The Bruuman Independence War: 1946 to 1950


Oil  tanks burn in New Orleansville after being bombed by the insurgents, September 26th 1950


The Colonial counteroffensive was launched on January 21 and in the course of six months regained control on all coastal and plain areas and in the cities. The BPVLF majority faction tried to put up resistance in strategic locations, and while they slowed down the offensive they were eventually overcome and most of its leaders slain or captured.  The minority factions managed despite the hardships to relocate in the forests or went underground before the assaults, gaining thus the control of the Party and imposing Papa Unclepear as its Leader and absorbing the survivors of the majority faction. PAIB chose a different tactics and chose to disperse its presence in all the locations it controlled, hoping to gain tactical advantage by maintaining control of an area too vast for the Army. The plan was that the columns would retreat when overcome and then go back when the Army left, but the plan backfired because of the lack of mobility and coordination and many columns were destroyed either by interception or surrounding. They managed to keep control of pockets of land only in areas where they retained popular support, mainly those inhabited by small land owners, or those too impervious or not strategic for the army to control. RiMoJE was hit the hardest: fueled by the apocalyptic preaching of the increasingly unstable Tinney, they engaged in furious but disastrous battles that costed a great deal of lives. The final blow came with the death of Tinney at the hands of a traitor in 1948; the complete annihilation of the movement was avoided only thanks to the solid clandestine network of supporters and the communities established in remote hamlets.


The colonial government could have dealt the final blow to the insurrection, but again committed a serious mistake and underestimated the remaining forces. So, between 1947 and 1949 the Army focused on patrolling and securing the areas already reconquered, instead of launching new offensives, and started to become increasingly bogged down by the low-intensity asymmetrical warfare.  Governor Everard had eventually to ask for an extension and even an increase of the troops’ presence on the island in light of another problem: desertion in the police force, which never managed to refill its ranks at antebellum level. Another issue came with white flight: the white population was weary of the war and its negative consequences and started to emigrate at high rate, thus also crippling furthermore the economy.  Meanwhile, the BVPLF managed to reorganized and structure its presence both as a clandestine network in the city and in the bases hidden in the jungle, consolidating its presence especially in the less inhabited slopes of Mount Benjamin and Mount Elizabeth. Two major changes happened meanwhile: first, Papa Unclepear cemented its absolute leadership, purging or subjugating its rivals. Second, the main foreign Communist power of the time, who up to then had kept its distance from the WMP unorthodox ideology, decided to back the insurrection and begin to ship weapons, equipment and instructors – an operation made possible by connection among the dockworkers, especially in Port Bayou,  and the control over uninhabited traits of coast. By the beginning of 1950 the BPVLF had also swelled its ranks and become a proper regular force, outperforming by far both PUIB and RiMoJE militias.


BVPLF rebels in one of their camps on the slopes of Mount Elizabeth, ca. 1948

 In the first half of the year the BPVLF launched an offensive campaign to put pressure on the colonial forces and put them on the defensive. The Communists’ assaults on the cities were repelled, but they did manage to force the most advanced presence of the RBF and RA out of their stronghold areas.  The main result was achieved through a rare joint action with PAIB: the New Orleansville Raid on September 26th, when guerrilla commandos managed to bomb the main oil depot in the industrial district: a quarter of Bruuma’s fuel reserve burned for five days and the action had a major psychological impact on both side, boosting morale for the insurgents and spreading disillusion among colonial forces. White flight increased dramatically in the months following the raid, while Governor Everard was more and more pressed by the Motherland to crush the insurgents once and for all. He requested additional troops and envised a plan to strike at the insurgency with an iron fist. The years to follow would be the most brutal and dark of the entire war.