Carib Comment: This is a lengthy post because we wanted to make sure to capture the story in English. We hope we did it justice as it tells the honorable story of the will to overcome the brutal Dominican dictator - Trujillo.
You can read the full Spanish article in the link below. June 14th
"They took me to the torture center to a room in the jail for the recruits. There, I see a lot of blood, it was the blood of my comrades who had been tortured and shot, "said Vargas Mayobanez, the only Dominican still living since the June 1959 expedition against the dictator Rafael Trujillo, 54 years ago today.
Vargas joined the group of 54 men who landed by plane in Constanza led by Enrique Jiménez Moya Dominican and Cuban Delio Gomez Ochoa.
It was a Sunday around 6:20 pm when the expedition, arrived from Cuba, where they had been supported by revolucion leader Fidel Castro for training in Mil Cumbres, Pinar del Rio province.
The guerrilla group arrived on a plane camouflaged with the colors of the Dominican military aviation, at a shy surprised airport security in Constanza but after gun battles, succeeded into the mountains.
The plane, piloted by Venezuelan Julio Cesar Rodriguez, with Oreste Cuban Acosta as copilot under fire managed to return to Cuba, where he arrived with several holes machine gun fire from the roof of the fortress. On June 20, six days later, the two boats with guerillas reached by Maimon and Estero Hondo, in Puerto Plata, after overcoming sabotage, lack of fuel, food and water to drift.
These boats were out on June 13, a day before the plane, with the intent of the arrival to coincide with the arrival of the plane to attack the Trujillo regime on several fronts.
The boat Carmen Elsa, landed in Maimon with 96 fighters, led by José Horacio Rodríguez, and later led by José Messon. Meanwhile, the other boat, Tinina, landed in Estero Hondo with 48 fighters was led by José Antonio Campos Navarro.
They were expected and bombed by the military forces of Trujillo, both aviation and the navy. Those arrested were taken to the San Isidro Air Base, where Ramfis Trujillo, the dictator's son, and his group, had devastatingly tortured them, executed them and then cast them into a mass grave.
Meanwhile, in Constanza the product of the shooting after landing, the group split into two, one led by Jimenez Moya, with 34 men, and the other by Gómez Ochoa, with 20 men.
The group of Moya Jimenez was completely eliminated, and Gomez Ochoa, who for nearly a month in the mountains, until July 11, accidentally divided amid attacks from Trujillo's military power survived; other survivors included Cuban Pablito Mirabal and Dominicans Gonzalo Almonte Pacheco, Mayobanex Vargas, Francisco Medardo Germán y Poncio Pou Saleta. Historians and also historian Franco Franklin considered that one of the factors that affected the invasion on June 14 was infiltration. "Trujillo was informed and prepared.
For example, the landings that occurred on June 19 on the beach of Maimon and Estero Hondo were practically expected by Trujillo naval forces, and that accusation had an unfortunate result in the annihilation of the expeditionary forces, "he said.
"If the invasion had not happened , Trujillo could have lasted a few more years because there was no generalized process for opposition. This event unleashed a process of widespread opposition. The invasion galvanized opponents and planning against Trujillo, there was a general anti-Trujillo drive, about the urgency and to end this monster, "said Roberto Cassá.
(+) DELIO GÓMEZ OCHOA Y MAYOBANEX VARGAS
The only two living fighters, Cuban, Dominican nationalized Delio Gomez Ochoa, and Dominican Mayobanez Vargas, relate various aspects of the feat. Both are national heroes.
"We have the right to live with freedom, but we also have a duty to know to achieve freedom and freedom sometimes costs us our lives, but sometimes it is preferable to life," Gomez said Ochoa.
He added: "When it died not only win freedom made the way there, but win freedom and having honored the sacrifice of so many who had fallen during the Trujillo Era".
While Vargas, asked that the massacred fighters be given their place in history as they deserve, after highlighting that they knew that they came to die for freedom, and that did not stop. Read the article in Spanish here