequal distribution of land and the ethnic distinctions that have characterized Peruvian society since that time. The Indian people were, of course, unhappy with their lot under colonial rule, but had little success in gaining redress of their grievances through the courts or peaceful petitions. In 1780 a series of uprisings culminated in a massive rebellion led by an Indian headman named Jose Gabriel Condorcanqui, who adopted the name Tupac Amaru II, after the last of the Incan monarchs. After two years and much bloodshed the rebellion was suppressed. Some historians have described this as a precursor of Peruvian independence from Spain, and many revolutionary groups, as well as governments attempting to legitimize their programs, have used the name Tupac Amaru. As the bastion of Spanish colonial rule and military power in South America, Peru was the last country to gain its independence. There were many aristocrats in Peru who were concerned that independence might lead to another uprising among the Indians and furthermore, reduce Peru's privileged colonial status to being one among many other nations (this did indeed occur) . Independence was more or less thrust upon Peru by circumstances and outsiders who would not tolerate the existence of this royalist stronghold. The armies of the Argentine Colonel Jose de San Martin and the Venezuelan General Simon Bolivar united in Peru to defeat the royalist forces. The climactic battle took place on December 9, 1824, on a plain where the City of Ayacucho is now located, where the forces under General Antonio Jose de Sucre defeated the last royalist army in South America. The history of Peru as a republic has been a convulsive one, and too complex to examine in any detail in this study. It has been typified by the rule of Caudillos, or strongmen, both military and civilian, with effective power vested in a small segment of society -- wealthy agrarian and commercial interests, and the military. Of great significance to the way Peru currently postures its military forces were two wars it fought with its neighbors: the War of the Pacific against Chile in the 1880's and one with Ecuador in 1941. The war with Chile was particularly bitter for Peru, as Chilean forced defeated the poorly prepared and badly outnumbered Peruvians, and Peru was forced to pay dearly in the loss of territory and heavy indemnities paid to Chile. Peruvians are still reminded of the anniversary of each each battle fought in this war. In the war with Ecuador, which broke out over boundary disputes, Peru won quick and decisive victories. A peace treaty was signed as a part of the Rio Protocol of 1942, the terms of which were highly favorable to Peru. Ecuador has since repudiated those terms. Enmities still exist from both these wars and have a considerable effect on the structure and disposition of the Peruvian military forces which are strategically oriented toward defending their borders and sea lines of communication from Chile and Ecuador. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Peruvian thinkers began to openly and systematically criticize their society, seek causes for recurring economic and political chaos, and search for reasons for the humiliating defeat at the hands of Chile. Manuel Gonzalez Prada was a principal early spokesman for the critics who found the answers in the social structure -- the jealous monopoly over power and wealth held by a small military-civil oligarchy and the isolation of the Indian from the national life. He was followed by men such as Jose Carlos Mariatequi, considered by many to be the founder of the communist party in Peru in 1928, and Victor Raul Hoya de la Torre, the founder of Alvanza Popular Revolucionaria Americana, or APRA (American Popular Revolutionaryu Alliance) in 1924. APRA is a political organization that has profoundly influenced 20th century Peruvian life and is currently in power. In its formation, it was radical (not communist); anti-imperialist, anti-capitalist, and anti-U.S. It proclaimed the need for Latin American Indians to rise up against oligarchic oppression that was allied with United States economic interests. APRA has moderated its views considerably over the years to the center-left positions it holds today, but has a history of confrontations and bitter conflict with the military. In 1932 the party led a revolt in which approximately 60 officers and government officials were executed and mutilated. The consequent military suppression and reprisals involved the execution of any known or suspected Apristas. Distrust and hatred between the two has not entirely disappeared to this day. 6 In 1963 Fernando Belaunde Terry, who has since been a major force in Peruvian politics, was elected to the presidency. His platform and that of his party, Accion Popular, was the full incorporation of the Indian into national life, agrarian reform, and the opening up of the interior through an extensive road network. Unfortunately, financial constraints and political opposition in the congress frustrated most of his goals. Adding to his woes was the uprising in the highlands of two foco-type armed insurrections which drew inspiration and aid from Cuba. Swift action by the government and the military, and lack of support among the peasants, brought a rapid end to these. 7 The impact on the military was significant, however. They had to mobilize over 5,000 police and soldiers to put down an insurgency consisting of a handful of guerrillas. It also left them deeply concerned about what would have happened had the guerrillas had wide support among the highland peasants, or campesinos. The military concluded that large segments of Peruvian society were in a state of latent insurgency that could be eliminated only by attacking its root causes -- lack of adequate land reform, government inefficiency, resistence to change by the oligarchy, and government aloofness to the problems of the Indians.8 The failure of the Belaunde government to adequately address these issues was one of the major causes of its downfall. In 1968, in response to growing political chaos and the perception that the government was losing control, a military coup occurred under which the Chairman of the Joint Command, Division General Juan Velasco Alvarado, assumed the presidency of the Revolutionary Government of the Armed Forces. This military government was unique among military regimes in Latin America. It was neither socialistic or capitalistic, although it incorporated elements of both. It instituted the most dramatic changes of any Latin American government in the period between Castro's revolution and that of the Nicaraguan Sandinistas. This was the start of an intent by the military to completely restructure Peruvian society. It included nationalization on a grand scale of private enterprise, establishment of closer relationships with eastern block countries, and one of the most sweeping agrarian reform movements in the history of Latin America. In order to prevent a violent revolution from the bottom, their intent was to impose a "controlled revolution" from the top. Their aim was to do this by breaking the power of the oligarchy; broadening reform programs; breaking Peru's economic dependency on foreign nations, lenders, and multinational corporations; and increasing the state's role in every aspect of Peruvian life. In spite of its good intentions, the "Peruvian model" was a failure in many, if not all, of its objectives. The failures arose from imposing reforms without consideration of larger consequences, economic factors out of control of the military government, and the isolation that illness imposed on its leader, General Velasco, who died in 1977. The limitations imposed on land reform in order to keep it from completely disrupting the agricultural economy resulted in the great majority of the most destitute farm families emerging empty-handed. The increasing state participation in the economy resulted in a marked decrease in private investment, leading the government to seek capitol in foriegn loans, greatly increasing the foreign debt burden. And a worldwide recession resulted in lower prices for Peruvian goods, bringing about soaring inflation and devaluation of Peruvian currency. Simple mismanagement by military officers not equipped to deal with political and economic decisions further hampered the Velasco regime. In 1975 another military coup replaced Velasco with the Prime Minister, General Morales Bermudez. Although it was considered as the "consolidation" of the military revolution, it was more of a withdrawal in terms of reform. The majority of the reformist officers were forced to retire and their replacements were more conservative. The administration of General Morales had to impose stern solutions to the deteriorating state of the economy and the mounting foreign debt problem. Austere IMF-approved fiscal and monetary restraints depressed the living standards of most Peruvians. Wages fell, prices rose, the Peruvian currency was severely devalued, and public spending and food subsidies were curtailed. Strikes and mounting violent opposition brought the return to civilian government. In May of 1980, after winning the presidential election, Belaunde and his Accion Popular party once again returned to power. The revolutionary military government had made some significant changes in Peruvian society: the power of the oligarchy was broken, control of the economy was shifted to the state, and Peru became a spokesman for third world nations. However, the standard of living of the average Peruvian had not increased, income distribution had not significantly changed to favor the poor, and dependency on foreign loans still existed. 9 The benefits of the land reform programs were minimal in the Department of Ayacucho. There were gains: additional pasture lands, more secure land titles, and for some peasant communities, membership in new agricultural enterprises. But the average value of property transferred to peasant communities was only about $50 per beneficiary.10 The people who mainly benefited from the reforms were the workers on the large estates, who comprised only a small percentage of the population. These estates were simply transferred whole to the workers as cooperative enterprises in order to preventthe economic chaos which would have followed the breaking up of the country's most productive agricultural enterprises. By 1980 the situation of the local peasantry was actually deteriorating due to the termination of rural development programs under government austerity measures, and the general ineffectiveness of agrarian reform. Adding to the problem has been a rapidly increasing population density in an area where the land is not even suited to agriculture. Only a small portion of the mountainous region is arable. Most of the terrain is dry, rocky, and windy, with altitudes over 12,000 feet. What land is available has suffered from erosion. So, while the expectations of the people were raised considerably by promises of land and a better life, these were not fulfilled. Already one of the two poorest departments the country, Ayacucho was becoming a fourth world region in a third world country. At the same time that their living conditions were worsening, the people of Ayacucho were be coming more politicized and likely to blame their troubles on the government. Prior to land reform, the staffs of the large haciendas had monitored political activities in the area and kept out would-be organizers. With these gone, no new political institutions replaced them. The government attempted to establish a political mobilization agency called SINAMOS, but this failed due to poor organization and lack of funding. Other socialist and Marxist workers organizations then became active in recruiting people to vote for leftist candidates and causes, but these also failed to benefit them in any significant way. Thus, what the majority of the people were seeing was unfulfilled promises, both by the government and by opposition parties and organizations, making them promises in return for their votes and support. This led to rising but unfulfilled expectations. Hence, many of the peasants were thus ready to listen to the appeals of someone like Sendero Luminoso. Chapter II THE NATURE OF THE INSURGENCY The insurgent group known as Sendero Luminoso, or simply Sendero, began in the City of Ayacucho, capitol of the department of the same name, in the National University of San Cristobal de Huamanga, founded in 1677, closed in 1855, then reopened in 1959. Ayacucho, famous for its 33 colonial churches and its celebration of Holy Week, was up until that time a bastion of conservative ideology. The university turned that around. Viewed as an historic opportunity to revitalize the area, it was to serve as an agent for change by educating local young people in subjects and at levels appropriate for the area and provide assistance for the many problems the region confronted. There was to be no law or medical school, but concentration instead on programs relating to local problems, like nursing, education, applied anthropology and rural engineering. Extension programs which spread out through the department were essential parts of the various schools. In its commitment to change, however, the university went well beyond the objectives of its founders, and many of the faculty and students came to believe that social change was possible only in the context of political change in tune with Marxist principles. In 1962, Abimael Guzman Reynoso was invited to teach at the University of Huamanga. Born illegitmately on December 3, 1934 in a small town in southern Peru, he received most of his primary and secondary schooling at a Jesuit school in the City of Arequipa.* He graduated with honors from the University of San Agustin with degrees in law and philosophy, defending dissertations on The Theory of Space in Kant and The Democratic Bourgeois State. Those who knew him as a student and as a teacher describe him as "brilliant and lucid in his thought and his dissertations. "1 His speeches and lectures were much sought after by students, other professors, and representatives of the community. He is characterized as a highly disciplined person who didn't smoke, was never seen drunk, and had no known vices; in sum, a highly self-disciplined individual. At Huamanga, Guzman became involved in radical politics immediately. He was named to head the youth movement of the local Communist Party. He frequently invited students to his home, leading them in discussions on politics and philosophy, and began organizing trips to Cuba for some of the most talented. In 1964, following *Other Latin American figures of note educated by Jesuits include Fidel Castro and Daniel Ortega. the Sino-Soviet split, he as well as many other pro-Chinese Communist Party members broke away to form the Communist Party of Peru -- Bandera Roja (Red Flag). In the 1968 university elections, in the wake of steep cuts in the university budget, members of Bandera Roja gained control of the university council.* Guzman had been put in charge of producing the newspaper of the party and was developing many followers through his fiery speeches and editorials urging the preparation for armed revolution. In 1969 he was named Head of Academics for the Department of Humanities, Head of the Education Department, and Director of Academic, Administrative, and Service Personnel of the University. He was thus in a position to control not only a large portion of the University's curriculum, but the hiring and firing of its personnel. In 1970, Guzman and his followers split from Bandera Roja, forming the party known today as Sendero Luminoso. The name of the party comes from its origins in a student group known as Frente Estudiantil por el Sendero Luminoso *By 1968, under the liberal policies of the military government toward education, the University of Huyamanga had become a highly politicized institution. It had open admissions and up to 15,000 students in a physical plant that could only handle one-fifth that number. There was constant political turmoil and frequent strikes, both by students and faculty. The distiictive extension services became yet one more instrument by which radical political goals could be accomplished. de Mariategui (Revolutionary Student Front for the Shining Path of Mariategui). Sendero Luminoso members, committed to armed revolution, began intensive efforts to build support among peasant communities. Sendero militants fanned out from Ayacucho to the surrounding villages, working as teachers, performing odd jobs in their native villages, and becoming social workers. In contrast to most Peruvian revolutionaries from middle-class backgrounds, the Senderistas were prepared to live austerely for many years in remote, bleak places. They learned the Indian language, Quechua, if they did not already know it, and they often married into the communities. Sendero wad also unique among Peruvian Marxist groups in its openness to young provincial militants as leaders. At its inception, Sendero included a substantial number of white, cosmopolitan intellectuals from large cities, but, by 1980, with a few exceptions, it was largely an Ayacucho-born leadership. 2 From 1970 to 1977 Sendero concentrated on the development of a party apparatus. Though regional committees and cells were formed throughout the country, they were mostly concentrated in Ayacucho and neighboring highland departments. This was also a time when they were concentrating on formulating and refining their ideology, dedicated to "retomar a Mariategui", or resurrecting the political thought of Mariategui which had been lost in the ideological struggles within the Communist Party. In constructing its ideology, Sendero synthesized Maoist tenets of a long rural struggle with the views of Peruvian society expressed by Jose Carl as Mariategui in the 1930's. Mariategui was concerned with racial and cultural pluralism, and the problem of how to organize a fragmented society so that economic growth could occur. His view was that the problems of the country could be solved only by the establishment of a legitimate political order based on the desires of the Indian and mestizo masses, and not the white European minority. He claimed that political legitimacy as defined by a truly representative government had not existed in Peru since the destruction of the Incan Empire. His ideology of new revolution consisted of four major elements: (1) , a commitment to obtain a better moral and material way of life for the masses through fundamental changes in the social system; (2) , a willingness to adopt non-Hispanic, non-Peruvian ideas to explain existing social and political conditions and to use Marxist explanations to justify changing those conditions; (3) , an attempt to create a new national identity through the synthesis of these ideas; and (4) , a commitment to obtain the material benefits of a modern, secular, industrial society while retaining the moral and spiritual purpose of traditional Peruvian society. These were expounded in his central ideologioal work, Siete ensayos de la realidad peruana. (Seven Essays of Interpretation of Peruvian Reality.)3 From the perspective of his followers, Guzman succeeded during this period in reconciling the bitter dispute which had divided the Maoist left in the 1960's over the application of Mao on the one hand, and the proper interpretation of Mariategui on the other. During the `70's, Sendero became more and more isolated from the rest of the Peruvian left due to its increasing radicalism. It viewed them to a large extent as being contaminated by their cooperation with the reformist military government which it characterized as fascist. They came to view themselves as the only repositories of true revolutionary Peruvian thought and their leader, Guzman, who is referred to as "Comrade Gonzalo" and his "Guiding Thought" as the "fourth sword of Marxism," with Marx, Lenin, and Mao being the other three. A detailed analysis of Sendero's ideology is difficult, simply because they have revealed little of it. What is known is garnered from those who had association with the leaders before they went underground and the few exhortative pamphlets which they have published.4 The principal aspect is Marxism, with its concept of class struggle between the dominating classes and the dominated, in this case the Indian rural poor. Sendero makes a direct comparison of modern Peru with prerevolutionary China and embraces the Maoist concept of a protracted revolutionary war beginning in the rural areas and growing to encircle and isolate the cities. This seems to have been a logical vision to promote in the underdeveloped regions of the southern highlands for three reasons: (1), it provided a clear explanation of the environment of the peasants in line with their limited social and political horizons, and filled a void caused by the absence of a varied, democratic party system practiced by diverse social groups. (2) , development actions carried out by attempted reforms raised the consciousness of the people but failed in their expectations, leaving them susceptile to alternatives to better their situation. And (3) , the ideology aligns itself with a history of Andean messianism in which promises made for a return of Indian power mesh well with a historic vision of an Incan Golden Age prior to the arrival of the Spanish conquistadores. This vision still remains strong among rural peasants and urban mestizos. In a 1981 document, Sendero calls upon the peasantry to join the revolution as a continuation of the historical experience of its existence. In "Let Us Develop the Guerrilla War" it states: And what is currently the situation of the people? A peasantry with a fundamental demand going back centuries, "Land for those who work it," which in spite of an unfalter- ing struggle has still not managed to achieve it; a peasantry which during the past twenty years they (the government) have tried to deceive with three purported agrarian reform laws, which after being introduced with high sounding demagogy have left the peasant with the same old unsatisfied hunger for land.5 The same pamphlet goes on to say: The violence of the revolution is, then the same essence as our historical process and if the emancipation of the republic was won with arms on the field of battle, it is easy to understand that the development and triumph of the Peruvian revolution, of our democratic revolution for the emancipation of the people and of the classes, will be gained only by means of the largest revolu- tionary war of our people, raising she masses by means of the popular war.6 The specific ideology of Sendero, the code by which its members live and die, and which outlines the strategy which for them is the guarantee of success, is contained in what is known as the Pensamiento Gonzalo, or "Guiding Thought of Comrade Gonzalo." The content of this is unknown, since it is taught only to members in oral form. It seems to be one way they have of showing contempt for their enemies, by denying them access to it. It is also a way by which the members, in teaching this to others, affirm their loyalty to the "Guiding Thought", swear that the revolution it espouses is that for which they are fighting and will die.7 The members of Sendero feel that they are unique and special, the originators and spokesmen for a new world, the country of "President Gonzalo." His Guiding Thought embodies the totality of their revolution and gives them the certainty of final victory. For the Guiding Thought to live, it is necessary to destroy all that which opposes it, seeking spaces which the Guiding Thought may enter until they reach the essential objective, which they call the "Great Subjective Myth." A captured Senderoist was quoted in an interview with the press as declaring: We are dedicated to the Guiding Thought of our leadership, the main policy, which is to fight to reach victory with the mission of dying to invent the Great Subjective Myth.8 The conditions which will create the "Great Subjective Myth" are unknown as is the exact nature of the society that Sendero Luminoso envisions it will create following the victory of its revolution. Because of the Andean origin of many of its leaders, most believe that they envision a communal agrarian type of society based on the Indian ayllu discussed previously. Some have likened them to the Khmer Rouge of Cambodia, and indeed in some captured documents they have expressed an affinity with that revolution. 9 What is clear is that conventional notions of right or wrong mean nothing to them; all reality is interpreted by means of the Guiding Thought. Charges of sectarianism, fanaticism and insanity mean nothing to them. Public opinion is not important to them. They embody the Guiding Thought and fight for it to the utmost of their abilities. This explains their extreme vertical discipline and the unquestioned obedience to the orders of superiors, even if they make no sense, because they believe that everything has its place in the giant puzzle which is the strategy of the Guiding Thought.* Sendero is organized into a many leveled body with a tightly controlled cellular structure which makes it easy for the few people at the top to control and virtually impossible to penetrate. There are three main divisions: the Party, which constitutes the leadership; the Popular Guerrilla Army, which carries out the military actions; and the Popular Front, which carries out support activities. The Sendero leadership is structured around a national conference of constituent members. All decision are made by a Central Committee which comprises leaders from five strategic regions. The country is divided up into five regions which are the southern, central, south- *See Appendix C. western, northern and Lima regions. A committee composed of province and district representatives exists in each of the regions. The provinces are in turn divided into zonal, subzonal, and local areas, each with its cellular committee.10 The military arm relies on a highly vertical cell structure to carry out the military missions decreed by the political sector. Each cell consists of less than ten members, with five being the usual number. One commander directs the militant actions and answers to the next highest level of authority. With the exception of large offensives there is generally no inter-cell contact between members. Each cell normally contains two explosives specialists, one political idealogue, and one person responsible for maintaining physical fitness and instruction in unarmed combat techniques. The cell commander is responsible for weapons concealment and maintenance, with weapons being handed out just prior to every action and collected immediately afterward. All members are trained in basic first aid, with one member usually possessing more advanced medical skills. The military organization is headed by a unified command and separated vertically into companies, detachments, platoons, militias, and cells. It is composed of three main bodies. The Main Force is mobile and in constant movement. This is complemented by local forces installed in each town which remain there permanently. Finally, there is a militia integrated among the inhabitants of the towns.11 The Popular Front is composed of all the members of Sendero who are not in the Party or Popular Guerrilla Army. They are organized into various groups whose missions are to support the military arm and to carry out political, social, and psychological operations. Some of these groups were created in the 70's and have since gone underground, but are still viable. They include: The Poor Peasants Movement This is a group in charge of recruiting and organizing the rural peasantry. The Working Class Movement: In charge of organizing workers in urban areas and infiltrating the unions. The Neighborhood Class Movement: In charge of recruiting and organizing in the "pueblos jovenes" slums of Lima and other poor urban areas. The Popular Youth Movement: In charge of recruiting and organizing in the secondary schools and universities. The Popular Women's Movement: In charge of recruiting and organizing women throughout the country. The Mariatequi Centers for Intellectual Work: Recruits and organize; intellectuals throughout the country. Theater and Folklore Music Groups: Musical and Theatric groups which spread Sendero's ideology and propaganda by means of the arts. Popular Support: This is an umbrella group, for a number of organizations which provide help for imprisoned members and their families, and for families of dead members. They provide legal and financial assistance, and organize the families into support groups. They are in charge of subversion of the judiciary by assassination, intimidation, or bribery. They act as distributors of propaganda to the various Human Rights organizations, and finally, act as a go-between for urban terrorists in Lima and the rural guerrilla forces. 12 Sendero is highly selective in the recruitment of new members. It principally targets those under twenty years of age. It does this for two reasons. They believe that adults already have a lifestyle and an established concept of the world, and are contaminated by the system. Young people can more readily absorb new ideologies and are less likely to feel pain or pity. They can be indoctrinated to ignore any feelings of remorse, and taught that acts are justified only by the test of whether or not it will help to "liberate" the people from capitalism and feudalism as perceived by the movement in the misery of the poor and social injustices. The second reason is that penetration of the organization would be that much more difficult because an agent of the counterinsurgency forces would have to be seventeen or eighteen years old, at a maximum. Anyone wishing to join Sendero must be recommended by two members. Sendero investigates the recruiting process as one way of avoiding infiltration. After selection, the initiate will spend one year participating in propaganda actions such as painting walls, distributing pamphlets, and other such acts. During this phase the initiate is not allowed to participate in military actions or to come into contact with the military arm. Emphasis is placed on political indoctrination and instruction in guerilla theory. Usually, the initiate will begin to participate in low-risk military actions, such as the destruction of bridges and electrical towers between the first and second year of training. His expertise in firearms, explosives, guerilla strategy, and physical fitness is emphasized. A decision regarding final admittance is made after this stage and, if admitted, the person will swear an oath of allegiance in front of four hooded Sendero representatives. The training may be stopped at any time and the member assigned to a cell with little personal knowledge of the structural hierarchy and other members. Sendero is not sexually discriminatory, as many of its members are women and there are several women among its top leaders. A Sendero leader, when asked why there were so many women in its ranks, was quoted as saying: Not just any woman can be involved in the revolution. They have to be young, because as long as women remain unmarried and have no children, they are much more insensitive and colder than men and are thus willing to do anything.13 Some of the elements of Sendero's strategy can be discerned from their writings. One of the rare published Sendero documents was circulated in Spain in 1984. It was titled "The Truth About the People's War in Peru" and was primarily written as a revolutionary handbook utilizing Peru as a case study. It identified five stages of the revolution as follows: (1) Agitation and armed propaganda. First actions and training of the combatants in attacks with limited objectives. This lasted from May 1980 until the end of 1981. (2) Systematic sabotage and initiation of the first regular guerrilla actions destined to destroy the power of the bourgeois landowner in the zones chosen to be bases of support. This lasted all of 1982. (3) Generalization of the guerrilla war and the beginning of the creation of support bases, behind the expulsion of the reactionary authorities. This extended throughout the entire year of 1983 and had to face the intervention of the Army. (4) Conquest of the bases of support, establishing in them the power of the Popular Committees and strengthening the militias and popular army. Expansion of the popular army to new zones (including the city as an auxiliary activity) to obtain the dispersion of the enemy forces. Reorganization of the productive process to place it at the service of the popular army. This fourth stage is long and complex and the PCP (Peruvian Communist Party) has divided it into numerous substages each with specific tactical objectives. In the final substages the war will probably evolve into movements of large combatant columns. (5) Generalized civil war. The popular army will depart the liberated zones to surround the cities. It is probable that during this stage imperialist forces will directly intervene. Insurrection in the cities will complement the external siege. Complete destruction of the reactionaries, and the installation throughout Peru of the Popular Republic of New Democracy as the concrete form of the first stage of the dictatorship of the proletariat.14 Sendero has learned a great deal from the failure of the foco style insurgencies of the 60's and appears not to be willing to commit the same errors.* By adhering to a long term strategy, they have avoided the poor organization and preparation that marked their earlier counterparts. Tbe coastal urban composition of the foquista leadership and superficial knowledge cf the Andean conditions have been replaced by recruitment of militant peasants native to the highlands who are familiar *Foco style insurgencies are those based on the Cuban revolution wherein a small group of armed insurgents serve as a catalyst or focus for a disaffected population to rise up against an unpopular existing regime. with the language, geography, and customs of the region. Sendero has also criticized the previous guerrillas for not selecting the proper historical moment. They chose to undertake the revolution when the revolutionary correlation of forces had not yet reached maturity. The foquista insurgents were open in meeting with the press in an effort to publicize their cause, while Sendero has been extremely reclusive, choosing only to publish a few slim pamphlets and abjuring interviews with the press. Having decided that the time was right, Sendero chose to commence its actions with the return of democratic government in 1980. Their first action was the burning of ballot boxes in the village of Chuschi in the Department of Ayacucho during the voting for a new president. Most Peruvians first heard of Sendero Luminoso when the citizens of Lima were confronted by the sight of dead dogs hanging from utility poles along the principal boulevard of the city. The carcasses were decorated with placards denouncing the "fascist dog of Deng Xiaoping" and praising the Chinese Gang of Four. This was repeated soon afterward in the City of Ayacucho, where most people could only guess as to its significance. 15 The initial actions of Sendero covered a wide spectrum of operations executed mostly in the southern highlands region in and around the department of Ayacucho. They dealt largely with some type of armed propaganda, such as attacks on government officials, destruction of electrical towers and bridges, and assaults on isolated police posts and centers of public administration. Destruction and burnings were particularly targeted at buildings where debt records were held. These early operations served as a training ground for teaching their militants the use of weapons on easily achievable tactical objectives. They were able to take advantage of the lack of a governmental and society infrastructure to implement their strategy nearly unopposed by the local police forces. Their weapons were unsophisticated, consisting of weapons seized during attacks on police stations and dynamite stolen from the many mines in the area. Sometimes, dynamite was wrapped in balls of mud and slung from a huaraco, or traditional Inca llama-skin sling. Grenades were made from beverage cans filled with gasoline end topped with makeshift fuzes. Sendero was the originator of the "donkey-bomb", in which a donkey would be loaded with dynamite and driven toward a police station or government building. The general tactic used during this phase was surpise, with Sendero units going on the offensive at night. Following the attack, the militants would take refuge in the towns or return to their daily occupations, making detection and capture difficult by a security force handicapped by the lack of an effective intelligence capability. The Senderistas were able to remain mobile and use the geography and difficult terrain to their advantage. They were aided in the rural zones by the clandestine help of local citizens and the lack of police forces to pursue them. Sendero also utilizes methods other than violence to further their cause. They would bold regular meetings in the countryside at which guerrillas would lead indoctrination sessions, distribute food, and establish a system of "popular justice". They would arrive at a settlement during the night and round up all of the citizens to the town square to accuse and punish the "enemies of the people". Among these would be alleged child molesters, petty criminals, wealthy merchants, money lenders, and cattle theives. They would mete out sentences to those deemed guilty which included floggings, humiliating haircuts, and executions.* Property would be distributed and debts owed by the peasants voided. Many peasants regarded these actions as the first public services they had ever received. 16 These strategies were mainly employed in the lower *See Appendix C. elevations of the highlands The Indian peasants in the more remote villages of the higher and less hospitable terrain had less contact with the Senderistas except when the guerrillas transited the mountain passes to the lower valleys. The isolation, harshness of the climate and terrain, dispersion of the villages and primitivism of the people did not lend itself to their indoctrination and the building of support bases. The high zones were generally used as transit corridors where the guerrillas could disappear after carrying out armed actions in the lowlands. 17 In 1982 a new phase in Sendero strategy was ushered in. On March 2, in a well coordinated military offensive three columns of guerrillas numbering 300 in all, attacked and held the maximum security prison of Ayacucho. A total of 247 prisoners were set free, including over 100 suspected terrorists. In a national party conference between March and May 1982, the initial goals of the revolution were acknowledged as having been accomplished. They proclaimed to the nation that a revolutionary group had taken up arms, they claimed that two companies of the People's Army had been formed, and that the conditions had been created for the establishment of bases of support. Actions were now to be taken to occupy those areas of the countryside not yet under Sendero control, and to rid it of the representatives of the state and of capitalism.18 These consisted of government authorities (mayors, governors, police), peasant authority figures (community presidents, traditional authority figures) and small businessmen and bureaucrats. The goal was to eliminate them completely, either by causing them to leave or by execution. This process of ridding the countryside of what they called their "natural enemies" was called "sweeping the countryside" or "killing the weeds."19 This signified a greater use of political executions and terror tactics. In the months following the prison raid, several attacks on major police barracks occurred. On August 12, guerrillas simultaneously dynamited four electric pylons, darkening all of Lima. Less dramatic but more vicious outrages occurred on an almost daily basis. Crowded theaters were bombed and many banks robbed in which police guards were invariably killed. In the final months of 1982, Sendero stepped up its campaign of assassinations in the highlands. The mayor and deputy mayor of Ayacucho were killed, but most of the rest of the victims were more humble citizens: local leaders of political parties, labor unions and peasant organizations, many of whom were anti-Sendero Marxists. "People's trials" resulted in the barbaric executions of squealers. Indian community leaders were whipped and paraded naked through their villages. A girl witnessed a band of Sendero militants conducting a "people's trial" in her village and offered this: They stood the boy in the plaza, calling him a traitor and a coward. Then, in front of everyone, they cut off his head with a knife. There was nothing we could do to save him. Five minutes later one of them yelled, `Whoever does the same thing will receive the same punishment. Then they left shouting allegiance to Comrade Gonzalo.20 Frightened local officials in the highlands resigned en masse and teachers, parish priests, and others whose names appeared on Sendero death lists fled the region. Sendero also began to take actions which conflicted with the economic survival of the peasantry. The guerrillas attempted to coerce the villages into self-sufficiency and eradicate the cash economy by restricting food production. Only enough crops were to be grown to meet the needs of each village. They also closed down the traditional local markets where the Indians sold their meager surpluses to buy goods not available to them by other means. This was also aligned with Sendero's strategy of "encircling the cities" by strangling them through starvation. Although there was a small shortage in the cities of potatoes and some cereals, this was certainly not catastrophic since 80% of cities' food needs are supplied by farms on the coast. In 1981, in response to the growing insurgent threat, a battalion of civil guard counterinsurgency specialists were dispatched to Ayacucho. They turned out to be poorly trained, unfamiliar with the terrain, and lacked knowledge of the local Quechua language. They were inadequate for their assigned purpose and many abuses of authority were reported, resulting in the deaths of innocent people. The administration had rejected early calls to use the army, fearing that the struggle might turn into a "dirty war" like that of Argentina during the 1970's, when thousands of people simply disappeared. Having just returnd to democracy after a long period of military government, there was also the fear of further military intervention in the government. However, in the mounting violence and evidence that the normal state apparatus was unable to deal with the military threat, the government took the fateful step it had resisted. On December 29, 1982, President Belaunde proclaimed a new state of emergency in Ayacucho and deployed 1500 soldiers and Marines to the area. At the end of their second year of insurgency, Sendero was enjoying its most widespread support among the highland peasants. It had succeeded in convincing a large segment of the population that it represented an alternative to the existing regime. It did this by discrediting the state apparatus while legitimizing its own claim to power by "protecting" and providing social services to a heretofore ignored social stratum Evidence of this support was demonstrated in 1982 by the massive turnout of up to 30,000 people in Ayacucho for the funeral of Edith Lagos, a young guerrilla commander killed by the police. Sendero was also able to build a sizeable arsenal of weapons seized from security forces while training its members in strategy and tactics With the introduction of the military into the zone, the struggle became even more savage. During the first two months of 1983, 243 guerrillas, 56 civilians, and 5 security personnel were reported killed. By June, the death toll for that year had reached 1000 and many wore than that had been arrested.21 The use of terror by the armed forces met with increased terror by Sendero, which began to undermine the base it had achieved. Tactics turned to being more destructive instead of constructive. Although they were successful in achieving the intervention of the military to demonstrate the weakness of the government, this placed the population in a crossfire between two diametrically opposed institutions. In line with its strategy of attacking their perceived symbols of the bourgeois state and capitalist dependency, Sendero was also destroying such institutions as the agricultural experimental station of the University of Huamanga, the Nestle Company stores and factories, peasant cooperatives, and any and all government or foreign aid program installations.22 This began to erode some of the base of support they had labored to achieve. Their withdrawal from some areas to avoid confrontation with the military also caused them some loss of support. As one sympathizer put it: Why don't they take care of us? They have put us into this problem and they don't take care of us; they should defend us. Why have they told us that they would lead the fight and we would come behind? Where are they? You don't see them around here. They stuck us in this mess and they left -- it can't be!23 Sendero had foreseen the intervention of the armed forces and had planned for it, to a certain extent. They had worked hard on establishing support bases in the rural highland areas. They controlled large areas where police and government authorities dared not venture, and which were administered by "popular committees". But they kept their leaders and most valuable components under ground, so that when the security forces moved into these areas, they lost only the popular committees and some of the other more overt members. The leaders were able to continue to work underground to continue to build their forces and inake their actions more selective.24 Although they began to suffer losses and setbacks with the intervention of the military, Sendero had accomplished some important objectives during the first phases of its insurgency. They gained time by fixing the attention of the government on the initial and few widely scattered actions while they put the final touches on their preparations for the armed struggle, and their guerrilla wing gained valuable experience in a gradual buildup of violence. They demonstrated the vulnerability of the government and economic institutitons, and the impotency of the police and armed forces to protect them. They undermined the credibility of top government officials who kept saying that there was no cause for concern, since the situation was allegedly under control. When the minister of interior under the Belaunde government issued a declaration that the terrorists had been defeated, they launched a wave of blackouts and bombings in Lima and in the highlands. It was obvious that they were only waiting for a declaration like this to be made. They sought a slow but steady economic attrition of the government and economic institutions, which they were achieving, as the damages from their acts started to reach the hundreds of millions of dollars. And they were well prepared for the repressive tactics of the police and military, which they in fact did their best to incite. They mounted a well-coordinated and successful propaganda campaign which portrayed the security forces as bloodthirsty beasts who were more terrorist than the terrorists.25 However, the resistance of some of the highland communities to Sendero was highlighted in an event which shocked the nation. In January 1983, eight journalists were murdered in the Andean village of Uchuraccy by villagers who mistook them for Senderistas. A horrified nation watched via live television coverage while the corpses, which had been mutiliated in ritual Indian fashion, were disinterred. An investigative commission, headed by the noted Peruvian author, Mario Vargas Llosa, placed the blame on the villagers and absolved government forces in the matter.26 Some later called this a "whitewash" and accused the armed forces of killing them to prevent disclosure of a secret counterinsurgency operation.27 Charges were brought against some of the peasants, later withdrawn, and then reinstated. Two defendants were eventually convicted of the murders. 28 In March 1983, Sendero convened a congress somewhere in the jungle during which Abimael Guzman, along with other leaders, was in attendence. Decisions were made to deepen the war and carry it into its fourth stage of conquering bases of support and strengthening the military forces. Some previous failures were attributed to the lack of training and quality of sufficient military leaders, and deficient ideological indoctrination of the militants. This had resulted in deserters and traitors to the cause, thus allowing the manipulation of the people by the security forces. Resolutions were passed to retake the zones occupied by the military and to extend the radius of action to the neighboring departments of Lime, Junin, Cuzco, and Apurimac. They also resolved to develop more international contacts and addressed the need for an improved communications system.29 During 1983 Sendero began to be more active in the urban areas, stepping up attacks and bombings and increasing the frequency of blackouts. In addition to the operative cells, they established so-called "centers of resistance", or secret militias, in factories, universities and slums. 30 The inital urban Senderistas were untrained platoons of city dwellers led by trained insurgents from the countryside, but they became increasingly organized and effective and carried out well-coordinated maneuvers. Sendero also became increasingly effective at conducting simultaneous attacks in different sections of the county. This indicated an improvement in their communications systems. It was thought that they may have acquired a powerful radio transmitter which they used in conjunction with equipment captured in raids against police stations. As the military increased its effective control over Ayacucho and the surrounding areas, Sendero carried out its plans to spread their operations to other rural regions. They concentrated on exploiting the poor living conditions of the landless peasants in a strategy similar to the one they carried out in Ayacucho. However, they did not have the benefit of having carried out extensive preparation and political work as they had there. This led them to use more repressive rather than persuasive tactics to garner the support of the local populace. They used such tactics as attacks on peasant cooperatives, which were the sites of the most productive land where most of the families were landless. This was an attempt to pit the impoverished highland peasants against those with better land. All of the fronts were located in neglected and impoverished areas with little infra- structure to facilitate the effective deployment of security forces. Sendero's activities in urban areas, particularly Lima, increased significantly. There were 637 actions in Lima in 1983, and 1,398 in 1985.31 Actions consist of sabotage, propaganda, and bomb attacks against representatives of the "establishment" and "foreign imperialism" as well as assassination. Blackouts are used frequently to emphasize or celebrate certain events. The entire city of Lima was blacked out at midnight of the New Year of 1983, leading many Peruvians to comment that this was the first time in the history of Peru that something happened exactly on time! Blackouts were also used to mark the visits of the Pope and the President of Argentina, and to celebrate the birthday of Guzman. However, Sendero's use of propaganda is not generally in creating spectacular news events. They prefer to paint slogans on walls, distribute leaflets, and occupy schools to harangue the students. Sendero's campaign does include, however, attacks on domestic and foreign "symbolic institutions". Attacks on symbols of the establishment include government buildings, police stations, the international airport, hotels, Expensive restaurants, newspapers, "elitist" schools, state-owned businesses, big department stores, banks, and other objectives which represent power and privilege. Attacks on symbols of foreign imperialism include embassies: The U.S embassy nine times, the Chinese six times, the Soviet three times. U.S.-Peru and USSR-Peru cultural centers also have been targets as well as foreign-owned businesses such as Holiday Inn, Mercedes-Benz, Eastern Airlines, Fiat, Sears, Coca-Cola, Aeroflot, and many others. Assassinations are becoming more and more frequent. They have included congressmen, APRA party leaders, police, and members of the armed forces including an admiral and a retired admiral.32 Recently, a Yugoslavian manager was killed outside his factory, the first foreigner to be killed in the capitol.33 One institution which Sendero has not attacked is the Roman Catholic church. Many believe that the sentiments of the people, particularly the rural peasants, favor the Catholic church so strongly that Sendero would lose support if it attacked the church. However, they have used threats and other types of pressure to force many priests to leave their rural parishes, not having yet indulged in direct attacks on the institution. It is possible that, since the church is a special entity, it deserves special treatment which will take place in a later phase of the revolution.34 But this does not involve other churches. Sendero has attacked some Evangelical Protestant churches run by foreign missionaries, which they consider to be symbols of foreign interference in Peru. Then in June 1986 a spectacular event occurred. That month Senderistas in Lima's three major prisons staged uprisings in which they took control of the prisons and took hostages. These prisons, which held the majority of captured Senderistas, had been under the effective control of Sendero for some time, and most of the terrorism in Lima had been planned and controlled from there. The civil authorities in charge of the prisons had allowed the highly disciplined and organized Senderistas to take over many of the internal functions of running the prisons as "trustees". They had enjoyed virtual autonomy in parts of the jails, conducting political classes and engaging in military training, and had smuggled in dynamite, small arms, and homemade weapons. President Garcia gave the armed forces authority to quell the revolts, transferring authority to them from the civilian officials who ran the prisons. No significant e effort to negotiate was made, and the suppression of the revolts became a massacre. At Santa Barbara, the women's prison, the revolt was quickly put down with minimum casualties, but this was not repeated at the other two. At Lurigaucho, on the outskirts of Lima, an anti-terrorist unit of the Guarda Republicana stormed and took the prison, then killed over a hundred prisoners after they had surrendered. At El Fronton, an island prison, the marines were given the job of retaking it. Attacking against the well-entrenched prisoners armed with some small arms and many homemade weapons, the Marines blasted their way in with attack helicopters and direct fire weapons, reducing the buildings to rubble. One hundred and thirty-five prisoners were killed. These events, as well as the President's promise to punish those guilty of the massacres, were widely publicized in the world news media. Sendero has profited greatly from the resulting propaganda value, able to portray the government and the military as beastly violators of human rights. They have proclaimed the day of the uprisings as the "Day of Heroism" and the dead Senderistas as martyrs to their cause. 35 They promised to commemorate the occasion annually with acts of violence. Much attention has been focused recently on the operations of Sendero in the upper Huallaga River valley, in the department of San Martin. This is the major coca producing region in Peru, which is the world's largest exporter of unrefined coca. * Sendero actually began operating in this region as far back as 1980, when Senderistas settled in the region and began to grow coca. *Peru exports more raw coca than Colombia and Bolivia combined. The leaves are boiled down into a paste in Peru which is then transported to sites in Colombia where it is refined into cocaine. After a period of two years, they began to recruit and organize the coca growers to present a unified front against the police and the coca buyers, who were principally from Colombian drug gangs. This was a popular movement among the growers because it protected their plants from being destroyed by the police and allowed them to set their prices for the coca leaves. Sendero met with considerable resistence from the buyers and from the MRTA, another revolutionary group, and there were many violent confrontations.* Sendero eventually came to dominate most of the region through their superior organization, ruthlessness, tactics, and firepower. In the areas under their control, Sendero put an end to the alcohol and vice engendered by the easy money from the drug trade. Although they are involved in the trade, they are determined not to let their members become corrputed by it. They close discotheques and brothels, kill homosexuals, and expel the prostitutes. The presence of Sendero in the region became increasingly evident to the government, especially so when a police station was attacked by 200 armed men in May 1987.36 An emergency was declared in the zone and the *The MRTA is a foquista-style revolutionary group believed to be in Cuba. It specializes in sensational acts of terrorism and porpaganda and is believed to have 300-400 members. police presence increased, supported by some military operations. When the police or military forces intervene the Senderistas mix with the local populace or withdraw into less accessible areas. The local populace generally resents these incursions because the security forces often destroy the coca plants or otherwise interrupt the drug trade on which the economy of the villages depends. The end result is that they increasingly support Sendero. The area is particularly important for Sendero because it is estimated that over $600,000,000 a year flows through the region as a result of coca sales. If Sendero extracts a 5% cut, as they are believed to do, they could be garnering over $30,000,000 per year, which can purchase much support and many sophisticated weapons. Sendero has been increasing its relations with organizations external to Peru. Its main object appears to be to influence world opinion in its favor, and against the Peruvian government. It has some relations with the International Revolutionary Movement headquartered in London, a loose organization of radical leftist groups in Western Europe and the Americas.37 They assist in spreading Sendero and helped sponsor a Sendero radio program in Paris. Sendero has support from groups of university students in France, Spain, West Germany, Great Britain, and Sweden. Abimael Guzman's father-in-law lives in Sweden and uses it as a base for raising support for Sendero. There are some support groups in Berkeley and New York which assist in spreading Sendero pamphlets and other propaganda. * In Latin America, Sendero appears to have established relations with various revolutionary groups from other countries, primarily Colombia, Venezuela, Bolivia, Chile, and Argentina.+ There have been reports of meetings in Colombia and Bolivia with representatives of those groups, with attendees also from Cuba and Nicaragua. There are also reports of individuals from Argentina, Italy, Chile, and Colombian M-19 insurgents fighting alongside Senderistas in Peru. There is no doubt that Sendero has international aspirations. In their 1986 manifesto, Desarollar La Guerra Popular Sirviendo a la Revolucion Mundial, (Develop the Popular War Serving the World Revolution) they instruct their members to restrain their "sectarianism and *Organizations in the U.S. which have expressed support for Sendero (according to Peruvian Intelligence) include the Revolutionary Communist Party, and the Committee for Support of the Peruvian Revolution, address 2483 Hearst Ave., No. 225, Berkeley, CA 94079. +These include the Colombian M-l9, Argentine Montoneros, Ecuadorian Alfaro Vive, Chilean MIR, El Salvadorean Poor People's Guerrilla army. dogmatism" and seek support from outsiders.38 According to Peruvian sources, their objectives are to create an "Andean community" which will unite Andean Indian groups the length of Latin America and become the leaders of a new "international guerrilla army" which will inflame the whole of the hemisphere.39 It is unlikely, considering their dogmatism, that they will ally themselves with any mainstream communist countries or parties such as the Soviet Union, China or Cuba, but it is apparent that they are building relations with other revolutionary groups, particularly in neighboring countries. Although there are constant calls from the media and politicians in the opposition party for negotiations with Sendero, it is important to note that Sendero has no intentions of entering into negotiations with the government in any form. They pay no attention to such calls and have never responded to the numerous offers put forth in the media. They consider any dialogue with the existing power structure "chocolate with poison inside, a stupidity."40 Negotiations, for them, violates a fundamental principal: never surrender, to be at the mercy of the enemy and gamble at losing the destiny of the people for which they struggle. In the last eight years of its revolution, Sendero has been highly successful in some ways while failing in others. In contrast to the ill-fated revolutionaries of the 60's, Sendero's preparation, organization, impenetrability, and clandestine operation have contributed to continued successes against a state counterinsurgency campaign hampered by a lack of organization and resources. Following their increased use of terror and political violence, Sendero eroded some of the support base which they had constructed during their early years. The movement has not produced the worker-peasant alliance prevalent in their ideological rhetoric and has failed to achieve the polarization of the society into two extremes. The vast majority of Peruvians continue to support democratic alternatives to the revolution. The campaign of sabotage has not severely undermined the economy, although it has made some inroads. On the other hand, Sendero has proven itself to be tenacious and impossible to easily eradicate. Sendero seems to consider the phase of establishing the support bases complete and is moving into the phase of developing and exploiting them. It is important to consider that time in a calendar sense is not significant to them, as they measure the progress of revolution by events and do not have a timetable schedule. It doesn't matter if a phase takes five years or fifty years to complete. Victory, they believe, is inevitable. They claim to have established support bases in all departments of Peru, from the Ecuadorian to the Bolivian borders. 41 Their aims are now to consolidate the popular committees in the bases which will control them and serve as a foundation for a future higher governmental structure. Their further goals are: Political - Build the party by recruitment. - Build their presence in the urban areas to tie down more security forces. Economic - Destroy the present economy. - Create a new economy in the support bases based on barter. Social - Gain the support of the urban masses, especially in the pueblos jovenes (slums). Military - activate and deactivate guerrilla actions in different zones to spread the security forces more thinly. - Militarize more of their support groups, especially in Lima. - Step up operations in the Upper Huallaga and Apurimac (a line of communications center). 42 They have progressed more rapidly than they had thought, it seems, and may not be prepared for this new phase of developing the support bases and moving out of them to generalize the war. They have to recruit more troops and gain the support of more people in the countryside. However, it is one thing to support a revolution in and around one's village and quite another to sign up to attack the cities and fight for some esoteric ideal. Moreover, most of the young men have generally migrated from the countryside to the urban areas, both to escape being drafted by Sendero or the security forces into the conflict, and to find work. So there are serious obstacles to them coming out of the support bases. They will most likely put more emphasis on urban terrorism, and recruitment and organization in the cities. They are also likely to start becoming more open, attempting to infiltrate or influence organizations such as unions, trade and community organizations, and competing with other political parties. In the earlier stages of the insurgency, Sendero doctine postulated that the countryside is the principle arena and the city the complementary. Now they add but necessary, which is a significant change in their strategy. 43 Now, instead of "sweeping the countryside" and "killing the bad weeds", they are more likely to try persuasion as a means of gaining support. There will likely be fewer blackouts and more propaganda. A true revolutionary situation would exist in Peru only if the majority of the society wanted a fundamental change while an elite in power remained intransigent to their demands. This is not the case, as the democratic government, while having its problems, is responding to the perceived desires of the people as best it can. In this context, the chances for a successful revolution by Sendero appear slim. However, given its tenacity and fanatical dedication, the chances of its defeat in the near future also appear slim. The amount of time it had to build its support bases, the geography favorable to the insurgents, and the great gaps in social conditijons which still exist in Peru suggest that Sendero may be inerradicable. When and how the government will be able to accomplish that is a very large question remaining to be answered. Chapter III THE NATURE OF GOVERNMENT On July 28, 1980 Peru inaugurated 68 year-old President Fernando Belaunde Terry in a spirit of optimism. Formerly President from 1963-1968, Belaunde was returned to power after twelve years of military rule with an impressive 45% of the vote. The legitimacy of the new administration was bolstered by the fact that Peru's illiterates, about one-fourth of the population, were allowed to vote for the first time.1 The nation's ailing economy was showing signs of recuperation and the morale of Peru's 18 million citizens was buoyed by the restoration of democracy after a long period of military dictatorship. The economy left by the military regime was emerging from one of the worst recessions in Peru's history. A severe austerity program had eased the crisis in Peru's external deficit and the economy was growing again. But servicing the huge foreign debt still required more than half of Peru's export earnings; annual inflation rose to a rate of 61%, and less than half of the labor force was fully employed. Real wages were one-third lower than in 1973. This translated into widespread malnutrition and dramatic increases in disease and the rate of infant mortality. Belaunde promised massive public works and development projects to create a million new jobs while greatly increasing expenditures for education, health, and other social programs. The economic program that was to permit this would be based on a greater emphasis on private enterprise and free market forces. This strategy had recently produced a highly acclaimed "economic miracle" in Chile. Unfortunately, everything that could go wrong, did. The success of the open economy program depended too much on the vagaries of nature and the international market, and neither cooperated. The favorable markets for Peru's exports, which pulled the country out of recession in 1979, disappeared in 1981 as the world's developed economies slumped. A three year drought in the north was followed by another in the south in 1981. In 1983, the warm El Nino current invaded Peru's cold coastal waters wreaking havoc on the important fishing industry and bringing torrential rains which ravaged the normally dry coast. Floods destroyed houses, crops, washed away irrigation systems and roads, and severely damaged the oil industry. Inflation climbed more than 70% in 1981 and 1982 and was galloping at an annual rate of 150% by 1983. The government began to run large deficits, and turned to foreign bankers to obtain more loans to cover their expenditures. Along with economic crisis came increasing political problems. The soaring cost of living, reductions in subsidies, and other unpopular cost-cutting policies resulted in waves of strikes and other demonstrations. The nation's mass media, returned to private hands in one of the President's first official acts, attacked the regime from both the right and the left. Another factor that added to the Belaunde regime's woes: a sudden rash of terrorist acts marking the commencement of Sendero Luminoso's armed revolution. The early operations of Sendero -- raids on mining camps to steal dynamite and minor acts of sabotage, primarily in Ayacucho -- caused little concern in Lima. Some leftists attributed the bombings to right-wing groups who wanted to provoke the suppression of government critics, for Sendero often does not claim credit for individual incidents. The administration discounted the guerrilla threat and rejected early calls to use the army against Sendero. Belaunde feared that the struggle might degenerate into a "dirty war" like the war in Argentina in the 1970's when thousands of victims "disappeared". The government insisted that the insurgency could be eliminated by the Civil Guard, Peru's national police. But what are Peru's security forces and what was their condition in 1981? The police are divided into three services that have traditionally been distinct and institutionally competitive. The main component is the Guardia Civil, which is responsible for crime control, traffic control, and maintaining public order. The Guardia Republicana has the primary duty of security for public institutions and prisons. The Peruvian Investigative Police (PIP) is a plainclothes organization responsible for criminal investigation and intelligence gathering, similar to the FBI. Each of the services have elite units which are designed to combat subversion. The Guardia Civil has the Sinchi Battalion, the Guardia Republicana has the Llapan Atic (Quechua for all-powerful) squad, and the PIP has its Directorate of Counterterrorism (DIRCOTE).2 The police services are characterized by internal rivalries, professional jealousy, and contradictions in their organization. They are inadequately trained, badly equipped, under-paid, and profoundly corrupt. The population has little or no confidence in them, and they are one of the worst police organizations in Latin America.3 They have shown themselves basically incapable of dealing with the growing wave of crime in Lima, and have had little to no success in combatting Sendero Luminoso. One reason for the poor state of the police was their treatment under the 12 years of military rule. The military kept the police at a poorly paid and equipped level to prevent the rise of a potential rival authority. The military is conscious of this error and are now supporting the government's attempts to reorganize and improve the police. One example of their sad state illustrates this: In l985 the police in Lima possessed only 22 patrol cars to service the metropolitan area of over six million!4 In contrast to the police, the military forces are among the most modern, well-equipped and well-trained in Latin America. They are configured, however, to fight a conventional war, as they view the primary threat to national security as coming from Chile and Ecuador. They view these countries as their natural foes, as memories of wars fought with both of them are still strong. The army is the senior service, with about 85,000 personnel, and is equipped with a large amount of Soviet tanks, artillery, and helicopters. These were purchased by the military government in the 1970's, when the United States was reluctant to sell arms to a country with a military government. In contrast to armies in many other Latin American countries, the Peruvian army officer corps does not have strong ties to commercial interests or to the traditional governing classes. The majority of the officers, especially the younger ones, come from the middle or lower classes. This is one explanation for the moral conscience of the Velasco military government which instituted reforms breaking the power of the oligarchy and attempted to reduce some of the great social disparities in Peru. Although a more conservative faction took control of the army after the failure of most of the reforms, this conscience still exists in many officers. In their solutions to the social conditions which they strive to implement in combatting Sendero, they turn to the ideas of the Velasco government.5 The navy has about 27,000 personnel, which includes 3,600 marines. The Naval Service is considered an "exclusive career" for the sons of the upper classes, and its officers are almost exclusively white. It has always been the most conservative service and the most tied to the traditional ruling classes. Naval forces did not participate in the counterinsurgency campaigns of the 1960's, but are an integral part of the one against Sendero. They have had some difficulty adjusting to the unconventional warfare required, and, in some cases, the painful social realities of the Peruvian highlands. The air force is one of the best equipped and trained in Latin America, with a mix of U.S., Soviet, and French aircraft. It is basically an apolitical service; it does not participate in the counterinsurgency war, other than providing logistical support. The Peruvian military is nationalistic in the extreme, and considers themseves to be the depository and custodian of the national conscience. They have one of the most comprehensive military training systems in all of Latin America. It's apex is the Center for Higher Military Studies, where the economic potential and social welfare of the country are stressed as well as defense from external sources. Largely due to this, the military has come to see themselves as the defenders of all the people instead of just the ruling classes as has sometimes been the case in the past. In the army about 22% of the enlisted men are volunteers, with the rest conscripts. A small number of conscripts serve in the navy and the air force. The great majority of conscripts are Indian, many of them illiterate who speak only Quechua. Peru has universal conscription, but many exemptions, most of which do not apply to the poor, rural population. Many Indians benefit from their two-year stint, learning to speak Spanish and read and write. One characteristic of many Indian conscripts is their aggressiveness. "They are hard to restrain" one Peruvian officer said. "They are used to a hard life and conflicts between their village and others, so they think nothing of going into a strange village and abusing or even killing the people there. This, undoubtedly has led to some of the human rights auses by the military in the counterinsurgency campaign. In 1980, the capability of the police to maintain order, even in times of relative calm, was questionable. They were certainly not prepared to deal with the crisis presented by a well-organized Sendero threat. The normal Guardia Civil contingent in the Department of Ayacucho was ineffective in dealing with the insurgents and allowed them to occupy large areas which were simply abandoned by government and police representatives. After a few months of increasing Sendero activity, the government began to see that the problem was more serious than had been thought. President Belaunde began to attribute the actions to an alliance between drug traffickers and terrorists who received their ideology and support from abroad. In January 1981, the Interior Minister announced that a vast, anti-terrorism campaign would be conducted by a coordinated police effort supported logistically by the military. In March 1981 Decree 046, an anti-terrorist law, was passed in the legislature. Anyone convicted of terrorism was subject to a sentence of 25 years and a fine of up to $8,000. Police were allowed to detain suspects for up to 15 days without judicial interference. The legal definition of a terrorist was left deliberately vague in order to give the police broad discretion. A person could be considered a terrorist if found guilty of: 1. Provoking fear or terror among the general population. 2. Destroying public or private buildings, communication facilities, or pipelines. 3. Commiting acts that endanger life, health, or possessions of other people. 4. Making, acquiring, or storing firearms, explosives, or their ingredients. 5. Adversely affecting international relations or the security of the state. 6. Forming part of a band of three or more people who utilize terror to accomplish their objectives. 7. Using the news media to incite people to terrorism. 8. Speaking out publicly in favor of an act of terrorism or a terrorist.7 Throughout 1981 the battalion of about 1500 Sinchis deployed to Ayacucho and began operating against the insurgents. In October 1981, following a rash of Sendero attacks, the President proclaimed a state of emergency in five provinces of Ayacucho. This imposed a curfew and suspended constitutional guarantees against arbitrary search and seizure. Under the Peruvian constitution, a state of emergency may only be declared for 60 days, but constant renewal has maintained the area under this condition, as well as expanding it to other areas. Thousands of people were arrested in wide-sweeping dragnet operations. PIP operatives fanned out posing as students, peasants, and travellers attempting to gain intelligence. None of those measures seemed effective, however, as widespread abuses of human rights began to be reported and the population became caught in a crossfire between the police and Sendero. The situation worsened for the security forces in 1982, as the police were forced to abandon more of the countryside and retire to the cities, leaving Sendero in control. The police were forced into a defensive posture, attempting to protect strategic points such as key electrical towers, microwave transmission points and their own barracks. Sendero still seemed able to attack anywhere at will, however. Two incidents in 1982 which highlight the ineffectiveness of the police were the attack on the Ayacucho jail which freed all of the prisoners and the attack and occupation of Huanta, a city of 80,000 people, for 24 hours. Fighting at a tremendous disadvantage, there were increasing reports of police utilizing torture and other atrocities against suspected Senderistas. In addition, published accounts often accused police of being drunk in public, using their weapons to threaten, rather than protect the local citizenry, and soinetimes resorting to outright robbery, extortion, and rape. * The Sinchis became notorious for their brutality. As one Marine officer told me: The Sinchis were very bad. The people hated them and were afraid of them. By the time we arrived, they had become completely ineffective. We were unlucky to be wearing uniforms that looked a lot like theirs, so when the people saw us, they ran away or wouldn't have anything to do with us. We later changed uniforms, partly because of this.8 The inability of the police to deal with Sendero forced a reluctant President Belaunde, in December 1982, as a last resort, to order the military into the area. An expanded emergency zone of nine provinces was *Various human rights organizations and publications have printed many accusations of abuses by the police and military of innocent civilians. The Peruvian government claims that these accusations are greatly exaggerated because the organizations are infiltrated by Sendero sympathizers. It seems to me that both are correct. Abuses have occurred, and they have been exaggerated. put under military rule, with a political-military command headed by a general. The command coordinated the counterinsurgency effort by integrating police, military, and civilian irregular forces. There are numerous reasons for the lack of police success in combatting Sendero. There was little or no counterinsurgency training given to the bulk of the Guarda Civil, and they were severely hampered by the lack of efficient communications and transport systems. They were understaffed, and the government did not have the resources or place enough priority on strengthening them. They were victims of low salaries and poor morale. They had no effective intelligence network in the area, having concentrated their efforts on different groups organizing strikes and creating urban unrest. Finally there is the nature of the struggle and the dilemma of a counter- insurgency program regulated by the rules of a democratic constitution. This holds true for the entire campaign from its start to the present. The security forces were assigned immense amounts of very rugged territory to watch over against an enemy without a defined front. The guerrillas are able to hit and run, then disappear in the midst of a population with which the security forces, due to language and cultural barriers, have little or no comunication. The security forces have had to choose between paralysis under democratic law or combatting subversion by at times violating that law. Survival many times dictated the choice of the latter alternative. But all efforts against Sendero were not failures. A recently published article documents the successful struggle of two communities to keep Sendero out of their lives.9 The towns of Huancasancos and Sacsamarca are located two miles high in elevation in a narrow valley in the Andes mountains about 40 miles south of the City of Ayacucho. They are difficult to reach by narrow, twisting dirt roads which wind around the sides of mountains. The villagers are relatively wealthy by highland standards, having a commitment to their community which has enabled them to build schools and their own hydroelectric plant nearby. It was this way of life that the people rose up to defend against Sendero. Sendero began operating in the area in late 1981, beginning with meetings in the town square and then gradually moving in and tightening their hold over the villages. Their leader was Juan Lopez Liceras, who had been a teacher at the high school for four years. Sendero reorganized economic life. No one could own more than five head of cattle and 50 sheep, the rest were given to poorer families or slaughtered. The community cattle herd was greatly reduced and, because farmers were prohibited from working in the fields, food became scarce and families were reduced to eating one meal a day. The Senderistas told them that this was a time of war; because the cities had to be starved out from lack of food, they would have to make sacrifices. The climactic event occurred, however, when a well-to-do businessman and former mayor, highly respected in the community, was shot in front of the entire town. His wife was later dragged from a truck and stoned to death by Senderistas. The villagers rose up against Sendero not long after this. After several teachers and villagers opposed to Sendero were also killed, some men entered a room where two Sendero leaders were sleeping, beat them badly, and threw them out the window to the street below where accomplices finished them off. Sendero responded by sending a patrol and capturing 22 men. Some of them were tied up near a walk-in oven belonging to the village baker where Senderistas intended to bake them alive. One villager, however, had walked all night to the nearest military outpost about 20 miles away, and a unit of Sinchis was dispatched by helicopter from the headquarters in Ayacucho. Several Senderistas (and other villagers) were killed in a battle, and the remainder fled. Within a week the villagers elected new leaders and "pardoned" the young Senderistas who chose to return to the community. Two weeks later, the Senderistas returned, but the villagers fought them off. The leader, Liceras, was shot in the stomach then dragged out into the street by some women who pummelled him with rocks and stabbed him with knitting needles until he died. For the next several weeks the region was in a civil war as supporters and opponents of Sendero fought in the villages. In nearby Lucanamarca, Sendero publicly executed two villagers. Three days later a military unit arrived and killed a number of people. Then Sendero invaded the town, killing at least 60 people. Some were executed while others, including old men, women, and children, were killed with axes and knives while huddling in the church where they had sought sanctuary. Finally, the climactic battle for the region was fought between villagers reinforced by Sinchis and the Senderistas. In May 1983 a man who had been seized by Senderistas as they moved through the area escaped in the night and made his way to the village to warn them that the Senderistas were preparing an attack. About 60 or 70 villagers, accompanied by six Sinchis, crept up to the Senderista camp. There were about 300 of them, but only 15 or 20 were armed with rifles. The Villagers and Sinchis attacked them in a battle which lasted about 30 minutes, until the Senderistas fled in all directions. Although there were later reprisal attacks by Sendero against some villages, this was the turning point in the struggle for control of the region. The military' s strategy upon taking control of the region was for the army to occupy pacified and neutral territory while Sinchis and marines were given the responsibility of zones that were under Sendero control. The idea was to relieve the police forces of superfluous duties so that they could more effectively pursue the guerrillas. The military participated in a variety of civic action programs, offering food, medical attention, seeds, and protection to many rural villages. Before long, though, army units began to patrol regularly with police, and there was an upsurge of accusations about the use of systematic terror accompained by secret detention centers, disappearances, and executions. An important aspect of the counterinsurgency effort has been the formation of rondas campesinas, or peasant patrols, which serve as indigenous community self-defense forces. These patrols are largely involuntary in nature, with community members who refuse to join regarded as Sendero sympathizers. All male members between the ages of 12 and 60 are inducted, and sometimes women join the ranks. The members are generally not allowed to use firearms but are armed with spears, clubs, knives, hatchets, and slingshots. The patrols can consist of up to 250 members and the leaders are appointed by the security forces. They receive a short period of training at camps which can accomodate several patrols at once. The patrol's mission is to defend their villages and act as guides for the security forces, but the military encourages them to participate in actions at considerable distance from their communities. They are authorized to detain anyone suspected of guerilla involvement. Some communities have used these patrols to carry out raids against rival villages. Although the army rewards villages with civil defense forces with food and seed, the villagers also sometimes reward themselves with booty seized in the raids. The patrols have unfortunately, in many cases, added an additional element of violence to an already turbulent situation. The marines arrived in Ayacucho in 1983 with little training and no experience in counterinsurgency warfare.10 Since they had not participated in the counterinsurgency campaigns of the 1960's, the army felt that it was time for them to do their share and gain some experience in this type of conflict. A reinforced company of about 350 men in size, they were assigned the provinces of Huanta and La Mar as their area of operations. These were areas that were considered to be under the control of Sendero. The adjustment to the terrain and the unconventional style of warfare was difficult. As one officer stated: We had a hard time at first. We didn't know what we we're doing, and there was a lot of confusion. We had to take some drastic measures sometimes. The altitude was very hard to get used to. We lived and operated at altitudes above 10,000 feet all of the time. I lost twelve kilo,s on my first deployment." The marines established bases at the main line of communication centers in the towns of San Jose, Huanta, Huamangilla, and Tambo, and began patrolling aggressively. They developed a reputation for ferocity in their actions against Sendero and brutality in their treatment of civilians. This was undeserved, though, according to the marines I interviewed. They simply did not have the time or personnel to devote to public relations and did not grant interviews. Thus, there were many unjust accusations printed about them in the press. The marine commanders rapidly learned what tactics worked the best in this new warfare. They included medical personnel on all of their patrols, laden with medicine and food to distribute to the villagers. Civil defense units were formed in all of the villages in their area and used as a source of intelligence, to check the movements of all the villagers. The civil defense forces were given weapons, trained in security procedures, and helped construct defenses in and around their villages. The marines used helicopters for aerial observation and to leapfrog their units into areas to cut off and surround known Sendero units. The use of helicopters had its own hazards, as one marine commented: We were using army Bell 212's which were not designed to operate at those altitudes. The pilots flew with all of the alarms on all of the time, and there were several crashes. The army later acquired Bell 214's, which performed better at that altitude, but by then the Senderistas had become wise to their use and kept their forces more dispersed, hence harder to locate. The new helicopters were an important means of resupplying units on patrol, however, because of the prohibitive terrain. More emphasis was placed on foot patrolling, especially at night. Flack jackets were worn initially, but soon discarded as too heavy in the high altitudes. The company of marines deployed to the Emergency Zone is made up of three platoons, which are replaced from lowland bases every three months. This is necessary because of the rigors of the terrain and altitude and the stress of unconventional warfare. The platoons are put together two months before their deployment to the highlands and together undergo a six-week counter- insurgency training course. While in the emergency zone, the military personnel do not use their real names so as to avoid reprisals on themselves and their families. After two years the marines considered that they had their assigned area under control and had the firm support of the population. Then, in a reorganization of the forces in the Emergency Zone, they were moved to an area along the Apurimac River, along the border between the Departments of Ayacucho and Cuzco. An indication of the support they had gained from the local populace was that a delegation of townspeople from Huanta travelled to the military headquarters in Ayacucho to petition that the marines be allowed to stay in their area. Their location along the Apurimac River was designed to interdict the movement of Senderistas between Cuzco and Ayacucho. Since Cuzco was not included in the Emergency Zone, the guerrillas used it as a sanctuary at times. This was a more difficult area to operate in because of the dense jungle which covered most of the terrain. They were more successful than they realized at first, however, because after a few months about 300 Senderistas who had been cut off from their supplies by the move and were starving, surrendered. The turning point in the conflict in Ayacucho, most of the military leaders felt, occurred in 1984. A meeting of Sendero's top leaders in the area was held in a town near Cavitos, the army's principal base in Ayacucho. A defector notified the army, who surrounded the town and captured or killed them all. Sendero activities declined substantially after this.* In January 1984, General Adrian Huaman Centero took command of the Emergency Zone. He was a native of the highlands, spoke Quechua, and put an end to many abuses, as well as putting together an ambitious and imaginative development program. In short order he gained the popular support of the local inhabitants and the loyalty of his troops. Ayacucho recovered much of its previous normality, there was a long period of calm, and Sendero was practically dislocated from the city. However, Huaman made himself unpopular with the higher military command and with the government by sharply criticizing their policies and not supporting his programs. In an interview he stated: The solution for Ayacucho is not military, but the reversal of 160 years of abandonment. Here the solution is not military, because if it were, if the issue were to kill everyone in Ayacucho, I could solve it in half an hour.... We are talking about human beings, about forgotten people who have been making *Most Peruvian officers I interviewed felt that 1984 was the year they began to gain control of the majority of the Emergency Zone, and than this battle was the beginning of that. demands for 160 years without getting anyone's attention, and now we are reaping the results. 11 Shortly after this interview General Huaman was relieved of command. The Belaunde government was so economically constrained that allocation of all of the funds he requested for Ayacucho was not feasible, and Huaman was, in effect, admitting a governmental failure to overcome the guerrillas. 1984 proved to be a bad year for the Belaunde government and for Peru. The IMF austerity programs instituted by his administration in order to gain new loans prevented spending in the highlands to improve the quality of life there. The national budget dedicated a full one-third to service the foreign debt, 25% was allocated to the military, while only a total of 15% was allowed for all social services, including health, education, and housing.12 The investment-starved Peruvian economy was near collapse and the purchasing power of the people fell to a level of the mid-1960's. Poor people suffered painfully and the middle class suffered a painful erosion of its standard of living. The IMF medicine had almost killed the patient. In 1985 Peruvians were ready for a change in political leadership and national direction. Hence, in May Alan Garcia, leader of tha APRA party, garnered 53% of the vote to become, at age 36, the youngest chief executive in the Western Hemisphere. In his inauguration, Garcia announced a series of sweeping reforms that would bolster the economy and aid in the struggle against Sendero. The police forces would be purged and reorganized, the military would be held fully accountable for any excesses and abuses of authority, and a peace commission would be established to explore alternative solutions to the Sendero problem. There would be an increase in public expenditures and development programs for the rural areas. These would be financed by an economic program that rejected orthodox austerity and would reactivate the economy through increased consumer spending. Garcia further announced that he would restrict payments on foreign debts to no more than 10% of export earnings. Although this was actually more than the Belaunde government had paid the previous year, it was a politically popular statement and had repercussions among other Latin American debtor countries. The President wasted little time in taking on the military. Following the disclosure of a massacre of 40 civilians by military troops in a counterinsurgency operation, Garcia dismissed the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the two top ranking officers in the emergency zone. He went on to reduce the military budget, reducing the order of 26 French Mirage 2000 aircraft to 12, which saved hundreds of millions of dollars. He also took rapid action in reforming and reorganizing the police forces. One of the first laws passed by his government authorized the reorganization of the police forces under the direction of a commision headed by the interior minister. By February 1986, the three national police forces were placed under one director, and 1700 police had been fired, including 70 generals.* Police training was reorganized, and better trained replacements upgraded the quality of the forces. The Peace Commission created by the President was less than successful. In seeking a dialogue with the insurgents, they have been ineffective as Sendero steadfastly refuses to participate in any talks and denounces the Garcia government as a continuation of previous oppressive governments. It has heightened its attacks against political figures, killing more than 250 APRA party leaders and members during the first two years of APRA administration *The fired policemen presented another problem. They were bitter and unemployed, and many still possessed their weapons and badges. Lima saw a huge increase in kidnappings for ransom, which many attributed to ex-policemen. In 1987, the Peruvian congress mandated a minimum imprisonment of 18 years for persons convicted of terrorism. 13 Few suspected terrorists have been brought to trial, however, and if done so, have generally been freed. Judicial authorities, lawyers, and witnesses all fear reprisals by terrorists. The government has authorized special tribunals, with secure courtrooms inside prison walls, and judges and prosecutors promised heavy police protection and double salaries. But there has been no rush of volunteers for the new program. But the reorganization and upgrading of the police forces and better cooperation with the military has seen some positive results. When Sendero stepped up its actions in Peru in 1986 in the southernmost department which borders on Bolivia, the security forces were ready for them. During the first few months the armed forces limited themselves to surveillance, and then decided to try preemptive moves rather than react, which had been the normal mode of operation. The military preferred, in this case, not to participate at the operational level, chosing to support operations at the intelligence and logistical level. The operation was to be directed by the Antisubversive Tactical Unit (UTA), created from all three police forces in the police reorganization. Its command gave priority to obtaining intelligence and remaining highly mobile. It also stressed the principle that local residents are allies, not enemies. The operational police units carried light weapons and mixed uniformed with plainclothed personnel. The police commanders met with local representatives of the church and trade organizations, the National Agrarian Confederation and the Sole Agrarian Organization. They also held meetings with the authorities of the predominant political party in the region. The rules of conduct were made clear and the police gained the support and assistance of the people. Within a few months the UTA determined the boundaries of Sendero activities and the center of their operations. Four Sendero columns numbering up to 200 guerrillas operated in the region supported by some groups of peasants. Sendero had sat up rudimentary support bases and divided the territory into "operation zones" and "guerrilla zones". Using good intelligence, remaining mobile, and moving quickly, the UTA was able to deploy its men at any point which was identified as a center of Sendero action or influence. In this way, by February 1987, Sendero saw its field of action narrowed to its original starting point. In April, a Senderist column assassinated the mayor of San Juan de Salinas. The local residents strongly objected to this and the Senderists were forced to retreat. The police tracked them, setting up a cordon around the area they were in and cutting off the rail service they were using as transport. On 18 April, after a three hour battle, the seven members of the last Sendero column were killed. The police found documents on them which enabled them to make arrests in other Departments. Thus, police, military, and civil organizations combined to produce a successful operation which considerably weakened Sendero's "Regional Committee of the South."14 Peru's economy has not had the same success. In June of 1987 President Garcia nationalized the banks and lending institutions to "stop the flight of capital from the country." This provoked a storm of protest and has promoted a resurgence of conservative political groups which were discredited after the failures of the Belaunde administration. Defaulting on IMF loans, Peru has cut itself off from that agency's loans and branded itself a pariah in the international financial community. A recent article in The Economist characterized Peru's economy as "one of the two worst in Latin America" because of its insurmountable foreign debt proglems and its disastrous policies. 15 Garcia has had to retreat from some of his original sweeping policies and now promises "selective growth" which involves reducing subsidies to all industries except food, clothing, housing and exports. In a January 1988 interview with the Lima newspaper El Comercio, President Garcia outlined his views on the insurgency and what it will take to defeat it.16 He begins by saying: The tragic thing is that we Peruvians refuse to accept that this is a war, that it will last a long time, and that no matter how many weapons we have, no one can put an end to it right away. He goes on to outline the measures that he believes Peru must take: We face a long hard struggle, but we must constantly strive to grapple with the under- lying problems that help explain subversion, through vigorous support for communal agriculture and the development of agriculture -livestock and agroindustrial production, through the expansion of social services for health, education, and housing in the mountains and in the slums, through steady growth in income and employment for the poorest, through the decentralization of the state, economic development in the interior, and the regionalization of the country. If we want to combat subversion with the participation of the people, then we must expand and strengthen democratic institutions and methods. Indeed, the development of social and political democracy is the best tool for confronting terrorism. But this entails social changes that the privileged groups refuse to accept. They do not realize that if profound changes are not made, not only society and the democratic system, but they themselves are in danger. I believe that we are advancing gradually in the struggle against terrorism. The intelligence services are carrying out their activities with increasing efficacy. The Armed Forces, on the other hand, in the areas where they intervene, are becoming more successful at ensuring adherence to democratic and human standards in the exercise of repression. I think we should improve the legal norms that govern the functions of judges and the protection of these officials, while also clarifying the norms governing the arrest, prosecution, and punishment of terrorists. As I have said before, I think that those responsibile for the mass media have a decisive role to play in this area, and I trust that they will fulfill it autonomously but responsibly. The armed forces also know that the principal factors which have aided in the growth of the insurgency are social, not political, and that the remedy is to change those social conditions. They also are aware that their conventional weapons will never completely defeat the insurgents. As one senior military officer put it: We can and are beating Sendero militarily, but there is another aspect in which we are not winning: the political and psychological one. We are not getting the resources we need to correct the causes of the war. It is going to take very radical means to win this war, a greater political cost than this government is willing to pay. Some newspapers, which actively support the terrorists, would have to be closed. Some people may be hurt. The ideology of the forces that fight the terrorists must be as great as theirs. Our ideology, out morale, is low because of the lack of support from the government.17 In 1990 the next presidential election will occur. President Garcia cannot run because the constitution prohibits two consecutive terms. There is belief in some circles that he will not relinquish power easily, that he will attempt to hold on to the presidency through a constitutional amendment or other means. There is some evidence that APRA is building an armed security force of its own, for purposes which are not clear. This, together with severe economic problems Peru is facing, the ever-present possibility of a military coup, and the fanatical tenaciousness of Sendero Luminoso, present an uncertain future for Democratic institutIons in Peru. Although President Garcia has attempted to rectify many of the problems that plagued his predecessors, there seems to be little that attests to an improved effectiveness of counterinsurgency operations under his leadership. Although there are isolated success stories like the one in the Department of Puno, the security forces seem at best to be containing the insurgency rather than eradicating it. The grim situation in the highlands has been worsened by the flight of most of the young population to Lima. Not only has this reduced the available labor supply in a place where it is desperately needed, but it has exacerbated an already critical situation of urban migration. The President has a bound notion and an optimistic vision of the state of the counterinsurgency campaign. Much depends, however, on his ability to get the economy back on track and on the ability of APRA, the military, and the police forces to overcome their historical antipathy toward each other and work together, as they did in Puno, to mount an effective counterinsurgency campaign. Chapter IV CONCLUSIONS The Sendero Luminoso rebellion is in many ways the result of a historical process in Peru of periodic revolt of the impoverished, but majority, periphery against the group in power in the center. Indian groups opposed Incan rule emanating from Cuzco before the Spanish Conquest, and Incan and Quechua groups opposed Spanish rule centered in Lima through a series of rebellions that sought to restore Indian leadership. Attempts to redress, the grievances of the periphery groups, have historically met with little success. Ironically, Sendero rose at a time when government was becoming more sensitized to the needs of the lower classes, or periphery, and it was able to take advantage of a more tolerant reformist attitude of the government. Sendero is also unique in some ways. It is fighting not merely to redress some grievances, but for the total overthrow of the system. It is a full blown rural rebellion guided by Communist principle which consciously and quite proudly follows the principles and practices of MAO, but depends largely on the guiding thought of its fanatical leader. It's leadership was willing to take the long view and work side by side with the Indians and educate them for many years before beginning the violent stage of the revolution. Sendero is also unique in the circumstances of its development, which are unlikely to be repeated easily. It emerged in a period when social and economic circumstances were worsening while expectations were rising. Its leaders came from a local university dedicated to helping its own region and people, and had the charismatic presence of a teacher and leader in Abimael Guzman. The region was relatively isolated culturally, geographically, and politically from the governmental center. It is unlikely that Sendero Luininoso could have had such success without these special circumstances. Peruvian governments were beginning to address the grievances of the impoverished Indians, although they were moving slowly due to economic difficulties. The irony is that now the people for whom Sendero professes to be fighting are caught in a seemingly endless cycle of violence which will impede even further any attempts to raise their standard of living. Sendero is not presently a threat to the existence of the Peruvian state, but can continue to be violently disruptive. They are a serious threat to the existence of a fragile democracy. It is also unlikely that the Sendero Luminoso rebellion is transportable to other countries. It is an essentially Peruvian phenomenon. Sendero's fanaticism has located it on the far extreme of leftist politics. It does, however, seem to be developing ties with other revolutionary groups which should be watched closely by Western intelligence agencies. While Sendero has not been able to generalize the war, they have certainly not been eradicated or are anywhere close to defeat. They firmly believe that time is on their side and that they will ultimately triumph. Time will certainly be required to bring an end to this insurgency, time and many more resources than are dedicated to it now. The security forces have proven capable of dealing with Sendero militarily, but they are aware that this is not the solution. The principal factors that led to the birth and growth of the insurgency are social, and these must be addressed to achieve success in a counterinsurgency program. The successes achieved in Ayacucho under General Huaman and in the campaign in Puno have generally not been repeated elsewhere, and accusations of human rights violations continue. Much depends on the future ability of the Peruvian government to get its economy healthy again and address the needs of its people. END NOTES INTRODUCTION 1. One must take into account the political leanings of Peruvian newspapers and news magazines when reading their articles. Peru has complete freedom of the press, and most publications have a definite political bias in their writings. One Lima newspaper, El Diario de Marca, publishes articles sympathetic to Sendero and is widely believed to have connections to the insurgents. II. THE NATURE OF SOCIETY 1. Richard F. Nyrop, Peru: A Country Study, ed. (American University Foreign Area Studies, 1980), p. xiv. 2. Ibid. 3. David Scott Palmer, The Sendero Luminoso Rebellion in Rural Peru, in Latin american Insurgencies, ed. Georges Fauriol (Georgetown University Center for Strategic and International Studies, 1985), p. 72. 4. David P. Werlich, Peru: Ashort History. (Southern Ill. University Press, 1978), pp.16-17. 5. Raymond Bonner, "Peru's War", New Yorker, Vol. LXIII, No. 46, January 4, 1988. 6. Werlich, pp. 197-198. 7. Richard Gott, Guerrilla Movements in Latin America, (London, Nelson and Sons Ltd., 1970). 8. Nyrop, p. 37. 9. George D. Philip, The Rise and Fall of the Peruvian Military Radicals, (Athlone press, London 1978). Contains a detailed examination of the successes and failures of the military government. 10. Cynthia McClintock, "Why Peasants Rebel: The Case of Peru's Sendero Luminoso," World Politics, No. 37, October 1984. II. THE NATURE OF THE INSURGENCY 1. Manuel Jesus Granados, "El PCP Sendero Luminoso: Aproximaciones a su Idealogia" Socialismo Y Participacion, March 1987 p.3. 2. Carlos Ivan Degregori, Sendero Luminoso: Los Hondos y Mortales Desencuentros, Document presented to the seminar "Social Movements in Latin America". United Nations University - Latin American Council of Social Sciences, Lima, January, 1985. 3. John M. Baines, Revolution in Peru: Mariategui and the Myth, (University of Alabama Press, 1972), p.13. 4. Through some Peruvian officers with whom I came in contact I was able to obtain some declassified Peruvian Naval Intelligence documents, which included three pamphlets published by Sendero. These are: Desarollamos La Guerra De Guerillas 1981 (Let Us Develop the Guerrilla War) Viva La Dia De La Heroicidad 1986 (Long Live the Day of Heroism) Desarollar La Guerra Popular Sirviendo A La Revolucion Mundial, August 1986 (Develop the Popular War Serving the World Revolution). 5. Desarollamos La Guerra De Guerillas, p.2 0. 6. Ibid., p.24. 7. Granados, p. 3. 8. Ibid., p.4. 9. Peruvian Naval Intelligence estimate, 1985. 10. Lewis Taylor "Maoism in the Andes: Sendero Luminoso and the Contemporary Guerrilla Movement in Peru" (working paper) Liverpool: Codeprint 1983 p.19. 11. Taylor, p.l2. 12. Caretas Feb 11, 1988 and Navy Intelligence estimates. 13. Quehacer, Sept-Oct, 1987 in FBIS 28 January 1988. 14. Raul Gonzales, "Especial Sobre Sendero" Quehacer August, 1984. 15. Ibid., p. 29. 16. Philip Bennett, "Corner of the Dead" Atlantic, May 1984, p.28. 17. James Anderson, Sendero Luminoso: Un Nuevo Modelo Revolucionario, London Institute of Terrorism Studies, London, 1987, p.26. 18. Granados, p.6. 19. Ibid., p.6. 20. Jeanne Dequine, "The Challenge of the Shining Path," The Nation, 239:610-13, 8 December 1984, p.6l3. 21. David P. Werlich, "Peru: The Shadow of the Shining Path" Current History, 83:78-82, February 1984. 22. Ronald H. Berg, "Sendero Luminoso and the Peasantry of Andahualayas",Journal of Interamerican Studies and World Affairs. Spring, 1987, p.179. 23. DiGregori, p.42. 24. Granados, p.4. 25. Ibid., p.4. 26. Mario Vargas Llosa "Inquest in the Andes," New Times Magazine, 31 July 1983. 27. "In Peru, A Loss of Human Rights," New York Times, 24 January 1985. 28. Interviews with Peruvian Officers at Quantico. 29. Julio C. Gaitan, "Congreso de Sendero: Abimael Reaparece" Equis X, 11 April 1983. 30. Julio C. Gaitan, "Sendero Cerca Lima," Equis X, 28 May 1984. 31. Anderson, p.36. 32. Ibid., p. 37. 33. "Peruvian guerrillas Kill Yugoslav Factory Boss" The Washington Times, 11 April 1988. 34. Granados, p.7. 35. Viva La Dia De La Heriocidad, 1986. This document eulogizes the Senderistas killed in the prison uprisings. 39. FBIS 28 January 1988. 40. Peruvian Naval Intelligence Estimates. 41. Desarollar... p.54. 42. Peruvian Naval Intelligence Estimate. 43. Granados, p.6. 44. Desarollar... p.13. 45. Peruvian Naval Intelligence Estimate. 46. Desarollar... p.13. III. THE NATURE OF GOVERNMENT 1. David P. Werlich, "Peru: Shadow of the Shining Path" Current History, 83:78-82 February 1984. 2. Nyrop, pp.237-239. 3. Anderson, p.29. 4. "Peru's Civilian Ruler Calls in Troops to Calm Lima," Washington Post, 24 February 1986. 5. Anderson, pp. 25-29. 6. Interviews with Peruvian officers in the U.S. 7. America's Watch, Abdicating Democratic Authority, (Washington D.C. America's Watch Committee, 1984), p.32. 8. Interview with Peruvian Marine Officer at Quantico. 9. Raymond Bonner, "Peru's War" New Yorker, Vol. LXIII, No. 46:31-58, 4 Jan 1988. 10. This account is based on interviews with Peruvian Marine Officers at Quantico. 11. FBIS, 29 August 1984. 12. America's Watch, p.16. 13. David P. Werlich, "Peru: Garcia Loses His Charm" Current History, 87:13-16, February, 1987. 14. FBIS, 24 February 1988. 15. "Argentina and Peru, Two Kinds of Trouble," The Economist, March 26, 1988, pp. 61-62. 16. FBIS, 8 March 1988. 17. Interview with a senior Peruvian officer. BIBLIOGRAPHY A. SPANISH/PERUVIAN SOURCES Anderson, James. Sendero Luminoso: Un Nuevo Modelo Revolucionario? London Institute of Terrorism Studies, London, 1987. A brief study, in Spanish, of the insurgency, the counterinsurgency campaign, and the prospects for the future. It is a good source of information on the urban terrorism carried out by Sendero and the capabilities of the security forces to counteract it. Digregori, Carlos Ivan. Sendero Luminoso: Los Hondas y Mortales Desencuentros. _________. Sendero Luminoso: Lucha Armada y Utopia Autoritaria. Documents presented to the seminar "Social Movements in Latin America," United Nations University -- Latin American Council of Social Sciences, Lima. January 1985. These two papers are a two-part study of Sendero's origins at the University of Huamanga and the first three years of armed conflict. The author, a Peruvian social anthropologist, was a professor at the University of Huamanga through most of the 1970's. "El Socorro de Sendero." Caretas, January 11, 1988. This article, in a popular weekly Peruvian news magazine, describes the "Socorro Popular" or popular support group which supports Sendero operations in Lima. Gaitan, Julio C. "Congreso de Sendero: Abimael Reaparece." Equis X, 11 April 1983. This article, in a Peruvian news magazine, describes the congress of Sendero in March, 1983, and the decisions which were made there. This was the last known appearance of Guzman. The author does not identify his sources. ________. "Sendero Cerca Lima," Equis X, 28 May 1984. This article describes the increased emphasis on urban terrorism carried out by Sendero, especially in Lima. Gonzales, Raul. "Especial Sobre Sendero" Quebacer, August 1984. In a monthly Peruvian magazine, this is an extensive article on the strategy and tactics of Sendero. It references Sendero pamphlets, and interviews with Sendero sympathizers. Granados, Manuael Jesus. "El P.C. P. Sendero Luminoso: Aprokimaciones a su Ideologia." Socialismo Participacion, March 1987. This is an extensive article on Sendero's ideology and strategy. The author wrote his thesis on Sendero Luminoso at the University of Huamanga in 1981, and knew some of the Sendero leaders personally. Peruvian Naval Intelligence Estimates. Author unknown. Through some Peruvian Marine officers studying in the Washington, D.C. area, I was able to obtain some copies of three declassified Naval Intelligence estimates on Sendero Luminoso. Although somewhat dated, they provided valuable information on the directions the insurgency is taking and Sendero's relations with groups outside of Peru. Sendero Luminoso. 1981. This pamphlet, and the two following, are propaganda pamphlets published by Sendero. They are liberally sprinkled with quotations from MAO and other Communist phraseology exhorting the Peruvian people to rise up against the government. This particular one concentrates on the validity of their cause and the need for developing a guerrilla war. _______. Viva La Dia de la Heroicidad, 1986. This pamphlet eulogizes the "martyrs" killed in the prison uprisings of June, 1986 and accuses the government of "genocide". _______. Desarollar La Guerra Popular Sirviendo A La Revolucion Mundial. August 1986. This pamphlet goes into great detail on the successes of Sendero and the faults of the government. It also signals an important change in Sendero's strategy by urging its followers to be more open to other groups which have the same goal of world revolution. Interviews with Peruvian military officers. Several Peruvian Naval and Marine officers in the Washington, D.C. area were interviewed and were invaluable sources of information. Some of the information was rather sensitive in nature, and a few of the officers were in the U.S. due to the current threat to their lives in Peru. For these reasons the officers are not identified by name. The general attitude received from the officers was that they have very capable forces which can handle the insurgents militarily, but they lack adequate resources to deal with the social and economic problems which are the root causes. They are generally critical of the Garcia government for not supporting them and addressing the problems adequately. Another important point they brought out was that fewer and fewer Peruvian officers are training in the U.S. This is due to lack of funds both from Peru and U.S. aid programs. More and more, however, are receiving training in the Soviet Union, which has a very liberal aid program for Peru. B. ENGLISH SOURCES 1. Books Baines, John M. Revolution in Peru: Mariatequi and the Myth, University of Alabama Press, 1972. Baines traces the development of the Peruvian Communist Party, its origins in Mariategui's writings, and its zenith in the aborted revolutions of the 1960's. Bejar, Hector. Peru 1965: Notes on Guerilla Experience. Monthly Review Press, London 1969. Written from prison, this is a first-hand account of the attempted revolution of the Ejercito de Liberacion Nacional (National Liberation Army). This was a foco-style Communist revolution led by Bejar in the 1960's. Gott, Richard. Guerrilla Movements in Latin America. London, Nelson and Sons, Ltd. 1970. This contains an excellent section on the Peruvian Communist revolutions of the 1960's. The author is sympathetic to the rebels, claiming in the introduction that he would have joined them if he weren't writing about them. Nyrop, Richard F. Peru: A Country Study. American University Foreign Area Studies, Washington, D.C. U.S. Government Printing Office, 1981. An excellent overview of Peru and its history, society, economy, politics, and armed forces. Required reading for anyone studying Peru. Philip, George D.E. The Rise and Fall of the Peruvian Military Radicals 1968-1976. University of London. Athlone Press 1978. An examination of the revolutionary military government headed by General Velasco which came to power in a coup in 1968. The author concludes that although it succeeded in its aimes of destroying the oligarchy and creating a large state sector, its economic failures, the health of its leader, and divisions within the Peruvian Officer Corps resulted in its downfall and the removal of the radical element from the Peruvian military. Werlich, David P. Peru: A Short History. Southern Illinois University Press, 1978. An outstanding study of Peruvian history, concentrating mostly on 20th Century events. Dr. Werlich has also written a series of articles used extensively in this study. 2. Periodicals and Publications America's Watch. Abdicating Democratic Authority. America's Watch Committee, Washington, D.C. 1984. This publication details alleged human rights abuses in Peru by the security forces and takes the position that the government basically gave them license to do whatever they pleased. Amnesty International. Peru Briefing. London, Amnesty International Publications, 1985. This is another publication which strongly criticizes the Peruvian government and security forces for human rights abuses which include beatings, torture, rape, and extrajudicial executions. It uses as sources peruvian news articles and interviews with Peruvian citizens. Bennet, Philip. "Corner of the Dead." The Atlantic. 253:28-30. May 1984. This provided some good background material on Ayacucho. Berg, Ronald H. "Sendero Luminoso and the Peasantry of Andahualayas." Journal of Interamerican Studies and World Affiars 51:165-197, Spring 1987. A good, detailed examination of the effect of the insurgency on the lives of Peruvians in the Department of Andahualayas, next to Ayacucho. Bonner, Raymond. "Peru's War." The New Yorker, Vol LXIII, No. 46: 31-58, 4 January 1988. An excellent article with good background information and detailed interviews with Peruvians from Ayacucho peasants to President Garcia. The author appears to take some literary license to make it more readable, but it is a good description of the insurgency and the government's problems in dealing with it. Candelaria, M. "Jose Carlos Mariategui: Forgotten Forerunner of Liberation Theology" Christ Century, 104:885-7, 14 October 1987. Although not used in this study, this is an intriguing view of the theories of Mariategui and their application to Christianity. Dequine, Jeanne. "The Challenge of the Shining Path." The Nation, 239:610-13, 8 December 1984. Brings out Sendero' s ruthlessness in its tactics. "Embattled in Peru." World Press Review 34:39 May 1987. Highlights the problems the government is having in dealing with the economy and the insurgency. "Excessive Force." Time 128:40 8 July 1986. An account of the Sendero-inspired prison uprisings and their violent suppression. Foreign Broadcast Information Service/Joint Publications Research Service. These are U.S. Government publications which reprint news articles and radio and television broadcasts from foreign sources. FBIS reports are published daily, and JPRS bi-monthly, and have had numerous articles on Peru and the actions of Sendero. The isues which were the most useful are listed. JPRS 28 January 1988 from Quehacer Sep-Oct 1987. Describes the relationship of Sendero with the coca growers in the Upper Huallaga River Valley. JPRS 24 February 1988 from Debate No. 47, November 1987. Details the successful government campaign in Puno which captured or killed a large number of Senderistas. FBIS 8 March 1988 from El Comericio, 10 Jan 1988. Report of an interview with President Garcia in which he outlines his administration's achievements and plans. Lager, K. "Caught in the Crossfire of a Deadly War" Macleans 98:42, 25 February 1985. McCormick, Gordon H. The Shining Path and Peruvian Terrorism. The Rand Corporation, As 86 R28 no. 7297 January 1987. A good overview of the insurgency. Concludes that Sendero has probably reached its technical and tactical ceiling. McLintock, Cynthia. "Sendero Luminoso: Peru's Maoist Guerrillas" Problems of Communism, Vol. 32, No. 5, September-October 1983. _________. Why Peasants Rebel: The Case of Peru's Sendero Luminoso." World Politics 37:48-84. October 1984. The author is a recognized authority on Sendero, having spent a great deal of time in Peru, and is referenced by almost every other writer on the subject. She contends that the reason the peasants support the insurgency was a crisis of subsistence in the southern highlands. Palmer, David Scott. "Rebellion in Rural Peru: The Origins and Evolution of Sendero Luminoso." Comparative Politics, Vol. 18, No. 2, January 1986. The author contends that Sendero emerged out of a very special set of events and conditions which are not easily comparable to other insurgencies. "Peru's Angry Young President." World Press Review, 33:22-7, August 1986. An examination of President Garcia's economic and political struggles. "Peru's Bad Boy is Starting to Look Like a Desperate Man." business Week. 87:55, 17 August 1987. A critique of President Garcia"s nationalization of Peru's Banks. "Peruvian guerrillas Kill Yougoslav Factory Boss." The Washington Times, 11 April 1988. This is one of many newspaper articles which have appeared over the past few years on Sendero's actions. It is significant because it is the first instance in which they have killed a foreigner. "Peru's Rebels Flame Out," Newsweek. 107:42, 30 June 1986. An account of the Sendero prison riots. Roett, R. "Peru: The Message From Garcia." Foreign Affairs 64:274-86, Winter 1985/86. A discussion of Peruvian economic policies, particularly President Garcia's decision to limit foreign debt payments and its consequences. Taylor, Lewis. "Maoism in the Andes: Sendero Luminoso and the Contemporary Guerilla Movement in Peru." Working Paper, Liverpool, England: University of Liverpool Center for Latin American Studies, 1983. An excellent source on the ideology of Sendero Luminoso. "Two Kinds of Trouble." The Economist. Vol 306, No. 7543, 26 March 1988. Characterizes Peru's and Argentina's economies as the two worst in South America. Vargas Llosa, Mario. "Inquest in the Andes" New York Times Magazine, 31 July 1983. A report on the murder of 8 journalists in Peru by peasants who mistook them for Senderistas. The author is a famous Peruvian writer who was appointed to head the commission which investigated the murders. Werlich, David P. "Debt, Democracy and Terrorism in Peru." Current History, 86:29-32, January 1987. _______. "Peru: Garcia Loses His Charm." Current History, 89:13-17, January 1988. ______. "Peru: Shadow of the Shining Path" Current History, 83:78-82, February 1984. A series of articles by a historian who has specialized in Peruvian affairs. They give good insight into the combination of political and economic problems and struggles with the insurgency which have made life difficult for Peruvian governments. 3. Interviews LtCol Pete Davis, U.S. Army -- U.S. Defense Department Inter-America Office. February, 1988. Helpful information on the Peruvian military and U.S. security assistance to Peru, which has been eliminated due to U.S. budget cuts and Peru's default on its debts. Karen Hollis -- U. S. Defense Intelligence Agency. March 1988. Provided some valuable insights to Sendero's links to drug trafficking and APRA'S clandestine buildup of an arms arsenal. Edward Vasquez -- U.S. State Department, Peru Desk. February 1988. Had good insights into Peruvian politics, and a very pessimistic view of the Peruvian economy. APPENDIX A KEY CHRONOLOGICAL EVENTS 1430-1533 Height of Incan Empire 1533 Conquest of Incas by Pizarro 1780 Revolt of Tupac Amaru II 1824 Peruvian independence from Spain 1879-83 War of the Pacific with Chile 1924 Founding of APRA by Hoya del Torre 1928 Founding of Peruvian Communist Party by Mariategui 1941-42 War with Ecuador 1962 Abimael Guzman joins faculty of University of Huamanga 1964 Communist Party of Peru - Bandera Roja splits from Peruvian Communist Party 1965 Revolution of National Liberation Army suppressed 1968 Revolutionary Government of the Armed Forces, headed by Gen. Velasco, takes power 1970 Guzman and followers split from Bandera Roja, form Communist Party of Peru -- Sendero Luminoso 1975 General Velasco replaced by General Bermudez May 18, 1980 Sendero Luminoso inltiates the armed phase of its revolution May 1980 Return to democratic government. Fernando Belaunde Terry elected President 1981 Sinchis deployed to Ayacucho March 1981 Anti-terrorist law passed October 1981 State of Emergency declared in Ayacucho December 1982 State of Emergency expanded to Apurimac and Huancavelica, military forces deployed to zone May 1985 Alan Garcia Perez elected President February 1986 Police forces reorganized June 1986 Sendero stages violent uprisings in Lima prisons. Troops violently suppress them APPENDIX B KEY CHARACTERS AND GROUPS Accion Popular (Popular Action). The conservative political party of Fernando Belaunde Terry which won the elections in 1980. Alianza Popular Revolucionaria (American Popular Revolutionary Alliance). The liberal political party of Alan Garcia Perez, currently in power in Peru. Belaunde Terry, Fernando. President of Peru from 1963-1968 and 1980-1985. Bermudez, Morales. Army General who was leader of the Revolutionary Government of the Armed Forces from 1975-1980. He replaced General Velasco in a coup. Bolivar, Simon. Venezuelan General who combined forces with Sam Martin to defeat the royalist forces and win Peru's independence. Ejercito de Liberacion National. (National Liberation Army). Castroite revolutionary group which attempted a foco-type insurgency in Peru in 1965 which was quickly suppressed by the armed forces. Garcia Perez, Alan. Current President of Peru. Guzman Reynoso, Abimael. Leader and idealogue of Sendero Luminoso. It is unknown whether he is alive or dead. Hoya de la Torre, Raul. Founder of APRA. Huaman Centero Adrian. Army General who commanded the Emergency Zone in 1984. He was considered to be the most successful commander, but was relieved for criticizing the government. Mariatequi,Jose Carlos. The founder of the Peruvian Communist Party. He adopted Marxist-Leninist doctrine to Peruvian reality. Movimiento Revolucionario Tupac Amaru (Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement). A small (300-400 members) insurgent group in Peru today. They favor highly visible, splashy propaganda and terrorist acts. They have no ties to Sendero Luminoso. Partido Communista de Peru - sendero Luminoso de Mariategui (Peruvian Communist Party - Shining Path of Mariategui) . The major insurgent group in Peru today headed by Abimael Guzman Reynoso. Pizarro, Francisco. Spanish conquistador whose forces defeated the Incas and began Spanish colonial rule of Peru. Prada, Manuel Gonzalez. Peruvian writer and philosopher who addressed social inequality in Peru in the late 19th Century. His writings heavily influenced Mariategui. San Martin, Jose de. Argentine whose forces liberated much of South America from Spain and who joined with Simon Bolivar to win Peru's independence. Sucre, Antonio Jose de. General whose forces defeated the last Spanish royalist army in South America in a climactic battle on the plain of Ayacucho. Tupac Amaru II. Peruvian Indian who led a massive uprising against spanish rule in the 1780's. Vargas Llosa, Mario. Noted Peruvian author who led the commission which investigated the murder of 8 journalists in the southern highlands in 1983. Velasco Alvarado, Juan. Army general who led the Revolutionary Government of the Armed Forces from 1968-1975. His attempts to reform Peruvian society met with only partial success and he was replaced by a coup in 1975. APPENDIX C The following article appeared in The Los Angeles Times, April 30, 1988. It is a classic example of Sendero Luminoso's fanatical ruthlessness. Rebels Kill 3 Sisters for Aiding Peru Army. Ayacucho, Peru - Maoist guerrillas hacked to death three sisters whom they accused of helping counterinsurgency forces in mountain hamlet 370 miles from Lima, police said Friday. Police said Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path) rebels dragged the three out of their house Thursday night in the village of Runguyoq in Ayacucho, south of the capital, and in a brief "people's trial" before the rest of the villagers, sentenced them to death for helping the army. The insurgents hung the women on a wall and hacked them with knives and machetes before slitting their throats, police said. The guerrillas have stepped up their eight-year-old war recently. Political violence has claimed 71 lives this month.
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