Boy Who Said No : An Escape to Freedom (9781608090815) (14 page)

The unit commander introduced him to the troops as Lieutenant Pino—the first names of officers were never revealed to us. Several lieutenants accompanied him on his rounds. The commander paid him great deference.

Unit commanders had strong personal ties to Fidel. These were loyal supporters who had stayed with the rebel leader when he was fighting Batista from his camp in the Sierra Maestra. But they were mostly illiterates with little or no formal education. Their years in the hills made them well suited for their job: to command the sergeants and corporals, to show off their muscle, and to instill fear and discipline into the troops. But Pino was a man of a higher rank, a man of a different stripe.

The lieutenant made his way from tent to tent, questioning the sergeant major who provided him with the names of three or four boys from each location. The lieutenant busily reviewed charts and took notes. I wondered what all the fuss was about.

• • •

The next morning I learned I was among thirty-three young men who'd been selected for a special military assignment. We were chosen from the larger group of four hundred because of our academic stature and our contributions to the revolution. We did not know the nature of our mission.

All the selectees were either in their last two years of high school or their first two years of college. With so many illiterates and so many school dropouts in Cuba, the army was hard pressed to find soldiers with more than a grammar school education. I was chosen because I was an eleventh grader who had served in the literacy brigade, had attended a government-run school, and had spent three summers helping poor farmers to harvest their crops.

No mention was made of my escape from the Tarara School or my dealings with Antonio. I had to assume these things had not been noted in my record or had been overlooked due to my other qualifications. I wondered whether Lieutenant Pino had investigated my background—perhaps he had made a mistake. I tried not to think about it.

The following day the sergeant major announced that Manny Cadiz, “Lazo” Lazaro, and I had been assigned to a military base in Santa Maria, a town located on the outskirts of Guanabacoa. I knew these soldiers from our time at boot camp, but only slightly.

Lazo was a well-educated, sophisticated mulatto from Guanabacoa—tall, handsome, and crazy about his girlfriend. He was a well-muscled sportsman who used his cultured voice to teach me about classical music.

Manny was just the opposite. A brilliant young man from Regla, he could figure out the most difficult theoretical problems. He was an abstract thinker and a whiz at math, which greatly impressed Lieutenant Pino.

A high school junior, he was also frail and sickly. Although he was
very good with his hands, he had difficulty doing anything physical. He didn't have a girlfriend and, as far as I could see, had little prospect of getting one. I was amazed he had survived boot camp.

Although this base was less than ten miles from my home, I had had no idea it existed. It was located on approximately seventy-five acres and screened by heavy foliage. Fidel had ordered this facility—and others like it—to be built in densely populated areas to protect it from bombing by the Americans. He figured they would not dare bomb a camp in an area with a high civilian population.

The camp housed ten barracks. It had paved roads and parking lots, housing facilities, and a state-of-the-art command center. A columned rotunda with the feel of an old Spanish mansion served as the officers' quarters. A large obstacle course occupied the center of the facility and guards regularly patrolled the perimeter. “Do Not Enter” signs were ubiquitous.

Manny, Lazo, and I looked at each other, astonished. It was clear this was a highly classified operation, and we would be required to do something important. But we had no idea what. We showered and were issued starched, pressed uniforms. We never looked so good.

Around one p.m. Lieutenant Pino introduced himself to the group in a polished, eloquent voice. He informed us that he was the political commissioner, and explained that he would be very active in the political life of the unit.

After welcoming us to the base, he told us that we had been hand-picked to join one of the most prestigious military units in all of Cuba's Revolutionary Armed Forces: the Elite Counterattack Force. We were about to become the most highly trained and skilled military personnel in Cuba. The soldiers' voices buzzed with excitement.

The lieutenant told us that their military intelligence indicated that it was likely that the United States would invade Cuba the way it had invaded Vietnam. With the help of the Russians, a careful plan had been drawn up for the country's defense. Our job was to protect Havana, the nation's capital, against an American attack at the city's six
most vulnerable points. We would undergo a long and difficult training process and, for the sake of our country, we must give it our all.

The lieutenant apologized to us for the brutality of boot camp, but said it was necessary to instill discipline into the troops. Then he did something surprising. He told us we would be immediately issued our six-pesos-per-month military allotment and given a seventy-two-hour leave. We were elated.

We were trucked to the outskirts of the base, and I grabbed a bus home from there. My first priority was to see Magda. As I walked down her street, one of her neighbors approached me, telling me how lonely Magda had been and how much she had missed me. The middle-aged woman accompanied me to my girlfriend's house and stood beside me when I knocked on the door. Magda was home alone, wearing a white eyelet blouse, a delicate gold cross, and a red satin ribbon that tied back her hair. She was so surprised to see me she broke down in tears.

“I can hardly believe my eyes. Is it really you?”

She was literally jumping for joy. I took her hand in mine and noticed she was still wearing the ring I had given her. I wanted to hug her but was hesitant to do so in front of her neighbor. Finally, the woman said, “Go ahead, young man, and give your lady a proper kiss.”

After I kissed Magda for a while, she said, “I didn't mean for it to go on
that
long. I can't be responsible for this.” We all laughed merrily.

During the Missile Crisis of 1962, all nuclear weapons had been removed from Cuba. The country now relied on high-caliber 57-millimeter cannons and Anti-Tank Guided Missiles (ATGMs) for defense. This expensive, high-tech equipment was supplied by the Russians and housed in top-secret locations in each of Cuba's six provinces. As part of the Elite Counterattack Force, we were told we would be trained on this equipment—and we must die to protect it.

Captain Martinez commanded the operation in Santa Maria. He made all military decisions up to the point where they became strategic and political. Then he relinquished control to Lieutenant Pino, giving the lieutenant considerable power. Pino was very knowledgeable about political issues in Cuba and in other countries. But he had limited knowledge of military operations and tactics. That was the purview of Lieutenant Brown.

During our first few days of service, we were assigned to a unit and issued an instruction manual on military rules and regulations, the proper way to address officers, and so forth.

There were two barracks of infantry, a brigade of one hundred seventy-five troops who guarded territory up to a mile from our position. They served as the first line of defense against the enemy.

Serving as the second line of defense were four batteries of 57-millimeter cannons that could shoot down low-flying aircraft. They consisted of units of sixty men each.

The most important, expensive, and lethal weapons were the ATGMs, which cost upward of one million dollars each and could hit targets two miles out—ships, aircraft, helicopters, tanks—just about anything the enemy could throw at us short of a nuclear bomb.

The ATGMs required a driver, a trained operator to fire the rockets, and personnel to supply food, ammunition, and other support services. Manny, Lazo, and I were to be trained as ATGM operators.

Lieutenant Brown, a black Haitian graduate of the Military Academy of Cuba, was in charge of our thirty-man unit, which included fourteen ATGM drivers, fourteen ATGM operators, and two support personnel. The lieutenant was an excellent instructor, hell-bent on turning us into superb “killing machines.” He drilled us early, often, and relentlessly. The word “failure” never parted his lips.

Our focus was defeating the American marines, the finest fighters in the history of man. The good lieutenant taught us to anticipate and overcome any move a marine might make by engaging in hand-to-hand combat with other platoons. We practiced how to kill with a kick, a punch, or a knife to the throat. We mastered how to snuff out life with our own bare hands.

We were instructed on how to track the enemy by studying footprints, the lay of the grass, and the breakage of twigs. We became expert in escape tactics in case we were captured by the Americans. We studied the best practices of other armies. “Learn this or die,” was the lieutenant's constant refrain.

Brown also oversaw the daily rigors of the obstacle course, draining us of our last ounce of energy. Navigating the course was easier for me than for some other men because so many exercises were similar to things I had done as a kid.

Climbing rope ladders was akin to scaling mango and banana trees. Maintaining balance required the same skills as skipping from rock to rock on the
Rio Lajas.

Long marches were similar to climbing the hills of the Sierra
Maestra. My muscles were already well developed from lifting weights with Gilbert and my other cousins, which made the course easier to complete.

Brown watched my every move, liked what he saw, and used me as an example for others to emulate. He soon made me leader of the platoon.

Every morning, Pino—or one of his four minions—provided us with political instruction and indoctrination. Those with any issues regarding their personal or army life were individually counseled.

We were all required to read the daily newspapers, including the Cuban and foreign press. We were taught about economic and social problems in the United States, about injustices inherent in the capitalist system, and about the suffering the American Negroes experienced under segregation. We were repeatedly told that Cubans enjoyed more equality and freedoms than people living in Europe and the United States.

Current events in Russia, China, and Vietnam were dissected and discussed at length. Occasionally, a consultant from Vietnam instructed us on military tactics the Americans had employed in his country—and how to combat them.

We saw films of burned-out villages, napalmed children, and other atrocities perpetrated by the Americans on the Vietnamese. I found them fascinating, but I was also very aware that they were propaganda tools to gain more support for Fidel.

With the help of a translator, a Russian commander named Mikhail trained the operators on various aspects of the equipment—how to fix our target in the crosshairs, how to operate the radio at frequencies that wouldn't be intercepted by the enemy, and how to use the joystick to launch the three 150-pound rockets that sat atop each tank.

We learned to make the complex calculations required to determine the rockets' trajectory and the amount of time needed to hit
both stationary and moving targets under normal and extreme weather conditions.

To keep information from falling into enemy hands, we were required to memorize all military procedures. For security purposes, no instruction manual existed.

All our training so far had been theoretical, simulated. No one had yet seen the ATGMs. Naturally, we wondered where they were. Many thought we would be transferred to another facility when it came time to engage in live operations.

Meanwhile, we were being carefully watched to make sure no mistake had been made in our selection for this critical work. In addition to our loyalty to the communist cause, we were being judged on our physical prowess, our reaction under fire, our technical proficiency, and our ability to learn and to survive. Anyone giving any hint of not fully subscribing to the Party line soon disappeared, never to be seen or heard from again.

We worked for six months before we learned that the rockets were hidden in a bunker right in our own camp—smack under our noses.

I was ordered not to discuss our assignment with anyone. Nor did I. Not with my parents, not with Magda, not with Abuelo. I did tell Gilbert and Jabao that I was working with very dangerous weapons, but that was all I said.

My grandfather did not want to know what I was doing and advised me to keep my own counsel. He was horrified that I was even in the army, and a communist army at that. He thought it was the worst thing that could have ever happened to me. One day when we were sitting in his living room sipping coffee, he said, “You are a pawn on the chessboard of freedom, Frankie. Make no mistake about it.”

“What do you mean?” Whenever Abuelo talked like this I paid careful attention.

“Fidel is taunting the Americans with this military build-up. He's saying we have Russian military equipment and support, so come and
get us. The man is a born bully, and he's playing the Americans like a fiddle. But don't underestimate the Yanks. They're on the side of freedom—always have been. They won't let us down.”

“What do you think will happen?”

“Sooner or later the Americans will invade Cuba again. They can't let the Bay of Pigs stand. It was a big embarrassment.”

“So they'll invade Cuba to save face?”

“It's bigger than that. America can't allow a communist nation to remain on their doorstep. They're afraid communism will spread like a virus through the entire continent.”

“When do you think they'll invade?” This talk was making me nervous.

“I have no idea, Frankie. And neither does anyone else. But if they do invade, you will have three options: to take the side of the Americans, to fight the Americans, or to flee Cuba. You will have to choose between losing your life to the Communists by refusing to fight the Americans, or fighting the Americans, the very people who have come to liberate your country.”