A CUBAN REBEL'S DIARY: LIFE IN THE TRAINING CAMP

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP75-00149R000600230019-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: November 11, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 26, 1999
• Sequence Number: 19
• Publication Date: May 4, 1961
• Content Type: NSPR

NEW YORK MAY 4 1961
A ia ffiarnrnvarl For ReI9a" : CIA-RD
10iz a Guatem, ala Mountain
Diary:
A !C l an Rbe1's .
amp
The following story a sun- wp wlil be y ng
vi, or of the abortive pbfi' We all know we are headed for
i asion, tctls of his de& `ere Guatemala evert though nobody
I mm .t.tte Tnited ate- told us.
C inintf` n, Guatemala. Jan. 25-we arrived ten hours
ago. The name of the airport
By Manuel Penabaz Is Retalhuleu, but -for a few
Written for United Press minutes, we had, our doubts.
International Getting' off the plane, they
Idf1A S, 3-i I had hoped lined us up, and a priest came
R up looking serious and said:
t s e aster with' my wife,
Gentlemen, welcome to the
L opoldna, and my two chit= Dominican Republic. Gene-
d en, Ana Maria, eleven, and ralissimo Rafael Trujillo sends
anuel, seven, before leaving to. you, his regards." It was a joke,
.1 in our liberation forces, but a joke that upset some for
, They had already' suffered a while. Later, we learned that
e ough, because of my political the pilots do this , 4th -all the
s uation. I believed they de- new, arrivals. Wihin a few
s rved that small happiness minutes, all of us 1' laughinf.
b fore the grief of my departure Bpsnbs Stacked,;,is Field
t join the fight for my coup- Oft' of the first .things I no-
ticed, was the gZ'ed,t number of
But one mornlVi in mid- airplanes on tie field. One sec-
J nuary, the telep e tang: tion of the #a :'port is stacked
"Your name is 11lruel afael high with bombs. - An officer
riabaz?" a voice A4 e came of and gave us orders.
"Yes, sir." k We piled into three trucks and
"I sin speaking fir i t e ge - drove for, over four hotvs.
e al staff of the vo u f y 'At the ties `: of the base.
emociatic Front (p'. D.), guards aril, with rifles and
our mobllization .hats betee1 n'iachln'e un. Were Ton duty.
dered. Be. ready, at 5 p.`,m. They are elist fighting men
~y W she Is Mac 119
great a it 9 keep me with
er. "They are going to kill
ou," she says. I tell her no.
y good friends, Dr. Mario
eon and Enrique Soto, drive
e to the Frente' (F. R. D.)
ffice on 19th St. in Miami.
hey promise to-take care of
y family if something hap
ens to me. I wave good by,.
eo tries to smile. The children
ere at her side, the girl sad-
ened, the, boy proud without
ven understanding what is
oing on.
The drive downtown 'etas,
ade in silence. As .I got out
f the car, Dr. Leon says, `".C
m going to tell you something
.oolish, if something happens
o you, your family won't have
for the hope of Cuba. Fifty-
nine recruits are inside. Ten-
sion is written on every face.
Shortly, I hear the sing-ong
accent of my province of Ori-
ente, and I go up to the speak.
er. It was: Mir, from Hol'&uin
in Oriente, who, like myself,
had fought with Castro in them
Sierra Maestra. They gave us
shoes and uniforms, a box
lunch, two pairs of high black
boots and the clothes we were
going to wear in the camps.
My own clothes were left there.
Addresses by Officers
I About 9 o'clock, the chief of
Ith( general staff, Col. Martin
Elena, called us together in the
:patio. Standing alongside him
was a fat marl, It was Col.
Oscar Diaz, also on the gen-
eral staff. . Elena spoke to
us in a rough voice. He had
a reputation as an honest man
-and this is worth noting in
an ex-officer in the army of
Fulgencio Batista. Diaz also
spoke. After those speeches,
not one man in the group was
left with a feeling of ease or
satisfaction about what awaited
him in the training camps or
unknown future.
Our group, they tell us, is one
of the largest ever to be sent
at one time to the camps, and
two trucks were sent to pick us
up... . They took us to Opa-
Locka where a C-46 transport
plane was waiting. The plane
had no marking insignia on it.
Off to Guatemala
At the airport, we went into
an old warehouse and there I
saw the first North Americans.
One of them said, "We are
members of the F. B, I." They
are tall and strong-looking.
Another said he was a C. I. A.
agent. A third said he was an
employee of the United Fruit
Company. But all of them
sound like they are joking.
Around midnight, we board
the plane and take off,some
/ mor hroW1 , iaMQ,'198
treat int our thoughts. I occupy
ifiyself with the diary. A man
our office in I iar l` fir your we see.
I confess that WU I was are dt er `wins towering
petting the call ev rat over its onirtl sides.
ays, it caught me 'bb~iis ip rse The trucks stopped in a field
nd filled me with o'(3ncei h. I surrounded by wooden barracks
as face-to;-face With the real With z'nc roofs. They ordered
f __,_-. r myself had uc to get out and we lined up
The date was Jn, 24 19'$1 cartT~ldge belts with a knife,
rom notes in my far Mere 1s air ii ss kits. Some of the boys
n aacot~nt of the , .ofi~ lsb ec; 0ed, rifles.
ant `ev rrts , in the r1A Jgned tor' Battalions
omen*SYU tuvu -4P- ext we were assignee to -our
Jan. p-" zl hi`Z4-Leo (his 1tb lY- battalions -mine the heavy
or
decided we didn't like it, i
wouldn't be easy to get a trans
fer.
I told him I liked the 4.
mortar and would like to lear
to handle that 'weapon. He sal
"With that one," he said, "w
may liquidate the enemy."
We were both tired and ex
cited,. but exhaustion or n
exhaustion they told us w
should prepare for an exercis
firing range, aboot 500 meter
($90 feet,) higher=. than th
camp, where we sate two 30
,calibre machineguns.
A Test Under Fire
erbise . consisted `.iii" crawlin
eral of our men fainted.
When it was over-I think
pei?iences of my life, even atf
much younger men.
Running at 7,000 Feet
r, ~Ale 10 f Was*
11 over-North. Americans, a vers and' practice landings.
March 5-Last week,, Jose
pilan called to tell me I
Rumors Flood Camp
when, but every one is guessing.
We've also heard they have
eliminated the general staff in
Miami, and that means the
brakes are off on shipment of
any Cuban who wants to train
for battle, despite his political
backgroutrd.
A- Cuban who wants to fight
i
communism now has the right them. He warned. against
to carry a rifle, and they're asaults or thefts. At duck we
larriving in droves. There will leave the camp in fourtee.,
once we get to Cuba. So many
persons have arrived in the last
few weeks that there is no more
room in the barracks, and hun-
dreds are sleeping outside in
the field.
Morale is high, nonetheless,
and starting at 5 a. in., we hear
the shouts of men taking cali-
sthenics and the fire of the
75-mm- cannons and the 50-
mm. machineguns- Some time
Marquez, one of our office
Roberto San Roman ordered is
to run at double-time to t e
field. Running at 7,000 f t
without training is somethi g
that demands extrA.ordina y
stamina-and will power. I ran
fifteen minutes and finally c
lapsed.
That afternoon I saw the fi st
foreigner-a Japanese call d
"Jackie" who was giving ju o
instructions to the paratroo s.
He is slim, carries a knife In
his belt, and walks like a co
boy.
Feb. 5-Our second Sun y
in camp.... The training as
been hard, but already I f el
like an expert. We have learn d
how to fire pistols, mach: e-
guns, BAR's (Browning au o-
(dear) 4.2 mortar.
Instructors "Nice Guys"
many of the newcomerst-too
many of them are old men or
weak, and one wonders what
they will be able to do in
battle,-
On the Way
April 10-we're on our ,way.
This morning, Jose San Roman
personally woke. us up with
pokes from a pole. "Fellows,"
he said, "the entire brigade
will form in the parade field."
All of `us on the staff. knew
what this meant. San Roman
never had spoken to the entire
brigade- I remember Feb. 24,
(Cuban Independence Day)
San Roman asked me to speak
to the brigade, saying he was
a soldier and not an orator.
Now his speech was short,
laconic-but convincing.
He said he has faith in the
brigade, in our equipment, and
God is with us. He told us to
fight aggressively, but respect
prisone,c -wx are not to kill
trucks, going back down that
road vie took more than two
months ago. We ride silently
we've been told the enemy
would be . watching for us
Already we are approaching
the airbase-how much shorte
thin trip than the last time
A little while ago, about 10
Indians in a town we passe
were in the doar waving a
us and saying: "So long. Go t(
fight." Aparently our departur
d
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