the flight of the ashaninkas

7/30/2019 The Flight of the Ashaninkas

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TERROR IN THE ANDES:The Flight of the Ashaninkas

By Gustavo Gorriti; Gustavo Gorriti is a Peruvian journalist. Volume 1 of his three-part history ofthe Shining Path insurgency was published in Peru this summer Published: December 02, 1990

As The Little Cessna 185 approached the last stronghold of the Ashaninka Indians,the harmony of the heavily forested mountains and spectacular cascades made itpossible to forget for a moment the deadliness of the jungle below us. We flew closeto a towering waterfall, and barely a minute later reached our landing place, aplateau on the summit of a mountain the native people call Tzibokiroato -- "theplace of ants."

I had an idea of what a jungle landing strip should look like, but couldn't see thisone until the young pilot pointed it out. It wasn't straight but curved along the rimof an abyss. It wasn't flat either, but full of mounds and depressions. I thought thatwhatever was going to take place there shouldn't be called a landing but moreappropriately an accident.

This was in early September, in the central highlands of Peru. Five months earlier,several hundred Ashaninka Indians, part of the largest group of native people inthe South American Amazonian jungle, had been pushed to the mountain redoubtafter a succession of bloody attacks by the Shining Path, a Maoist insurgency thatcontrols growing areas of Peru. In August, the Rev. Mariano Gagnon, a salty, chain-smoking 60-year-old Franciscan priest from New England who many years agowelded his destiny to the Ashaninkas, had left the mountain to seek help in Lima,200 miles to the west. Now Father Mariano, as he is called, was returning to

discuss with the natives the momentous decisions they had to make.

The Ashaninka refugees could try to stay at Tzibokiroato, which could be defended.But they would have to fight off the well-armed Shining Path guerrillas with bowsand arrows and a few shotguns. They could surrender, but they would face virtualenslavement and forced indoctrination in the Shining Path's rigid Communistdogmas. Or they could disperse in small groups, as some other Ashaninkas haddone, hoping that the guerrillas would no longer regard them as a threat. (TheShining Path had sent word that they would stop the killing if the American priestdid not return, an unconvincing vow.) Finally, they could try to cross the Andes, toseek refuge in the land of another tribe. But it would be dangerous for even the

fittest Ashaninkas to scale the steep mountains.

Just that morning, we learned that the native leaders had reported by radio that theguerrillas had surrounded them. When told that the priest was on his way, theysaid they would try to hold off the enemy until he arrived.

Later, flying over Tzibokiroato (pronounced tzhee-bo-kir-WAT-oh), we peeredanxiously at the huts built on the mountain; those on the lower levels had been


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charred in a recent rebel attack. We were waiting for the Ashaninkas to come outand give a signal to land (or, I thought, to crash). The plane circled several times, asclose as possible, but the place was desolate.

We headed back to Satipo, the provincial capital about 50 miles to the northwest.

Father Mariano's rough face showed his dejection, and he became more depressedwhen we flew over what was left of his mission at Cutivireni, for years thecommunal hub for 5,000 Ashaninkas of the Ene River parish. In the clearing nearwhere three rivers met, only blackened foundations were left of 80 houses -- theformer homes of some 700 people -- and 11 other structures.

Like somebody visiting the graves of dear ones, Mariano pointed to the placeswhere some buildings had been: the bilingual school and the smaller chapel, whichhad been torched by the Shining Path. The generator building and the landingstrip, he said, were blown up later in an operation directed by the United StatesDrug Enforcement Administration, which said it wanted to keep cocaine traffickersand guerrillas from capitalizing on what was left of the abandoned mission.

Back in Satipo, we tried to figure out what could have happened. In the morning,the native leaders hadn't given their location, no doubt because the Shining Pathmonitors radio traffic. Maybe they had evacuated Tzibokiroato. After a couple ofmelancholy hours, the voice of an Ashaninka leader named Nicolas came over theradio. He sounded nervous, and communication was brief. They were not onTzibokiroato, but in a fallback place that Mariano knew about. Despite the news,the priest beamed. Tomorrow at 8 A.M. Nicolas would radio again.

The next morning, the native leader reported that the refugees were very worried,their food was scarce. He gave his position -- "to the left of the waterfall" -- and said

they had prepared a spot where a helicopter could land. He said they had beenchased by the guerrillas the day before, but had shaken loose of them. Tzibokiroato,he said, was now controlled by Sendero Luminoso -- Shining Path. I have knownFather Mariano since 1984, when he sought help after his mission was burned forthe first time. In August of this year, more desperate than ever to aid theAshaninkas, he contacted me and a few other journalists, asking us to see thepeople's plight for ourselves. He gave me his diary and other documents, and overmany weeks I talked to dozens of witnesses. This is the story of the Ashaninkas'struggle, based on those sources.

The road that led Mariano Gagnon to the Peruvian jungle began early, in his poor,

Catholic upbringing in New Hampshire. He was born Joseph Theodore Gagnon toa French-Canadian mother and a father of French and Iroquois descent. Restlessand stubborn, Joseph dropped out of public high school and went to a Franciscanseminary in Callicoon, N.Y. There, he finished high school "with great difficulty," hesays, and began studying for the priesthood.

He had already decided he wanted to do missionary work with a native people, thefarther away and the more difficult the circumstances, the better. His decision was


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not unusual: the Franciscans have long reached out to indigenous ethnic groups,especially in the Amazon jungle.

He arrived in Peru in 1948. It was hard for an independent-minded, cussing gringoto adapt to the rigorous Franciscan discipline, but he somehow did it. He changed

his name to Mariano -- a not uncommon name in his order -- and was ordained apriest in 1957. Soon, he set out for missions in the jungle.

In the late 1960's, eager for a parish limited to a native people, he began a closerrelationship with the Ashaninkas -- Campas, as they are called in Peru -- and waseventually sent to a small new mission at Cutivireni, in the mountainous jungle ofthe Ene River Valley.

The Peru Ashaninkas (pronounced ah-SHAN-in-kahz), which means "people" intheir language, number roughly 20,000 and are scattered over a wide territory inthe central jungle highlands. About 5,000 of them were known to have lived in theEne Valley in the early 1970's. They are nomadic hunters and slash-and-burnfarmers, whose basic crop is manioc, an edible root and the mainstay of their diet.They also grow cacao, which provides them with the cash needed to buy machetes,knives, batteries and other essential items. Until the early 1950's, the native groupshad been able to maintain most of their traditional area. But outside settlers beganmoving in, and their land began to shrink.

The missionaries and colonizers who came in contact with the Ashaninkas over thecenturies described them as a simple people. "The Campas are childlike," the Rev.Dionisio Ortiz, author of about 10 books on Franciscan missions in Peru, told me."It is very easy to control them."

Father Mariano bristles at the stereotype. "Yes, they are childlike," he says, "but inthe biblical sense, free from pretension, ostentation or calculation. Obviously, theseuncommon virtues in a modern society make them victim to many abuses."

Realizing that the colonization pressure was only going to increase, Mariano triedfrom the outset to persuade the Peruvian Government to create a reserve, closed toother settlers. The Cutivireni area not only had a concentration of Ashaninkas, butalso magnificent steep forests and abundant cascades the priest believed should bemade into a national park. Though his campaign failed, he helped to preserveCutivireni as the only Ashaninka land free from colonization.

Unlike most Franciscans, Mariano did not try to make his flock change itstraditional ways, even when, as in the case of female breast nudity or polygamy, itoffended Catholic sensibilities. He also cooperated with Protestant organizationslike the Summer Linguistics Institute, which taught Indians Spanish. Despite hisdevotion to the Ashaninkas, Mariano never learned their language, communicatinginstead in Spanish.


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Though he could be blunt with outsiders, he was by all accounts gentle toward theAshaninkas, acting like a mother hen. Photographs show the gray-haired priest --invariably in shorts, T-shirt and tennis shoes -- tending to everyday chores.

He did make some concessions to the outside world: he tried to teach the people

about the market economy and modern technology. "I tried to prepare them forwhat was coming," he says.

The Cutivireni mission had a bilingual school, farm machinery, workshops and awell-stocked infirmary. Despite the Indians' dislike of large groups, they formed asmall town around the mission. They built a plaza, with a much-admired fountainin the form of a lion.

Meanwhile, outsiders continued to settle around the area, and by the 1970's, theyhad reached the opposite shore of the Ene River. Mariano discouraged contact withthe settlers, and while he says he never refused them the sacraments, he chose notto include them in his parish. "The Ashaninkas would have thought that a betrayalon my part," he explains. The colonizers considered him arrogant, and hardfeelings arose. "I was probably tactless," he now acknowledges.

In the late 1970's and early 80's, cocaine trafficking boomed in the Ene Valley, as itdid all over Peru. The local economy changed rapidly, raising the premium on land-grabbing. The airstrip near the mission, built by the Indians under Mariano'ssupervision, became increasingly busy, and Colombians appeared. They wereconsiderate toward the priest and offered him a regular "contribution," which herejected. The Ashaninkas were asked to give up cacao for the more lucrative coca,but Mariano warned that he would leave the mission if they accepted. None of the700 people in his mission took the Colombians up on their offer.

Coca-growing flourished nonetheless, and in 1983 Mariano decided to tell theauthorities. He sent a note to the commander of the Peruvian security police basein nearby Mazamari, and had a conversation in Lima with a United States DrugEnforcement Administration agent. Soon afterward, two drug traffickers visited themission. They told Mariano the contents of the letter he had sent to Mazamari, andplayfully advised him to steer clear of their business.

Mariano decided it was good advice. He never knew who had tipped off thetraffickers, but he thinks the leak came from the Lima office of the PeruvianInvestigative Police, where the letter had been sent for "processing."

It was already clear to Mariano that his vision of an Ashaninka Arcadia, immunefrom the world, was not going to be. He realized that a tough struggle for culturaland territorial survival was ahead. But he did not foresee a greater threat to hisphysical survival and to that of the Ashaninkas. IN MAY 1984, 20 ARMED MENinvaded the mission. Mariano was in Lima at the time, and Brother Pio Medina, anold Peruvian Franciscan, had been left in charge. The assailants looked forMariano, and told Pio that they intended to kill the American priest.


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Then they looted the mission and burned it to the ground.

Mariano heard the news two days later on his way home from Lima, and hurried toSatipo, the provincial capital, where he waited for his Franciscan superior, the Rev.Felix Saiz. The only pilot willing to take them to the mission was flying the plane

used by the Colombian traffickers.

When the village Ashaninkas found out that he had landed, they came out of theforest and back to the mission. They saw him standing over the ashes of hislifework, crying. The attackers were never identified. Father Mariano maintainsthey were settlers and local traffickers who wanted to get rid of him and dislodgethe Colombians.

Rebuilding began immediately, but the work was strenuous and the mission wasnot complete until May 1988. That year, the Shining Path, the shadowy guerrillamovement that had begun fighting "a people's war" eight years earlier, closed in onthe Ene River Valley and Cutivireni. Until then, the mission and neighboring areahad been on the periphery of the war. But the rebels were spreading north fromAyacucho and southeast from the high Andes, and the valley was in between.

At first, the Shining Path existed only in rumors and in signs of undergroundorganizing and proselytizing, mainly among the settlers, but also among someAshaninkas. The guerrillas often stay in an area for years before making theirmove, a strategy perfected by their elusive leader, Abimael Guzman, a formerphilosophy professor who spent years in Ayacucho organizing students and thenIndian peasants.

In June 1989, four armed guerrillas visited Mariano. They didn't try to conceal

their identities. They asked for food, tools and other help, which Mariano, knowingthe risks of acting otherwise, promptly gave them. They came back several timesand asked for more specific things, like sneakers and mimeograph stencils, whichhe provided. Then they also asked him to recruit young Ashaninkas forindoctrination. Mariano refused, saying he had no authority to do so.

A few months later, as the Shining Path presence became more evident, Marianodecided to take a long-overdue trip to the United States, thinking it might be hislast opportunity to visit his homeland.

While he was away, a United States helicopter landed at the mission, carrying Drug

Enforcement Administration agents and State Department contract personnel.They had been appearing at the Peruvian police base in Mazamari since the arrivalof a dozen or so members of the United States Army Special Forces, who weretraining the Peruvian paramilitary police. In operations, the Americans and thePeruvians combed the coca-carpeted Ene Valley for clandestine airstrips andlaboratories -- which were then blown up. The American presence at the mission,however brief, emboldened some Ashaninka leaders to stand up to the ShiningPath. A few even taunted the guerrillas, telling them that if they dared to attack,


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Father Mariano would call the Americans in with their helicopters to wipe themout.

On Nov. 12, 1989, there were national mayoral elections, which the Shining Pathtried to sabotage by attacking candidates and voting places. At the mission that

day, Mario Zumaeta, the head of the bilingual school, and other Ashaninkas tore upa red hammer-and-sickle flag the guerrillas had raised and replaced it with thePeruvian flag.

For several days nothing happened. In the meantime, Lucas Adins, a 43-year-oldBelgian volunteer who had worked in the Ashaninka region as a medic andagricultural adviser, arrived at the mission. The next Sunday, he was working in theinfirmary when the Shining Path entered the mission. Adins directed hiscompanions to sit still and wait. About 60 guerrillas, young men and women armedwith submachine guns and assault rifles, detained Adins and the Ashaninkaleaders. Unaware of the raid, Mario Zumaeta arrived during the night and wasarrested. "Don't make any error or it will be too late," Adins remembers saying tohimself. The guerrillas sacked the mission and forced him to drive a tractor to theriver with the loot to be shipped to the other side.

The next morning, while Adins was driving the tractor with more stolen goods, theinvaders burned the mission. In the afternoon, as he headed back from his last trip,he saw a group of guerrillas walking with three Ashaninka leaders: Mario Zumaeta,Roy Ponce, who was in charge of the mission in Mariano's absence, and Alberto, aschoolteacher. Adins was told to drive them to the river. He knew what was goingto happen, and he thinks the prisoners did, too. He was shaking when they reachedthe river, and was told to put his hands over the wheel and look straight ahead. Buthe saw the three prisoners being led away, walking with a strangely eager gait, and

soon heard seven or eight shots.

The guerrillas came back alone. "You could see by their faces which guys had donethe killing," he told me later. He was ordered to drive back to the mission. When hearrived, he was alone amid the smoky ruins.

Adins remained alone for several days. Then, early on the morning of Dec. 2, twoAmerican helicopters landed at the mission site with three United States advisersand six Peruvian commandos. They took the starving, distraught Belgian to theMazamari base, and from there he was taken to Lima. That afternoon, he wasdebriefed at the United States Embassy.

The Ashaninkas found the bodies of Roy, Alberto and another teacher, probablykilled later, several yards apart. Mario Zumaeta's body was never found. But thenatives soon heard a horrifying story about his death: Mario had been taken to thesettlers' town across the river, where he was crucified, castrated and disemboweled.What remained of his body was stuffed with stones and thrown into the river.


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The information came from some mission Ashaninkas who now sided openly withthe Shining Path. They were a minority, recruited clandestinely, but now they hadthe power to enforce their views. Their leaders were a paramedic who had workedat the mission and Nicolas's sister, Claudia. In nearby Ashaninka settlements,several native leaders -- including an evangelical priest and a bilingual teacher --declared themselves openly as followers of the Shining Path. Evidence ofunderground organizing became clear, as guerrilla settlements formed rapidly.

The killings continued, and the mission was now almost desolate. A week after theexecution of the three leaders, a group of guerrillas returned, looking for otherAshaninkas. They found the village shaman and a few young men. When they askedthe shaman about the natives' whereabouts, he retorted that he wouldn't talk withassassins. He was killed on the spot, as were two boys who tried to protect him.

A few days after those shootings, a small Shining Path patrol returned to themission for the tractor. A larger Ashaninka group, armed with bows and arrows,ambushed them, and most of the guerrillas were killed.

A full-scale war had broken out. As the mission's 700 inhabitants escaped into theforest, they knew they were outnumbered, outgunned and outmaneuvered. If therebels had come from far away, the natives would have had tactical advantages. Butthe Shining Path commanded a base among the Ene Valley Ashaninkas and usedtheir captives as slave laborers or soldiers. Other native groups, sensing that thebalance of power was tilting to the Shining Path, were careful not to antagonize theguerrillas and tried to reach accommodation. Only those Ashaninkas close toMariano, now under the loose leadership of Nicolas and another native, Matias, thecommunity's president, actively opposed the Shining Path.

Mariano learned of the killings when he returned from the United States in earlyDecember. From Satipo, he was flown by plane over the mission's rubble, and whenhe saw a small group of mission Ashaninkas, he dropped them a letter asking fornews and whether it was safe for him to come back and be with them for Christmas.

He heard nothing. Later he would learn that the natives had sent him a letter withthree messengers who tried to reach Satipo on foot. Shining Path guerrillasintercepted them and they were killed. On Dec. 26, Mariano flew over an area nearthe mission, and saw a group of natives. They made signals telling him not to land,that there was great danger. He dropped them salt and Christmas presents.

The violence grew worse. In February of this year, the guerrillas raided theAshaninka camp and killed 15 people. Most victims were women and children,because the men were able to run faster. Ashaninkas are no cowards, but they havea different way of waging war. They rely on surprise attacks and ambushes, and theconcept of territorial defense is alien to them. If attacked, they will run until theythink they have outdistanced the attackers. Then they will counterambush.


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In the days that followed, the Ashaninkas managed to ambush and kill about adozen guerrillas, but they suffered even more casualties. Shattered, they dispersedinto the forest in small groups. MARIANO WAS TOLD by informers that if hereturned to the jungle, the Shining Path would kill him in a way that would leave alasting impression on the Ashaninka memory. He had been joined in Satipo byMichel Saenz, a French explorer who had lived among the Ashaninkas, spoke theirlanguage, wore the native robes and went barefoot. His emotional attachment tothe Indians rivaled Mariano's.

The Americans began to help them, beginning a brief relationship that would soonunravel. Mariano befriended the head of the United States Special Forces group inMazamari. At first, Mariano saw them as a godsend. Desperate to save theAshaninkas, he did not foresee conflicts with the United States agenda of the waron drugs.

In mid-March, two American helicopters dropped him and Michel Saenz off at asettlement of Ashaninkas that the Frenchman knew well. The group's leader wasclearly worried that the pair's presence put his group in danger of retribution by theShining Path. A few days later, the helicopters picked them up. Flying back to thebase in Mazamari, they passed over the mission airstrip, and Mariano was horrifiedto see that it had been bombed during the brief time he was in the jungle. Herealized then that the same people who were ferrying him were responsible. (TheAmericans would later say that Mariano had once asked them to destroy the strip,as a way of hampering drug traffickers. He denies it.)

Now, there was no place for a plane to land in the Cutivireni area. "My God!" hewrote that day in his diary, "how much work and sweat went there! More than oneyear's toil, and now if the Americans don't help us, how are we going to get in?"

Two days later, the helicopters carried Mariano and Saenz to a place where thepriest hoped some mission refugee families were. He was right. They found Nicolasand Matias, the community's leaders, and other familiar faces. Uncharacteristically,the Ashaninkas gave free rein to their anguish, crying while they embraced thepriest.

As they recounted their tragedies, Mariano saw how thin and gaunt they were. Hedecided to stay with them, believing that as long as he remained, some peoplewould care about their fate. Two days later, the Americans returned and picked upSaenz, who said he would go to Lima for help. He and Marino agreed it was vital to

obtain some shotguns for the natives, who, armed mostly with bows and arrows,were easy prey for the Shining Path.

Every day, more families arrived, as they learned of Mariano's return, and byMarch 27, nearly 300 Ashaninkas were at the camp. The mood was dark. Theyknew that the Shining Path was aware of Mariano's presence and that an attack wasimminent. Those who had escaped from the guerrillas were the most afraid. Their


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testimonies about the heavy-handed indoctrination and brutal discipline werechilling.

Alarmed by the extent of Shining Path strength in the valley, Mariano decided toreturn to Mazamari to seek help. He contacted the base with the two-way radio he

had brought with him, and was told he would be picked up shortly.

In the meantime, he tried to improve morale and made plans for a fortified town.On March 29, Mariano, Matias and some other Ashaninkas hiked to a steep rockyhill that they thought would be an ideal place for building. When the inspection wasover, Mariano, a slower walker, decided to return to camp first.

Soon after he arrived, there was a sudden commotion. Women and children wailed,and ran around in a panic. They told Mariano that Rigoberto, an Ashaninka whohad become a feared guerrilla, and three other armed men were headed toward thesite Mariano had just left and where Matias still was. Bellowing commands, thepriest sent most of the men to rescue Matias, organized the rest in two ambushparties and sent the women and children to safer ground. He then positionedhimself with a pistol and two hand grenades he had brought from Mazamari.

The encounter on the rocky hill was brief. Matias's group fell on the guerrillas,killing Rigoberto and another rebel. A third tumbled over a cliff, into the abyss. Thefourth escaped. When the men came back, Mariano praised the fighters andchastised one who had hesitated to use his weapon. Now the priest was a militaryleader.

A heavy storm moved in that night, and the Indians thought they heard the spiritsof the dead rebels wailing in the rain. After waiting all the next day for the

American helicopter, Mariano was told by radio that it had crashed. It wasn'tknown when another helicopter could pick him up.

The Ashaninkas decided to flee. They thought the Shining Path was going to wipethem out at any moment and they were almost mad with fear. They wanted toescape to another mountain, much farther away. There was water there, and fieldsto cultivate manioc. And because it was difficult terrain even for an Ashaninka, thelikelihood of a Shining Path attack was lessened. Mariano resisted the idea, thenrelented.

At least 230 people began a five-day trek through rainy, slippery jungle up to the

mountain called Tzibokiroato. They ran out of food the second day, and, aftereating worms -- "green and hairy," Mariano remembers them -- the priest suffereddebilitating diarrhea. Throughout the hellish journey, the Ashaninkas kept an evendisposition. "Without a doubt, they are the Lord's chosen," the priest wrote in hisdiary. When they finally reached the mountain in a storm, he saw that an advanceparty had almost finished a thatched hut for him. He was overwhelmed by thistestimony of love and care.


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Tzibokiroato could be defended. Most important, the Ashaninkas could carve ashort landing strip on the plateau at the summit. For a few days, the priest and therefugees enjoyed the idea of a new beginning. Still, the fear of an all-out ShiningPath attack remained. Mariano thought the natives needed to be trained interritorial defense.

He radioed his new position, and on April 10 a Peruvian Air Force helicopter cameto get him. Michel Saenz and Luc Adins were waiting in Mazamari. Saenz hadbrought food and medicine, and some rudimentary shotguns would arrive later. Allthree felt it was necessary to help the natives adapt to the new place, and theywaited for the American helicopters to take them back to Tzibokiroato. THE TRIPWAS NOT to happen. Instead, Mariano received a letter from Father Felix Saiz, hisFranciscan superior, ordering him to Lima immediately. Mariano stayed inMazamari. Six days later, Father Felix's message was repeated: Mariano was toboard an American supply plane that was returning to the capital. This time, he hadno choice.

In Los Descalzos convent in Lima, Mariano had a long talk with Father Felix, aSpaniard of lively expression and intelligence. Their exchange, while not bitter,reflected a centuries-old debate in the Catholic church.

Was Mariano's presence helpful or harmful to the natives? Felix asked. Marianoargued that, all things considered, it was helpful. Wouldn't it be better if the nativeswere left alone to decide their own fate? the Franciscan leader said. That, Marianosnapped, would be tantamount to handing them over to the Shining Path.

Father Felix then said he had heard from the American Embassy that Mariano hadlost his sense of proportion, that he was organizing guerrilla units. This wasn't the

church's calling and would put all missions in Peru, and the church itself, injeopardy, Felix said. The embassy had also implied that Mariano was responsiblefor the loss of the downed helicopter and had otherwise cost the United StatesGovernment a lot of money.

The Franciscans didn't oppose self-defense in principle. But practicing it, especiallywith a priest in charge, could only make things worse, Mariano's superior argued.Many priests and nuns at the jungle missions in Peru survived through the dailycrafting of a volatile coexistence with the Shining Path. They had to give food to thecommissars, and watch helplessly as people were led to their deaths. At onemission, the guerrillas killed an uncooperative nun. Some missions couldn't take it

anymore, and were closed. At others, priests and nuns braved great danger everyday. They would be hostages if Mariano led a war.

Mariano no doubt knew of another Franciscan concern: reports of human-rightsabuses by the Peruvian military. It was feared that if a priest was in league with thearmed forces in any way, the cooperation might blunt the church's efforts to pressfor reforms.


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Left unsaid was the wider perspective, held by many Franciscans. They believedthat the natives were lost, that they would probably disappear as a culture as somany other indigenous peoples have throughout history. And there wasn't muchthe church could do, except to trim sails or to retreat altogether -- as it had donebefore in other times of rebellion. It would wait for peace to return, then resume itsministry with those who were left.

Mariano accepted none of this, and took the lack of an explicit church prohibitionas tacit permission to continue his struggle.

He needed a ride back to Mazamari. Despite his growing rift with the Americans,he called the United States Army attache, Col. Robert Froude, who had helped himtransport supplies in the past. Colonel Froude told him no planes or helicopterswere flying there for several days at least.

The next day, Mariano managed to hitch a ride to Mazamari on a bank's privateplane. He arrived there a few minutes before the American helicopters did. And hewas told that the supply plane had come that morning and had just left.

The next day, Mariano returned to the base in Mazamari, determined to fly toTzibokiroato with the two Europeans, Luc Adins and Michel Saenz. But right beforea helicopter was to take off, he was told that neither he nor Saenz would be allowedto board. Only Adins was allowed to take off.

The Belgian had begun supplying the Americans with intelligence after theyrescued him from the burned mission in November 1989. For his part, he says thatmore than anything he wanted to get back to help the Ashaninkas. "In themeantime," Adins said of the Americans, "they used me."

Mariano's falling-out with the American Embassy was to some extent a result of hisown impetuousness. But he was also the victim of the Americans' involvement inthe drug war, and their desire for information about the threat the Shining Pathposed to the United States advisers in Mazamari. When Mariano's goals appearedto conflict with the embassy's, the Americans stopped helping him and began tocooperate with people they thought were more reliable and useful.

Embassy officials said Adins was realistic and dependable, while Mariano wantedto drag American assets into a Peruvian internal war. "He wanted the Americans toprovide weapons to the Ashaninkas," an embassy official said, "and that once he

and Michel had organized them, that we use the U.S. helicopters in the event of aSendero attack. That was their hope and their game plan."

In May, Mariano wrote a letter to the United States Ambassador, AnthonyQuainton, challenging some accusations the embassy officials had been making,including the claim that he was responsible for the helicopter accident. Quaintonanswered in July, expressing his "highest regard and admiration" for Mariano anddenying that the embassy held him responsible "for any costs to the United States


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Government." By that time, the Army Special Forces had finished its work, and theAmericans -- and their helicopters -- were no longer in Mazamari.

Without a helicopter, getting to the natives' bastion in Tzibokiroato was difficult.But Michel Saenz, in an extraordinary feat, flew to the other side of the Andes,

crossed the high peaks by foot and walked all the way to Tzibokiroato. As soon ashe arrived, he and the Ashaninkas began carving an airstrip. It was finished in mid-July. Soon thereafter, a local pilot, Armando Velarde, flew Mariano to Tzibokiroato.IN AUGUST, MARIANO left Tzibokiroato to go to Lima for more help and to drawattention to the Ashaninkas. I accompanied him on his return to the Ene Valley inearly September.

On Sept. 10, two days after our unsuccessful flight over Tzibokiroato, which wasnow in the hands of the Shining Path, a Peruvian Air Force helicopter took us to thenew Ashaninka refuge farther east. It was called Maiobenti, which in Ashaninkameans "where it is impossible to pass."

The helicopter descended toward a rocky riverbed between two steep forests. Wecircled the hillsides a couple of times but saw no signs of life. Then I saw about 60Ashaninkas standing amid the rocks and boulders. They had materialized out of theforest in no time.

We jumped out of the helicopter, and Mariano embraced some of the natives. Withthe helicopter engine still roaring, the priest, all fire and action now, conferred witha small group. They listened intently, and then one native and Mariano boarded thehelicopter. They took off, leaving me behind.

I stayed with the Ashaninkas for about 20 minutes. Very young women nursed

babies; they were feeding intensely, as if to quicken the pace of life. When thehelicopter came to fetch me, neither Mariano nor the Indian were on board. As thepilot began the return trip, I asked him where they were. He pointed behind, to thefading Maiobenti mountains.

I reflected on what I had seen. When the people saw Mariano, their expressionsseemed a mixture of joy and pain. They obviously loved him and expected helpfrom him. But they also knew that the Shining Path would attack with a vengeanceas soon as they learned of his presence. And the Ashaninkas had probablyconcluded by now that their priest's noble intentions were greater than his means.MARIANO HOPED TO persuade the Ashaninkas to stand their ground. But they

had no more fight left. They told him that about 400 guerrillas attacked them inTzibokiroato in mid-August, soon after he left to go for help in Lima. The ShiningPath, now an equal mixture of hardened Andean rebels and Ashaninka natives, hadoverpowered them after an all-night climb and burned most of the new huts. Therebels also sabotaged the landing strip, and would have annihilated the refugees if asmall party of Ashaninkas had not ambushed their enemy's rear guard. About 20guerrillas died, including Claudia -- Nicolas's sister -- and some other Ashaninkaconverts. The natives fled from Tzibokiroato, but it was not long before the Shining


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Path found them and attacked again. Some of the Ashaninkas were killed, and therest broke up into small groups and fled into the forest.

The Shining Path now controlled most Ashaninka communities. From about 500families, the rebels could mobilize at least 1,000 natives, and it didn't matter

whether they were eager or reluctant fighters.

The refugees, by contrast, now totaled 213. They had 18 shotguns with scantammunition and a few hand grenades, which Mariano had brought them. And theywere starving because they hadn't been able to tend their manioc fields for almost ayear. Hunting was poor, and they subsisted mainly on snails and worms.

They had decided to try to escape over the Andes, to the territory of theMachiguenga, 125 miles east beyond the mountains. They knew that only the fithad a chance to make it, so they decided they had to kill the babies and youngerchildren, and to leave the infirm behind.

Mariano told them that he would try to arrange the exodus, if they promised not toresort to infanticide. They agreed, and he contacted the Peruvian Air Force byradio. He asked for an airlift, to carry the refugees over the Andes peaks to theUrubamba River Valley. The air force answered the next day that it couldn't help,and would return only to pick up Mariano.

But Armando Velarde, the young private pilot who had aided Mariano in the past,signaled that he was willing to help with his little Cessna. So, Mariano and thenatives decided to march back up to Tzibokiroato, where a plane could land, and totry to hold it for four to five days until Velarde could fly them out. They hoped theguerrillas would need longer to mount an all-out attack.

They began the trek, fortified by a breakfast of invertebrates as well as somecondensed milk, which Mariano brought with him. It was two days of endlessclimbing and precipitous descents. Heavy rain made the river crossings hazardous.For Mariano, it was a punishing ordeal. He suffered several painful falls andarrived at Tzibokiroato exhausted.

But the rising rivers proved a blessing, preventing the Shining Path from swiftlymoving to attack them. In one day, the Ashaninkas had fixed the crudemountaintop airstrip, and Armando Velarde managed to land his Cessna on theafternoon of Sept. 15.

He took Mariano back to Satipo, where they arranged an airlift of the refugees witha priest of the Dominican order, which ran the Catholic missions in theMachiguenga region where the refugees would resettle. Velarde would fly in andout of Tzibokiroato, with logistical help from a single-engine plane from Wings ofHope, a philanthropic organization. He would have to make the flights over the14,000-foot peaks without oxygen masks and navigational help. He also had to


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count on the weather to remain cloud-free, a remote possibility, since the Andescordillera stays cloudless for only a week or so a year.

The evacuation began early on the 16th, and on the very first flight, disaster almoststruck. Unknown to anyone, part of the Cessna's tail stabilizer broke as Velarde

landed in Tzibokiroato. When taking off with the first group of Ashaninka women,the plane suddenly plunged into the abyss. Amid his passengers' screams, Velardethrottled the engine, pressed his knees tightly on the rudder control, and somehowmaneuvered the plane out of the canyon. He headed to Mazamari, instead of overthe Andes. "After two minutes, my legs were numb," Velarde said afterward. "After10 to 15 minutes, the pain seemed unbearable." The flight took 35 minutes, andafter an emergency landing, he rolled out onto the ground, racked by nausea andstomach cramps. But the plane was repaired, and he was ready to fly again.

The next day, he made 20 trips across the Andes, carrying five or six natives fromTzibokiroato each time. Winds were strong, increasing the danger. The next day, hemade 22 flights, and on the third he finished the evacuation. Wings of Hope madetwo flights to Tzibokiroato, but mainly ferried fuel for Velarde's Cessna. Themountains, normally swathed in clouds, remained clear for three consecutive days.Some thought it was a miracle. "What do you think a priest is for?" Mariano asked,using an unprintable adjective.

Almost all the refugees -- 169 people -- had been evacuated. The few remainingchose not to go. They dispersed, saying they would make the trek another time. TheAshaninkas relocated to Machiguenga land were greeted warmly and given alargely unoccupied territory upriver. The prospect of settling down, of plantingmanioc and of forgetting the bloodshed, at least for a while, made them happy.

With broad smiles and sunny faces, they set off up the river on Sept. 22. Theywaved to Mariano, who, after 22 years, was finally leaving his mission and theAshaninkas, probably forever. The people would now be under the care of theDominican order, which wanted a clean break between them and their priest.

He waved goodbye, vision and remembrance mingled together. He saw Matias andNicolas, and Capitan, who had lost his wife and three daughters to the war, andthen remembered Mario Zumaeta and Roy Ponce and all the others. And as he bidfarewell, he cried, and as he thanked God, he mourned.

the flight of the ashaninkas

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