Introduction: Identifying a Generation
A Cause for Revolution
Following the failure of the October 30, 1950 revolution, Puerto Rican nationalist and resistance movements quickly lost momentum over the course of the three following years. Although attacks were still making national headlines, such as the assassination attempt on President Truman on November 1, 1950 and the armed attack on the U.S. House of Representatives on March 1, 1954, the amount of them were steadily decreasing. However, by the early 1970s, multiple parties and organizations had organized in the interim since the tumultuous 1950s, basing themselves primarily in key Puerto Rican colonia in the U.S. mainland and on the island proper. Of these, the Fuerzas Armadas de Liberación Nacional or FALN were the most active on the American mainland, taking up residence in cities like New York, Chicago, and Washington D.C. From the 1970s to the early 1980s, the FALN committed over 120 bombings throughout the United States and Puerto Rico, a record that gives this website its namesake.
A Generation of Terror traces two years of the FALN's operations in New York City from 1974 to 1976. Using U.S. census data, primary source research, and geolocation software like ArcGIS and Social Explorer, this exhibit offers a different presentation to the story of the FALN and their campaign of urban guerrilla warfare. Furthermore, it argues for the typical urban FALN guerrilla, seeking to answer the question of 'who were they?' through scholarly literature and quantitative data on the period. Where were the FALN's attacks located in relation to Spanish-speaking neighborhoods? Where did the FALN's members more than likely come from, and were they first, second, or third generation Puerto Ricans? What did the guerrilla believe in and fight for? All these and more lines of inquiry are examined here.
The Urban Guerrilla
The FALN in the 1970s and onwards operated in relative secrecy through interconnected but independent guerrilla cells. Each cell, ranging in locations from New York City to Chicago, contained its own leadership and members that answered to a so-called 'central command,' as mentioned in many of their communiques. However, although divided by distance, the whole of the FALN acted in accordance to the standards and objectives set explicitly by their political position as well as underlying motives and customs native to Puerto Ricans. A more complex picture of the FALN is presented in the "Examining the FALN" section, focusing on how the politics of the organization were influenced by Puerto Rican socio-cultural norms on the family, gender, and the role of outside colonizers in the Puerto Rican national imaginary.
In addition, "The Bombings" section deals exclusively with the actual bombings themselves, including maps and political communiques claiming responsibility for these attacks. Furthermore, the section examines the logic behind the attacks, focusing particularly on the concept of 'bombs as symbolism' as opposed to 'bombs as weapons.' In reference to the name of the site, the FALN often did not intend to cause civilian casualties or casualties at all. While there were attacks that listed the death of perceived oppressors as a primary objective, the FALN's track record of bombings yielded very little fatalities. Instead, property damages and incurring monetary loss on the political enemies of the FALN may have been the driving motive behind these attacks, striking at banks, bars, and businesses as a symbolic declaration of war on capitalism and imperialism.
Politics Aside: Using the U.S. Census
Beyond the politics and socio-cultural motives behind the FALN, this exhibit presents extensive quantitative data as a means of further expanding the picture of what the FALN 'looked' like. Namely, data such as the census and geolocation through programs like ESRI's ArcGIS and Social Explorer help present a different perspective on the FALN and their operations in NYC throughout the 1970s. Being able to identify the number of Puerto Ricans or Spanish-speaking people in certain neighborhoods, as pictured in this section here, along with the number of people with families or whether they are from the island originally helps solidify the picture of the FALN's member base. Instead of thinking of the FALN and other Puerto Rican resistance movements as nebulous organizations with no defining characteristics regarding their member base, this exhibit argues that a mix generations comprised the FALN. Specifically, as will be discussed in the "Examining the FALN" section, the ground roots of the FALN were laid during the early Puerto Rican diasporas of the 1940s to the 1960s, especially in the aftermath of the 1950 October uprising. The following generations, predominantly second generation Puerto Ricans in the 1960s through to the 1980s, may have made up the bulk of the younger ranks in the urban guerrilla. Finally, a large body of scholarly literature on the Puerto Rican diasporas helps explain the reasoning behind these numbers, along with the motives behind these migrations from the island to the mainland.