BY ELAINE DE VALLE


Exile army's last mission.  As members die off, Brigade 2506 tries to remain alive



   Bay of Pigs veteran Félix Rodríguez Mendigutía paused nine times in the past two months to remember fellow freedom fighters each time he heard another had died.

    There was Segundo Borges, 98, governor of the Las Villas province in pre-Castro Cuba; Ovidio Cuesta, 87, who had retired to Rhode Island; Lorenzo Nodarse, 64, whose relatives said his only regret was his failure to outlive Fidel Castro; and Felipe GuillermoToledo Niebla, a squadron leader in the 1961 invasion.

    Gone, too, are Manuel Vietes Rey, whose participation in the invasion is noted in the book Traición 1961; Manuel Lago, 66, who died too poor to pay for a wake or a casket; Adrián Vidal, 74, who settled in Tampa's Cuban community, and Manuel Garrandés García, 67, who was buried Friday.  
    (Click here     and see the picture of the Brigade's MARTYRS)

    The hardest loss was that of Juan Pérez Franco, the group's six-time president and one of its most dedicated leaders, whose death in September left Rodríguez in charge of the struggling Bay of Pigs Veterans Association. ''He was an exceptional colleague, a tireless fighter for the Cuban cause,'' Rodríguez said.  "Nobody dedicated more time and effort to keep the association alive and active.''

    Time has nicked and chipped at the organization as members of Brigade 2506 -- the small army of exiles that invaded Cuba in the ill-fated, CIA-backed 1961 mission -- die off. Since the August death of former Radio Martí director Antonio ''Tony'' Navarro -- who wrote a book on his underground activities in Cuba before, during and after the invasion -- the pace has been quicker than the average one member a month, said Esteban Bovo Caras, a former B-26 pilot and the group's secretary and membership director.

    A total of 3,082 people participated in the mission. In addition to the nearly 1,300 infantrymen who landed on the beach, the group also includes naval and air force personnel, support staff, members of the ''second wave'' -- which never left Florida -- members of ''infiltration teams,'' Cubans on the island and American citizens who joined the ad-hoc force.

    Today, membership in the veterans' group is about a third of that -- and of those, only about 30 to 40 are actively involved, Bovo said. These days, the biweekly board meetings are as much about helping pay medical or utility bills for an ailing veteran as furthering the cause of a free Cuba.

    ''We already feel it,'' said former squad leader Juan Torres Mena, 68, about the void that grows with each passing funeral. ``But we have to go on. It is a dilemma.''

    To give the group renewed vigor, members recruit descendants of brigadistas -- as well as unrelated, but like-minded Cuban Americans.

    ''We have to prepare for a time when we are no longer here,'' said Bovo Caras, 65. ``Our historic and personal effects are being turned over to our sons and daughters.''

    Said Torres: ``Though we know it will never be the same, it will at least continue.''


    LESS PASSION FROM KIDS

    It's not a unique problem. Some Veterans of Foreign Wars and American Legion posts nationwide are also seeing their members die off.

    ''Most of these guys were in their 20s or early 30s when they went to Playa Girón,'' said Jaime Suchlicki, a University of Miami professor and director of the school's Institute for Cuban and Cuban American Studies.

    Suchlicki said that allowing Brigade families to join may keep the museum and library housed at the organization's Little Havana headquarters open, and keep the group active as a humanitarian and social organization. But he predicted that the organization's influence in the community and among politicians will eventually diminish.

    "Some of the children will carry on in the memory of the parents, but they do not feel the same. The years pass, and the people who were the stronger militants disappear.''

    It may be difficult, though, to recruit new generations.

    Torres' two sons speak Spanish. ''But their hearts are not in this,'' said the man, one of two employees who open and close the museum six days a week. "They live in Naples. They feel American.''

    Still, some relatives feel a magnetic pull to the organization. Bovo said nearly 200 of the 1,100 or so members are family or associate members. They include John Smithies Fernández, born in Pennsylvania but raised in Cuba, who had two uncles -- José Ignacio Macía and Manuel Rionda -- killed in the invasion.

    ''I've always wanted to join, and I think that what drove me was precisely the death of Mr. Pérez Franco,'' said Smithies, 61, a Miami-Dade employee who works at the airport. ``The Brigade should go on. The ones that are the second generation need to be the guardians of that history. It is . . . probably the most important moment of the exile era, and it should not be erased -- just as the U.S. should never forget people who fought in the Second World War, like my dad.''

    One of his uncles, Macía, was among nine men who suffocated in a sweltering tractor trailer that took many captured exiles to prison.

    "He was suffocated to death. That is why I will never forget him or the people who died with him. It's important for me to remember that.''


    RUNNING OUT OF MONEY

      Smithies said the group needs his moral and financial support. And the association admits it is cash-poor. Besides losing members, it has lost more than $100,000 in grants since 2001, nearly forcing it to close its doors at Brigada House, 1821 SW Ninth St., where photos and artifacts -- weapons, bullets, uniforms, government documents, rosaries fashioned from a prison bench -- are on display.

    Rodríguez, the president, and Vice President Nilo Messer told The Herald that fewer than half of the members pay the annual $60 dues.

    There are ''older members who don't have money sometimes to take care of themselves,'' Messer said. He said the group had bought 20 cemetery plots to give indigent brigadistas a proper memorial. ``They die and they don't have a place to be buried.''

    Miami City Commissioner Joe Sánchez gave the organization a $5,000 check in October to keep the museum and library open. The group also seeks county, state and federal grants to maintain the museum and library.

    Operating costs are about $5,000 a month, veterans say.

    One expense seems to have grown: Each grieving family is given a new $25 Cuban flag to drape over the coffin of the veteran and later keep.

    Sánchez hopes the community will step up:

    "It's really sad, you know? Because we have so many influential, successful, wealthy Cuban Americans in our community that could make sure that their doors stay open and that we're able to continue to exhibit what the Brigade 2506 was and did.

    "If the younger generation does not start getting involved, the group is going to be extinct. History is going to be erased.''

    But even if and when the children and grandchildren of brigadistas decide to carry the torch, they won't shine as much light on history as those who were there, whose friends died in their arms, said Emilio Herrero.

    In '61, he manned a machine gun during the attack. Today the marketing analyst lives in Boca Raton.

    Recently Herrero visited the veterans' headquarters just to buy a cap with the association's logo on it.

    ''The grave concern of those who were there, not only who fought but who spent 22 months in jail -- you can't buy that in a bottle,'' he said. "It is very sad. But it's something we have to face.''