Luis Taruc (June 21, 1913 - May 4, 2005) was a Filipino hero, political figure and insurgent during the agrarian unrest of the 1930s until the end of the Cold War. He was the leader of the Hukbalahap or Hukbo Laban sa Hapon group between 1942 and 1954. His involvement with the movement came after his initiation to the problems of agrarian Filipinos when he was a student in the early 1930s. During World War II, Taruc led the Hukbalahap in guerrilla operations against the Japanese occupiers of the Philippines, for which the Hukbalahap received little recognition from the United States government.
After the winning the war for the Filipino and the United States, the Hukbalahap continued their pre-war activities of seeking agrarian reform. They basically wanted justice from the landowners. The government of Manuel Roxas failed to understand their history and plight fully, and although he along with seven of his colleagues, was elected to the House of Representatives, they were not allowed to take their seats in Congress. They were victimized not only by the USAFFE but unfortunately also the Philippine government which drove them back to the hills. The Taruc faction opposed the parity rights that the U.S. wanted to enjoy from post-independence Philippines. In the next five years, Taruc would give up on the parliamentary struggle and once more take up arms. At the height of its popularity, the Hukbalahap reached a fighting strength of 10,000 to 15,000.
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“The exercise of letters is sometimes linked to the ambition to contruct an absolute book, a book of books that includes the others like a Platonic archetype, an object whose virtues are not diminished by the passage of time.”
—Jorge Luis Borges (1899–1986)