The Hawk Broken. By Daniela Seves Rodriguez. Since 1209, the Catholic Church has celebrated the real presence of the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ on a feast day known by its Latin name, Corpus Christi. This celebration does not fall on a fixed date. It is a date that shifts according to Holy Week, as it is celebrated 60 days after Easter Sunday. Therefore, the Thursday following those sixty days is known as Corpus Christi Thursday, when in addition to the adoration of the blessed sacrament, there is usually a procession through the streets of the cities, carrying the monstrance with the utmost care and fervor. As a Spanish proverb says, there are three Thursdays in the year that shine brighter than the sun: Holy Thursday, Corpus Christi Thursday, and Ascension Day. The year was 1971, and the churches of what was then the Federal District, with their ringing bells, invited the faithful to attend the celebrations that afternoon of June 10, which, according to the liturgical calendar of that year, corresponded to the celebration of Corpus Christi. In the sacristies, the most beautiful monstrances shown, which would serve as a safeguard for the consecrated host. The acolytes prepared the incense, as well as the white palliums and corporals that accompanied the diamond chasubles. Meanwhile, that afternoon at the official residence of Los Pinos, President Luis E. Alvarez would have an early meeting with the head of the Secretariat of Hydraulic Resources, Leandro Roverosa Wade, and staff from that secretariat, where they would analyze in detail projects for the renewal of the drinking water system of the Capitol. The regent of the Capitol, Alfonso Martinez Domínguez, would also be present at said meeting. Meanwhile, in the streets of Mexico City, students from the two main universities, UNAM and the Polytechnic, along with a host of other young people from various institutions, had called for a rally after a week of intense demonstrations and activism. They wanted to support the demands and denounce the abuses suffered by students of the Autonomous University of Nuevo León in their protests for equal opportunities and the participation of professors and students in their proposed organic law. The rally was to begin at the Santo Tomas campus and proceed to the Zocalo, the main square of the capital, to express their opinions and rejection of what had happened in Nuevo León. The march was scheduled to start at four in the afternoon, but the commotion was already noticeable by midday. A peaceful afternoon was not expected for motorists in the sprawling metropolis, nor for the average pedestrian on a typical Thursday in Mexico City. The student demonstration, along with the processions from various parishes, suggested that one should carefully consider the route home from work or to run errands missed during the day. Above all, the embers of 1968 were still fresh, and this demonstration revived memories and feelings that remained raw within the collective consciousness. Although it was a peaceful march, the general staff and the Mexico City Police and Transit Department would seek ways to dissuade the march through mutual persuasion. While the president, in his usual governing style, reviewed each plan presented to him for the projects, and in the parishes the Panj Lingua, or the Tantum Ergo, was heard along with the sound of bells and the smell of incense that elevated the spirit in divine communion. The student march was growing through the city streets, watched by the authorities who were making an ever-increasing attempt to convince those students not to continue with their mission. After several blocks upon reaching San Cosmi, the authorities ordered them to abandon their objective and withdraw, an instruction that was not heeded, so the group continued advancing. The chronicles tell that a few blocks further on, to be exact at the Cosmos Cinema, some unidentified buses with personnel inside had been stationed, who, upon seeing that the march continued, started their engines and moved towards the students. And that's when the unimaginable began. Young men of athletic build and similar haircuts descended from the buses, carrying, among other things, swords and katanas. Displaying their martial arts skills, they attacked the students who were running or seeking refuge in the surrounding area. It seemed like a scene from the recent Oriental films so popular in the early 70s. The situation spiraled out of control because, strategically placed in trash cans, there were also firearms which they detonated. These young men, skilled in martial arts and trained specifically as a paramilitary shock group, were known as the Hawks, and that day was their debut into society. They say that at Los Pinos the presidential telephone would ring and the president would leave the meeting for a few moments to go and answer it in his private office. He could be heard using a loud tone of voice and giving instructions, but he would return and continue without any exception. The meeting ended at approximately seven in the evening, the same time that the violent pandemonium subsided, and the blessed sacrament was placed in the tabernacle after being adored. Another bloody and regrettable event had occurred in our history. The wounded were taken to the Ruben Lenero Hospital, the Red Cross of the National Army, and the Green Cross. The number of dead and wounded remained in presidential silence, and on the tombstone that hours later would be closed with the public resignation of Alfonso Martinez Domínguez from the capital's regency. Rogilio Flores Curial as chief of police, the disappearance of the Alcones group, and the political realignment that Echeveria achieved by displacing figures from the Diaz-Ordaz orbit who were sidelined to make way for this personal style of governing, as Daniel Cozio Villegas called it. The Halcanazo on a bloody corpus Christi Thursday, a stigma etched in the flesh of the Mexican people. Where the former president completely disassociated himself from the events, nothing was ever clarified about it, nor was he brought to justice. In 2009, he was exonerated of any charges and crimes of genocide.