Recently, and old and false story about General John J Pershing was revived, claiming he had ordered the execution of Mora Islamist rebels in the Philippines in the early 20th Century by bullets dipped in pig blood. The story has been fully debunked and is contrary to everything I have read about this extraordinary military leader. Here is an excerpt from the Snopes.com article on the issue:[1],[2]
The history of the American administration of the
Philippines between the Spanish cession of the islands at the conclusion of the
Spanish-American war in 1898 and the attainment of full political independence
in 1946 … is too long and complicated to explicate here. Suffice it to say that
General John J. “Black Jack” Pershing was part of the process as Governor of
the troublesome Moro Province between 1909 and 1913. We found no
references to this alleged incident in Pershing biographies, however, nor does
it match the way Pershing is generally recorded as having dealt with the Moros
in 1911. When they refused to obey Pershing’s order banning firearms by surrendering
their weapons, his response was to draft a letter to the Moros expressing
sorrow that his soldiers had to resort to killing them to enforce the order:
I
write you this letter because I am sorry to know that you and your people
refuse to do what the government has ordered. You do not give up your arms.
Soldiers were sent to Taglibi so that you could come into camp and turn in your
guns. When the soldiers went to camp a Taglibi, your Moros fired into camp and
tried to kill the soldiers. Then the soldiers had to shoot all Moros who fired
upon them. When the soldiers marched through the country, the Moros again shot
at them, so the soldiers had to kill several others. I am sorry the soldiers
had to kill any Moros. All Moros are the same to me as my children and no
father wants to kill his own children …
When negotiations stalled and matters came to a head,
Pershing was still reluctant to be responsible for any more loss of life than
was necessary:
[The
Moros retreated to a sacred extinct volcano in December, 1911.] It was the refuge against fate, the last
bastion of the hopeless, the place where their ancestors stood off great waves
of enemies. Once on the mountain, ensconced in its big cotta, Moros
would die gladly, …. Retreat to Dajo meant a clear declaration of war.
Sobered and depressed, Jack wrote of an overriding worry: “I
am sorry these Moros are such fools, but … I shall lose as few men and kill as
few Moros as possible.” …
Pershing’s strategy was to surround the Moros and wait them
out while attempting to induce them to surrender, a strategy that worked
effectively: the Bud Dajo campaign ended with only twelve Moro casualties. But
in his report Pershing seemed keenly aware that the best approach was not to
take any action that would encourage religious fanaticism:
There was never a moment during this investment of Bud Dajo
when the Moros… would not have fought to the death had they been given the
opportunity. They had gone there to make a last stand on this, their sacred
mountain, and they were determined to die fighting … they were chagrined and
disappointed in that they were not encouraged to die the death of Mohammedan
fanatics.
[2] For
an article on the same subject in the Christian Science Monitor, see https://www.csmonitor.com/Books/chapter-and-verse/2017/0825/The-real-story-behind-Trump-s-Pershing-tweet-how-General-Pershing-handled-Muslim-insurgents
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