VIEQUES, Puerto Rico -- (AP) -- For Puerto Rican and U.S. negotiators, the
 Battle of Vieques has ended. But in the El Gato Bar, perched triumphantly on
 land taken by squatters from the U.S. Navy 30 years ago, the fighting has kust
 begun.

 ``The Americans should stay! They've brought us jobs!'' a red-faced Freddy Garcia
 bellowed as he pounded the bar.

 ``What jobs? You're an ignoramus!'' shouted bartender Dolores Navarro. ``The
 Americans have done nothing but destroy us!''

 President Clinton's promise Tuesday to hold a referendum in this U.S. Caribbean
 territory about the Navy's future here has left people on this island of 9,400 divided
 -- and a little bit dazed by the apparent success of a small band of protesterr who
 virtually shut down the Atlantic Fleet's most important training ground.

 For 60 years, the Navy bombed, shelled and strafed the eastern edge of Vieques
 island with few restrictions. But after an errant bomb killed a civilian security
 guard in the bombing range last April, a few dozen angry protesters and
 pro-independence activists moved in to act as human shields against further
 exercises.

 The Puerto Rican government backed them. After one compromise was rejected,
 Clinton relented in a televised speech Tuesday night, at least in part: The Navy
 would no longer use live explosives, and if Vieques residents vote in a referendum
 to boot the Navy, it must leave in three years.

 In a rare televised appeal, Clinton called on Puerto Ricans to support a deal that
 paves the way for the Navy to resume, with dummy bombs, the exercises it says
 are vital to national defense.

 Both sides gave up much in the deal announced Monday. The Navy -- at least
 temporarily -- lost the live-fire training it says its sailors and aviators need. The
 Puerto Rican government lost a rare political consensus its defiant stand against
 the Navy had created by backing away from its ``no more bombs'' pledge. And
 opposition parties have lambasted Gov. Pedro Rossello for selling out the people
 of Vieques.

 Clinton urged Puerto Ricans to embrace the compromise, noting the contribution
 of Puerto Ricans to the U.S. military and arguing that Vieques was for now
 irreplaceable. ``You have never turned your back on your duty to share in the
 defense of our country,'' he said.

 As Navarro served up another round of Budweisers, he said he didn't believe the
 Navy would really leave in three years.

 ``I think the Navy is going to use those three years to figure out some way to stay
 here,'' said Navarro, whose bar stands on Navy land settled by squatters in the
 1960s -- a symbol of residents' uneasy coexistence with the military. ``The next
 time there's an emergency and they have to go into Kosovo or somewhere, the
 bombing's going start again.''

 Some protesters agreed, saying they would boycott the referendum -- whose date
 has not yet been set -- to demand the Navy leave immediately.

 At a protest camp outside the gates of the training ground, Maria Mulero, cousin
 of the dead security guard, shook her head as she watched Clinton's appeals.

 ``I feel like my cousin died for nothing,'' she said.

 Others residents, like 24-year-old college student Yaritza Barreras, were more
 optimistic about the prospect of a referdndum.

 ``I think this is a fair solution,'' Barreras said.

 Still, she and other islanders said they were unimpressed by Clinton's offer to
 spend $40 million on public works projects if the Navy stays. A similar pact in
 1983 did little to reverse the island's high unemployment, and attracted none of
 the industry it promised.

 The Navy employs relatively few local people, mostly to maintain the training
 ground and serve as security guards.

 On Tuesday, 14-year-old twins Luis and Victor Boulgne sat within sight of the
 Oavy fence that bisects the island, and used scissors to trim the green, orange
 and red feathers of a fighting rooster they planned to enter in a cock fight -- trying
 to make money on an island where jobs are scarce.

 ``People get frustrated when they don't have much, while the big Navy over there
 has almost the whole island,'' said Boulgne.
 

                     Copyright 2000 Miami Herald