In my entry "History of Mindanao, Part XIII" I discussed the withdrawal of the last Spanish soldiers in 1899. Unlike most Spanish withdrawals the last one took place in an orderly fashion with a handoff of power that was achieved in an absolutely orderly fashion. From 1899 to 1902, while the rest of the Philippines was at war with the Americans the Sultunate of Sulu had managed to come to an accomadation with the Americans with a few notable exceptions. From 1906 onwards though, Jolo Island, the main island in the Sulu Archipelago (which includes both Basilan and Tawi Tawi) was as peaceful as peaceful gets.
In 1911 this would change after a sinle, particularly attack by a "Juramentado," the era's equivalent to a Suicide Bomber. A properspective Juramentado fasts, prays, shaves every hair on his body including his eyebrows, and then attempts to kill as many non-Muslims as possible. The initial Juramentado attack in 1911, against a First Lieutenant, Walter H.Rodney is discussed in the following excerpt culled from the book, "Moroland, 1899 to 1906: America's First Attempt to Transform an Islamic Society," by Robert A.Fulton (Bend,Oregon:2009) which was written by a veteran of the American Diplomatic Service who served in the Philippines during the 1960s.
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Sunday, April 16th, 1911, 1Lt.Walter H.Rodney, a recently arrived officer of the 6th US Calvary, was out for a stroll with his 5 year old daughter on a wide boulevard outside the walls of the Jolo garrison. As the pair walked by a coxkpit (STADIUM FOR COCK FIGHTING) thronged with excited, screaming spectators watching a cockfight, a lone young male Tausug approached from the opposite direction. As they passed one another, the Tausug suddenly pulled a barong (INDIGENOUS FORM OF SWORD) from his shirt and whirled about, and repeatedly slashed the hapless officer about the head and shoulders. Rodney staggered to the side of the road, mortally wounded. His daughter, though traumatized, was left unharmed as the man quickly discarded his weapon and attempted to hide in the nearby crowd. Cries of "Juramentado" went up from the cockpit and hundreds ran for the safety of the guarded village gate. The commanding officer of the garrison by chance only a few yards (METERS) away in a passing carriage yelled for the gate sentries, who, assisted by the crowd, confronted the assailant and shot him to death. Three days later, at the Asturias guardhouse at the opposite end of the road, the Seargant of the Guard began to search two young Moros for weapons, when both suddenly drew barongs from hiding and killed him instantly. Another guard shot both men, killing one and mortally wounding the other.
This was the first such incident in Jolo, and General Pershing concluded that, whilr Rodney's death was infortunate, the real blame lay with the newly arrived garrison commander who had failed to enforce a long standing order that no officers or men were permitted to go outside the garrison walls unless armed. Not only Rodney, but the commanding officer himself and several others nearby officers had been unarmed and might have been able to intervene. But to their dismay, in reporting on the incident the American press faulted Pershing and Bell, claiming that they had been too "soft and weak" on the Moros. It turned out that a few Americans in the Philippines had anonymously written Rodney's father, a retired Army General, falsely claiming that the real reason Rodney and the others had been unar$ed was due to a direct order from Pershing forbidding them to carry weapons. The letters further claimed that Pershing had caved into pressure from the datus. In his grief, Rodney's father had written angry letters to the Taft Administration and members of Congress over the "supidity" and the "calumny" of the "civil government" of Moroland. Uncharacteristically and for reasons unclear, Pershing panicked and reacted to outside pressure even though his superiors fully supported him and knew the accusations to be false. Over the astonished objections of the Constabulary and Scouts, the vert people he relied upon to maintain public order,, on September 8th, 1911 Pershing issued Executive Order #24 ordering the total and immediate disarming of Moro Province, an action he had strongly opposed only a few weeks before.
Nearly all army officers who had previously served in Moroland thought Pershing was out of his mind, particularly since it specified not just a total ban on firearms but the carrying of any and all edged weapons of more than six inches in length. This struck at the very heart of Moro warrior culture and the reality that despite a formal American system of law and policing the average still looked upon his or her datu for protection, redress, and justice, not the Government. How ccould a datu enforce the traditional communal beliefs of right and wrong and preserve stability without arms? Even hardline Leonard Wood, now Army Chief of Staff, felt Pershing had bitten off more than he could chew. Holding out both a carrot and a stick, Pershing offered cash bounties on all proscribed weapons turned in before the end of 1911, but wuth the threat of heavy fines and incarceration for those caught with contraband weapons after that date. Those arrested were held indefinitely until relatives were able to raise money to pay the fines.
As expected the Moros were outraged and in many cases took out their anger at what they saw as the impotency of their headmen by switching allegiances to younger vocal, firebrands who nursed a growing sense of shame and outrage that the older generation of leaders had so willingly acquiesced to a long period of control by foreigners. Particularly restive were the Maranaos (MARANAW) of Lake lanao and the Tausugs of Jolo. Violent incidents between Americans and Moros multiplied resulting in a steady stream of small skirmishes in Lanao between the Constabulary and the Maranaos and the Second Battle of Bud Dajo on Jolo during Christmas week of 1911. Random shots fired at night into the Jolo garrison. Became so common that the wives and the dependents of the garrison were evacuated to Zamboanga (ZAMBOANGA CITY).
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