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1942–1954 communist rebellion in the Philippines
The Hukbalahap rebellion was a rebellion staged in the Philippines by former Hukbalahap or Hukbong Bayan Laban sa Hapon (lit. 'People's Anti-Japanese Army') soldiers against the Philippine government. It started in 1946 after the independence of the Philippines from the United States, and ended in 1954 under the presidency of Ramon Magsaysay.
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The Hukbalahap rebellion was a rebellion staged in the Philippines by former members of the guerrilla movement known as Hukbalahap (or Hukbong Bayan Laban sa Hapon (lit. 'People's Anti-Japanese Army'), often shorted to Huk
The Huk had formed in the 1940s to combat Japanese occupation during World War II. The rebellion started in 1946 after the independence of the Philippines from the United States, when the new Philippine government denied the communist-leaning Huk movement seats in congress and also demanded the movement disarm. The rebels refused and found support among rural farmers.
The conflict ended in 1954 under the presidency of Ramon Magsaysay, with a combination of concessions to the sympathetic farmers and military intervention against the rebellion’s leadership.
During the Japanese occupation of the Philippines, the Hukbalahap created a resistance army consisting largely of peasant farmers against the Japanese forces in Central Luzon. The Huk resistance, as it became popularly known, recruited heavily in response to Japanese terror tactics and created a stronghold against the Japanese in the villages through guerrilla warfare. During this time, the area was heavily protected by Huks, and Huk justice reigned.
The aftermath of the liberation from Japan was characterized by chaos. The Philippine government, prompted by the United States of America, disarmed and arrested the Huks for allegedly being communists. Harassment and abuses against peasant activists became common as United States Army Forces in the Far East (USAFFE) and the Philippine Constabulary (civilian police) hunted them. Civilian casualties were substantial and the Huks decided to retreat into the mountains and to their guerrilla lifestyle.
The late 1800s and early 1900s saw the opening of the Philippine market to the US economy following American victories in the Spanish–American War in 1898 and the Philippine–American War in 1902. The arrival of the Americans was characterized by the expansion of capitalism already introduced by the Spaniards in the encomienda system; there was an exponential increase in the amount of free trade between the Philippines and the United States of America. Landowners favored cash crops for export to the US, such as tobacco and sugar cane, over the usual rice or cereals, resulting in a smaller supply of staple foods for the peasant farmers.
This period saw the collapse of the social structures maintained under the Spanish for more than three centuries. Landowners had previously attended social functions such as the weddings and baptisms of their tenants, sponsored food during fiestas, and conducted land inspections. Landlords helped them in times of distress, especially financial ones, and were seen as protectors from friars and government officials.
Patterns of farm management also changed. Traditional landowners wanted to modernize their farms and employ tenant-farmers as wage-earners with legal contracts in order to maximize their profit. This changed the social relations of the countryside, as indicated by comments from a landowner in Nueva Ecija:
In the old days … the landlord-tenant relationship was a real paternalistic one. The landlord thought of himself as a grandfather to all tenants, and so he was concerned with all aspects of their lives. … But the system had to be changed over time as the hacienda has to be put in a sound economic footing.. The landlord tenant relationship is a business partnership, it is not a family. The landlord has invested capital in the land, and the tenants give their labor... I was enthused about putting modern machinery to work like the modern farms I'd seen in the US. … The only machine here is the Japanese rice thresher. … Meanwhile, I try to make the tenants do as I said so the land will be more productive. If you tell a machine something it will do it. It's not the way with tenants.
As landowners turned their estates over to cash crops, the haciendas were left to caretakers. There was a growing unrest among the peasantry, characterized by small protests against their own landlords. This situation was especially true in the Central Luzon area of the Philippines. The sudden and extreme gap between the landlord and the tenant was the main cause of the peasant unrest.
With peasants out of work and cash crops being preferred to staple food, peasants started begging and stealing from the rice warehouses of the government. There was despair during this troubled decade. The early 1930s saw the formation of many small peasant unions, including:
The objective of these movements was broadly to revert to the traditional tenancy system. The means of protest varied from strikes to petitions of government officials (including the president) to court cases against landlords to winning local office.
In 1939, the two largest peasant organizations merged: The AMT with 70,000 members and the KPMP with 60,000. They participated in 1940s election by joining with the Partido Sosyalista ng Pilipinas (PSP), a rural peasant political party, and ran with a complete slate of candidates under the Popular Front ticket in Pampanga. Although Pedro Abad Santos, the founder of the PSP, did not win a seat, his party became synonymous with the peasant movements and eventually with the Huks. His right-hand man was Luis Taruc, the future supreme commander of the Huks.
In December 1941, the Japanese Army invaded the Philippines. The country did not have sufficient military capacity to protect its citizens and needed the help of the US, under the USAFFE, to defend the country. Still, the peasants of Central Luzon fought against the Japanese for their own survival. The organized peasant movements of the 1930s in Central Luzon set the conditions for organized resistance against the Japanese. During the Japanese occupation, the organization became an underground political government with a fully functioning military committee composed of 67 squadrons in 1944.
On March 29, 1942, 300 peasant leaders decided to form the Hukbalahap or the Hukbo ng Bayan Laban sa Hapon. This event marks the moment when the peasant movement became a guerrilla army. The Huks collected arms from civilians, gathered arms from retreating American and Filipino forces, and prevented banditry. By September 1942, there were 3,000 Huks under arms. By 1946, the Huks numbered about 10,000. The Huk army was composed of squadrons, which usually accounted for 100 men. Two squadrons formed a battalion; two battalions formed a regiment. Regiments were organized geographically in units called Military Districts. In the town of Talavera, Nueva Ecija alone, there were 3 squadrons, with about 200 men each.
Its top commanders were Casto Alejandrino (AMT, PSP), Felipa Culala (KPMP), Bernardo Poblete (AMT), and Luis Taruc (AMT, PSP), with Taruc being the supreme military commander. The communists claimed that the Hukbalahap was communist-led and initiated. Prior to the war, none of the top leaders had any connections with the PKP, and interviews conducted by Kerkvliet with members afterwards also points to a non-bias towards any ideology.
The Huks were well received by the villagers and were seen as their protectors from the abuses of the Japanese. Nationalism, empathy, survival, and revenge all served as primary motives for the people to join. Those who could not join the guerrilla army joined the underground government via its "secretly converted neighborhood associations", called Barrio United Defense Corps (BUDC).
The Hukbalahap also tried to recruit beyond Central Luzon but were not as successful. Nonetheless, the Huks fought side-by-side with local troops of the Philippine Commonwealth Army, the Philippine Constabulary, and the USAFFE, helping to repel the Japanese invasion of the Philippines.
Life for the Huks did not return to pre-war conditions even after World War II. Most of the landowners were collaborators during the Japanese occupation and were no longer interested in tenant farming. Furthermore, most of them had already moved to Manila during the war.
Not only was life economically unsustainable for the Huks, their hardships were aggravated by the hostility and repression they experienced from the USAFFE soldiers, the Philippine Constabulary, and landlords. Former Huks were hunted down and arrested under orders of disarmament from the United States. Even the villagers were victimized: their properties were looted, food stolen and houses even burned in search of Huks who were possibly hiding in them.
The massacre of Squadron 77 was seen as a major act of hostility against the Huks which occurred in Malolos, Bulacan in February 1945. Consisting of 109 Huks, Squadron 77 was returning home from Pampanga were surrounded by American and Filipino soldiers, disarmed and brought before USAFFE Col Adonias Maclang, who ordered them shot and buried in a mass grave. Maclang was later appointed mayor of Malolos by US CIC officers who approved the executions.
Furthermore, in February 1945, the US Counter Intelligence Corps (USCIC) decided that the only way to end what they saw as "Huk domination of the area" was to arrest the prominent leaders of the Hukbalahap. There were almost 20 prominent leaders arrested, including the top two commanders of the Huks: Alejandrino and Taruc.
In September 1945, Taruc and other Huk leaders were freed from prison after 22 days. Luis Taruc formally announced the end of the resistance movement. He gave the roster of Hukbalahap names to the US and Philippine governments, hoping for recognition from President Sergio Osmeña for their participation during the Japanese war to qualify for war veteran's benefits. Four squadrons, consisting of about 2,000 men, were not recognized. The Huks saw it as a divide and conquer tactic and decided not to accept anything from the government.
Taruc protested to Douglas MacArthur, who was sympathetic to the Huks' cause, to stop the maltreatment of the Huks. Although at the top levels leaders were constantly negotiating with each other, the situation on the ground between the Huks and the US and Philippine forces was ripe for a full-scale rebellion. In the words of Huk supreme commander Taruc, the truce is "in effect only at the top level, between the government representatives and peasant leaders. On the level of the fields there was open conflict."
Moreover, the harvest between the period of late 1945 to early 1946 not only exacerbated the plight of the Huks, it also further intensified the gap between the tenants and the landlords. There were "landowner-tenant disputes over high interest rates, loans, rent payments, and sharing agricultural expenses sometimes led to evictions." The landed elites, who collaborated with the Japanese during the war, now pledged their allegiance to America. Together with the government, they agreed to a 60% share of harvests for the tenants, from the usual 50–50. But when harvest came, the promises were not kept.
So the Huks decided to join politics again. The Pambansang Kaisahan ng Magbubukid (PKM) or National Peasants Union was formed. At the national level, the PKM lobbied for the 60–40 division of harvest. The PKM lobbied for better relations between peasants and landlords, low interest loans from landowner, for the setting up of banks by the government, enactment of laws to protect peasants from landowners and small landowners from big landowners, and "justice for everyone regardless of social standing.
But despite their meager aims, harassment and abuses continued. Local police, military police, and even "civilian guards" intimidated, arrested, and even killed Huk veterans and PKM supporters.
It is in this situation that the Huks formally allied with the Partido Komunista ng Pilipinas (PKP). The PKP had created the Committee of Labor Organizations (CLO) to spearhead its political offensive on the labor front. It was composed of 76 trade unions from all over Manila and had a membership of 100,000 laborers. On the other hand, peasant support for the PKM was significant in the countryside.
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