(Redirected from Che Guevera)
'Ernesto Guevara de la Serna' (
June 14,
â
October 9,
1967), commonly known as 'Che Guevara,' 'El Che' or just 'Che' was an
Argentine-born
Marxist revolutionary,
political figure, and leader of
Cuban and
internationalist guerrillas.
As a young man studying
medicine, Guevara traveled rough throughout
South America, bringing him into direct contact with the impoverished conditions in which many people lived. His experiences and observations during these trips led him to the conclusion that the region's socio-economic inequalities could only be remedied by revolution, prompting him to intensify his study of
Marxism and travel to
Guatemala to learn about the reforms being implemented there by President
Jacobo Arbenz GuzmĂĄn.
While in
Mexico in 1956, Guevara joined
Fidel Castro's
revolutionary 26th of July Movement, which seized power from the regime of the dictator
[2] General
Fulgencio Batista in
Cuba in 1959. In the months after the success of the
revolution, Guevara was assigned the role of "supreme prosecutor", overseeing the trials and executions of hundreds of suspected war criminals from the previous regime.
[3] After serving in various important posts in the new government and writing a number of articles and books on the theory and practice of
guerrilla warfare, Guevara left Cuba in 1965 with the intention of fomenting revolutions first in
Congo-Kinshasa, and then in
Bolivia, where he was captured in a military operation supported by the
CIA and the
U.S. Army Special Forces.
[4]
Guevara was
summarily executed by the
Bolivian Army in the town of
La Higuera near
Vallegrande on
October 9,
1967.
[5]
After his death, Guevara became an icon of
socialist revolutionary movements and a key figure of modern
pop culture worldwide. An
Alberto Korda photo of him (shown) has received wide distribution and modification, appearing on
t-shirts,
protest banners, and in many other formats. The
Maryland Institute College of Art called this picture "the most famous photograph in the world and a symbol of the 20th century."
[6]
Family heritage and early life
Ernesto Guevara de la Serna was born in
Rosario,
Argentina, the eldest of five children in a family of
Spanish and
Irish descent; both his father and mother were of
Basque ancestry. One of Guevara's forebears, Patrick Lynch, was born in
Galway,
Ireland, in 1715. He left for
Bilbao,
Spain, and traveled from there to Argentina. Francisco Lynch (Guevara's great-grandfather) was born in 1817, and Ana Lynch (his grandmother) in 1868. Her son, Ernesto Guevara Lynch (Guevara's father) was born in 1900. Guevara Lynch married Celia de la Serna y Llosa in 1927 (one of her non-lineal ancestors was
José de la Serna e Hinojosa, Spanish
viceroy of Peru), and they had three sons and two daughters. ]]Growing up in this
leftist-leaning ''déclassé'' family of
aristocratic lineage, Ernesto Guevara became known for his dynamic personality and radical perspective even as a boy. He idolized
Francisco Pizarro and yearned to have been one of his soldiers.
[7] Though suffering from the crippling bouts of
asthma that were to afflict him throughout his life, he excelled as an athlete. He was an avid
rugby union player despite his handicap and earned himself the nickname "Fuser" — a contraction of "El Furibundo" ("The Raging") and his mother's surname, "Serna" — for his aggressive style of play. Ernesto was nicknamed "Chancho" ("pig") by his schoolmates because he rarely bathed, something he was rather proud of.
[8]
Guevara on a ''
burro'' at the age of 3
Guevara learned
chess from his father and began participating in local tournaments by the age of 12.
[9] During his adolescence, he became passionate about poetry, especially that of
Pablo Neruda. Guevara, as is common practice among Latin Americans of his class, also wrote poems throughout his life. He was an enthusiastic and eclectic reader, with interests ranging from adventure classics by
Jack London,
Emilio Salgari and
Jules Verne to essays on
sexuality by
Sigmund Freud and treatises on social philosophy by
Bertrand Russell. In his late teens, he developed a keen interest in photography and spent many hours photographing people, places and, during later travels,
archaeological sites.
In 1948 Guevara entered the
University of Buenos Aires to study medicine. As a student, he spent long periods traveling around
Latin America. In 1951 his older friend,
Alberto Granado, a
biochemist, suggested that Guevara take a year off from his medical studies to embark on a trip they had talked of making for years, traversing
South America. Guevara and the 29-year-old Granado soon set off from their hometown of
Alta Gracia astride a 1939
Norton 500 cc
motorcycle they named ''La Poderosa II'' ("The Mighty One, the Second") with the idea of spending a few weeks volunteering at the San Pablo
Leper colony in
Peru on the banks of the
Amazon River. Guevara narrated this journey in ''
The Motorcycle Diaries'', which was translated into English in 1996 and used in 2004 as the basis for a
motion picture of the same name, directed by
Walter Salles.
Witnessing the widespread poverty, oppression and disenfranchisement throughout Latin America, and influenced by his readings of Marxist literature, Guevara decided that the only solution for the regionâs inequalities was armed revolution. His travels and readings also led him to view Latin America not as a group of separate nations but as a single entity requiring a continent-wide strategy for liberation. His conception of a borderless, united
Ibero-America sharing a common '
mestizo' culture was a theme that would prominently recur during his later revolutionary activities. Upon returning to Argentina, he expedited the completion of his medical studies, completing his education as a medic in order to resume his travels in
Central and
South America and received his diploma on
12 June 1953.
Guatemala
On
7 July 1953, Guevara set out on a trip through
Bolivia,
Peru,
Ecuador,
Panama,
Costa Rica,
Nicaragua,
Honduras, and
El Salvador. During the final days of December 1953 he arrived in
Guatemala where President
Jacobo Arbenz GuzmĂĄn headed the second fully democratic and modern government in the whole latin american region that, through
land reform and other initiatives, was attempting to bring an end to the U.S.-dominated ''
latifundia'' system. In a contemporaneous letter to his Aunt Beatriz, Guevara explained his motivation for settling down for a time in Guatemala: "In Guatemala", he wrote, "I will perfect myself and accomplish whatever may be necessary in order to become a true revolutionary."
[10]
A map showing Che Guevara's movements between 1953 and 1956; including his trip north to Guatemala, his stay in Mexico and his journey east by boat to Cuba with
Fidel Castro and other revolutionaries
Shortly after reaching Guatemala City, Guevara acted upon the suggestion of a mutual friend that he seek out Hilda Gadea Acosta, a Peruvian economist who was living and working there. Gadea, whom he would later marry, was well-connected politically as a result of her membership in the socialist
American Popular Revolutionary Alliance (APRA) led by
VĂctor RaĂșl Haya de la Torre, and she introduced Guevara to a number of high-level officials in the Arbenz government. He also re-established contact with a group of Cuban exiles linked to
Fidel Castro whom he had initially met in Costa Rica; among them was Antonio "Ăico" LĂłpez, associated with the attack on the "Carlos Manuel de CĂ©spedes" barracks in
Bayamo in the Cuban province of Oriente,
[11] and who would die at Ojo del Toro bridge soon after the ''
Granma'' landed in Cuba.
[12] Guevara joined these "
moncadistas" in the sale of religious objects related to the
Black Christ of
Esquipulas, and he also assisted two Venezuelan
malaria specialists at a local hospital. It was during this period that he acquired his famous nickname, "Che", due to his frequent use of the Argentine
interjection ''
Che'' (
pronounced ), which is used in much the same way as "hey", "pal", "
eh", or "mate" are employed colloquially in various English-speaking countries.
Argentina,
Uruguay,
Paraguay, and southern Brazil (where the interjection is rendered 'tchĂȘ' in written Portuguese) are the only areas where this
expression is used, making it a trademark of the
Rioplatense region.
Guevara's attempts to obtain a medical internship were unsuccessful and his economic situation was often precarious, leading him to pawn some of Hilda's jewelry.
[13] He maintained a distance from any political organization, even though his political thinking at that time manifested a clear sympathy towards communism. Despite Guevaraâs financial woes, he rejected an offer to work as a state medic when it transpired that he would have to affiliate himself with the
Communist Party of Guatemala.
Political events in the country began to move quickly after
May 15,
1954 when a shipment of
Ć koda infantry and light artillery weapons sent from
Communist Czechoslovakia for the Arbenz Government arrived in
Puerto Barrios aboard the
Swedish ship ''
Alfhem''. The amount of Czechoslovak weaponry was estimated to be 2000 tons by the CIA
[14] though only 2 tons by Jon Lee Anderson.
[15]
Guevara briefly left Guatemala for El Salvador to pick up a new visa, then returned to Guatemala only a few days before the CIA-sponsored coup attempt led by
Carlos Castillo Armas began.
[16] The anti-Arbenz forces tried, but failed, to stop the trans-shipment of the Czechoslovak weapons by train. However, after pausing to regroup and recover energy, Castillo Armas's column seized the initiative and, apparently with the assistance of US air support, started to gain ground.
[17] Guevara was eager to fight on behalf of Arbenz and joined an armed
militia organized by the Communist Youth for that purpose; but, frustrated with the group's inaction, he soon returned to medical duties. Following the coup, he again volunteered to fight but his efforts were thwarted when Arbenz took refuge in the Mexican Embassy and told his foreign supporters to leave the country. After Gadea was arrested, Guevara sought protection inside the Argentine
consulate where he remained until he received a safe-conduct pass some weeks later. At that point, he turned down a free seat on a flight back to Argentina that was offered to him by the embassy, preferring instead to make his way to
Mexico.
The overthrow of the Arbenz regime by a
coup d'Ă©tat backed by the Central Intelligence Agency cemented Guevara's view of the United States as an
imperialist power that would implacably oppose and attempt to destroy any government that sought to redress the socioeconomic inequality endemic to Latin America and other developing countries. This strengthened his conviction that socialism achieved through armed struggle and defended by an armed populace was the only way to rectify such conditions.
Cuba
Guevara arrived in
Mexico City in early September 1954, and shortly thereafter renewed his friendship with
Ăico LĂłpez and the other Cuban exiles whom he had known in Guatemala. In June 1955, LĂłpez introduced him to
RaĂșl Castro. Several weeks later,
Fidel Castro arrived in Mexico City after having been amnestied from prison in Cuba, and on the evening of
8 July,
1955, RaĂșl introduced Guevara to the older Castro brother. During a fervid overnight conversation, Guevara became convinced that Fidel was the inspirational revolutionary leader for whom he had been searching, and he immediately joined the "
26th of July Movement" that intended to overthrow the dictatorship of
Fulgencio Batista. Although it was planned that he would be the group's medic, Guevara participated in the military training alongside the other members of the 26J Movement, and at the end of the course, was singled out by their instructor, Col.
Alberto Bayo, as his most outstanding student.
[19] Meanwhile, Hilda Gadea had arrived from Guatemala and she and Guevara resumed their relationship. In the summer of 1955, she informed him that she was
pregnant, and he immediately suggested that they marry. The wedding took place on
August 18,
1955, and their daughter, whom they named Hilda BeatrĂz, was born on
February 15,
1956.
[20]
When the cabin cruiser ''
Granma'' set out from
Tuxpan,
Veracruz for Cuba on
November 25,
1956, Guevara was one of only four non-Cubans aboard. Attacked by Batista's military soon after landing, about half of the expeditionaries were killed or executed upon capture. Guevara wrote that it was during this confrontation that he laid down his knapsack containing medical supplies in order to pick up a box of ammunition dropped by a fleeing comrade, a moment which he later recalled as marking his transition from physician to combatant. Only 15â20 rebels survived as a battered fighting force; they re-grouped and fled into the mountains of the
Sierra Maestra to wage
guerrilla warfare against the Batista regime.
Guevara became a leader among the rebels, a ''Comandante'' (English translation: Major), respected by his comrades in arms for his courage and military prowess,
[21] During the guerrilla campaign, Guevara was also feared for his ruthlessness, and was responsible for the
execution of a number of men accused of being informers, deserters or spies.
[22] In March 1958, Guevara was tasked with directing a training camp for new volunteers high in the Sierra Maestra at Minas del FrĂo, one of a number of military schools set up by the 26th of July Movement. Though wishing to push the battlefront forward and frustrated by his more stationary role, Guevara spent the period developing contacts with sympathetic locals.
[23] He also conducted a brief relationship with eighteen-year-old Zoila RodrĂguez, the daughter of a local ''guajiro''.
[24]
As the war extended throughout eastern Cuba, Guevara and a new column of fighters were dispatched west for the final push towards Havana. In the final days of December 1958, he directed his "suicide squad" (which undertook the most dangerous tasks in the rebel army)
[25] in the
attack on Santa Clara that turned out to be one of the decisive events of the revolution (although the series of ambushes first during ''la ofensiva'' in the heights of the Sierra Maestra, then at Guisaâand the whole Cauto Plains campaign that followedâprobably had more military significance).
[26][27] Batista, upon learning that his generals — especially General Cantillo, who had visited Castro at the inactive sugar mill, Central Oriente — were negotiating a separate peace with the rebel leader, fled to the
Dominican Republic on
January 1,
1959.
On
February 7,
1959, the government proclaimed Guevara "a Cuban citizen by birth" in recognition of his role in the triumph of the revolutionary forces. Shortly thereafter, he initiated divorce proceedings to put a formal end to his marriage with Gadea, from whom he had been separated since before leaving Mexico on the ''
Granma''. On
June 2,
1959, he married
Aleida March, a Cuban-born member of the 26th of July movement with whom he had been living since late 1958.
He was appointed commander of the
La Cabaña Fortress prison, and during his five-month tenure in that post (
January 2 through
June 12,
1959),
[28] he oversaw the trial and execution of many people, among whom were former Batista regime officials and members of the "Bureau for the Repression of Communist Activities" (a unit of the secret police known by its Spanish acronym BRAC). José Vilasuso, an attorney who worked under Guevara at
La Cabaña preparing indictments, said that these were lawless proceedings where "the facts were judged without any consideration to general juridical principles" and the findings were pre-determined by Guevara.
[29][30] It is estimated that between 156 and 550 people were executed on Guevara's extra-judicial orders during this time.
[31]
Later, Guevara became an official at the National Institute of Agrarian Reform, and President of the National Bank of Cuba. He signed all
Cuban banknotes issued during his fourteen-month presidency with his nickname, "Che". Throughout his time in the Cuban government, Guevara refused his due salaries of office, insisting on drawing only his meager wages as army ''commandante'' in order to set a "revolutionary example".
[32]
During this time his fondness for
chess was rekindled, and he attended and participated in most national and international tournaments held in Cuba.
[33][34] He was particularly eager to encourage young Cubans to take up the game, and organized various activities designed to stimulate their interest in it.
Even as early as 1959, Guevara helped organize revolutionary expeditions overseas, all of which failed. The first attempt was made in
Panama; another in the
Dominican Republic (led by Henry Fuerte,
[35] also known as "El Argelino", and Enrique Jiménez Moya)
[36] took place on 14 June of that same year.
In 1960 Guevara provided first aid to victims when the freighter ''
La Coubre'', a French vessel carrying munitions from the port of Antwerp, exploded while it was being unloaded in Havana harbor. A rescue operation immediately ensued but went awry when a second explosion occurred, resulting in well over a hundred dead.
[37] It was at the memorial service for the victims of this explosion that
Alberto Korda took the most famous photograph of him.
Guevara later served as Minister of Industries, in which post he helped formulate Cuban
socialism, and became one of the country's most prominent figures. In his book ''
Guerrilla Warfare'', he advocated replicating the Cuban model of revolution initiated by a small group (''
foco'') of guerrillas without the need for broad organizations to precede armed insurrection. His essay ''El socialismo y el hombre en Cuba'' (1965) (''Man and Socialism in Cuba'') advocates the need to shape a "new man" (''hombre nuevo'') in conjunction with a socialist state. Some saw Guevara as the simultaneously glamorous and austere model of that "new man."
During the 1961
Bay of Pigs Invasion, Guevara did not participate in the fighting, having been ordered by Castro to a command post in Cuba's westernmost
Pinar del RĂo province where he was involved in fending off a decoy force. He did, however, suffer a bullet wound to the face during this deployment, which he said had been caused by the accidental discharge of his own gun.
[38]
Guevara played a key role in bringing to Cuba the Soviet nuclear-armed
ballistic missiles that precipitated the
Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962. During an interview with the British newspaper ''
Daily Worker'' some weeks later, he stated that, if the missiles had been under Cuban control, they would have fired them against major U.S. cities.
[39]
Disappearance from Cuba
In December 1964 Guevara traveled to
New York City as the head of the Cuban delegation to speak at the
UN (
listen,
requires RealPlayer; or
read). He also appeared on the
CBS Sunday news program ''
Face the Nation'', met with a gamut of individuals and groups including U.S. Senator
Eugene McCarthy, several associates of
Malcolm X, and Canadian radical
Michelle Duclos,
[41] and dined at the home of the
Rockefellers.
[42] On 17 December, he flew to
Paris and from there embarked on a three-month international tour during which he visited the
People's Republic of China, the
United Arab Republic (
Egypt),
Algeria,
Ghana,
Guinea,
Mali,
Dahomey,
Congo-Brazzaville and
Tanzania, with stops in
Ireland,
Paris and
Prague. He also visited
Pyongyang and told the press that
North Korea was a model to which revolutionary Cuba should aspire.
[43]
In
Algiers on
24 February,
1965, he made what turned out to be his last public appearance on the international stage when he delivered a speech to the "Second Economic Seminar on Afro-Asian Solidarity" in which he declared, "There are no frontiers in this struggle to the death. We cannot remain indifferent in the face of what occurs in any part of the world. A victory for any country against imperialism is our victory, just as any country's defeat is our defeat."
[44] He went on to say that "The socialist countries have the moral duty of liquidating their tacit complicity with the exploiting countries of the West." He proceeded to outline a number of measures which he said the communist-bloc countries should implement in order to accomplish this objective.
[45][46] He returned to Cuba on 14 March to a solemn reception by Fidel and RaĂșl Castro,
Osvaldo DorticĂłs and Carlos Rafael RodrĂguez at the Havana airport.
Two weeks later, Guevara dropped out of public life and then vanished altogether. His whereabouts were the great mystery of 1965 in Cuba, as he was generally regarded as second in power to Castro himself. His disappearance was variously attributed to the relative failure of the
industrialization scheme he had advocated while minister of industry, to pressure exerted on Castro by Soviet officials disapproving of Guevara's pro-
Chinese Communist bent as the
Sino-Soviet split grew more pronounced, and to serious differences between Guevara and the Cuban leadership regarding Cuba's economic development and ideological line.
[47]
Following the
Cuban Missile Crisis and what he perceived as a Soviet betrayal of Cuba when
Khrushchev agreed to withdraw the missiles from Cuban territory without consulting Castro, Guevara had grown increasingly skeptical of the Soviet Union. As revealed in his last speech in Algiers, he had come to view the
Northern Hemisphere, led by the U.S. in the West and the Soviet Union in the East, as the exploiter of the
Southern Hemisphere. He strongly supported
Communist North Vietnam and the
Viet Cong in the
Vietnam War, and urged the peoples of other developing countries to take up arms and create "many Vietnams".
[48]
Guevara with members of his "reception committee" at Havana airport
(Havana - 14 March 1965)
Pressed by international speculation regarding Guevara's fate, Castro stated on
16 June,
1965, that the people would be informed about Guevara when Guevara himself wished to let them know. Numerous rumors about his disappearance spread both inside and outside Cuba. On 3 October of that year, Castro revealed a hand written undated letter
[49] purportedly written to him by Guevara some months earlier in which Guevara reaffirmed his enduring solidarity with the Cuban Revolution but declared his intention to leave Cuba to fight abroad for the cause of the revolution. He explained that "Other nations of the world summon my modest efforts," and that he had therefore decided to go and fight as a guerrilla "on new battlefields". In the letter Guevara announced his resignation from all his positions in the government, in the party, and in the Army, and renounced his Cuban citizenship, which had been granted to him in 1959 in recognition of his efforts on behalf of the revolution.
During an interview with four foreign correspondents on 1 November, Castro remarked that he knew where Guevara was but would not disclose his location, and added, denying reports that his former comrade-in-arms was dead, that "he is in the best of health." Despite Castro's assurances, Guevara's fate remained a mystery at the end of 1965 and his movements and whereabouts continued to be a closely held secret for the next two years.
Congo
Expedition
During their all-night meeting on
March 14â
March 15,
1965, Guevara and Castro had agreed that the former would personally lead Cuba's first military action in
Sub-Saharan Africa. Some sources state that Guevara persuaded Castro to back him in this effort, while other sources maintain that Castro convinced Guevara to undertake the mission, arguing that conditions in the various Latin American countries that had been under consideration for the possible establishment of guerrilla ''focos'' were not yet optimal.
[50] Castro himself has said the latter is true.
[51] According to
Ahmed Ben Bella, who was president of
Algeria at the time and had recently held extended conversations with Guevara, "The situation prevailing in Africa, which seemed to have enormous revolutionary potential, led Che to the conclusion that Africa was imperialismâs weak link. It was to Africa that he now decided to devote his efforts."
[52]
The Cuban operation was to be carried out in support of the pro-
Patrice Lumumba Marxist Simba movement in the Congo-Kinshasa (formerly
Belgian Congo, later
Zaire and currently the
Democratic Republic of the Congo). Guevara, his second-in-command
Victor Dreke, and twelve of the Cuban expeditionaries arrived in the Congo on 24 April 1965; a contingent of approximately 100
Afro-Cubans joined them soon afterwards.
[53][54] They collaborated for a time with guerrilla leader
Laurent-Désiré Kabila, who helped Lumumba supporters lead a revolt that was suppressed in November of that same year by the Congolese army. Guevara dismissed Kabila as insignificant. "Nothing leads me to believe he is the man of the hour," Guevara wrote.
[55]
Although Guevara was thirty-seven at the time and had no formal military training, he had the experiences of the Cuban revolution, including his successful march on Santa Clara, which was central to Batista finally being overthrown by Castro's forces. His asthma had prevented him from being drafted into military service in Argentina, a fact of which he was proud given his opposition to
PerĂłn's government.
South African mercenaries including
Mike Hoare and
Cuban exiles worked with the
Congolese army to thwart Guevara. They were able to monitor his communications, arrange to ambush the rebels and the Cubans whenever they attempted to attack, and interdict his supply lines.
[56][57] Despite the fact that Guevara sought to conceal his presence in the Congo, the U.S. government was fully aware of his location and activities: The
National Security Agency (NSA) was intercepting all of his incoming and outgoing transmissions via equipment aboard the ''USNS Valdez'', a floating listening post which continuously cruised the Indian Ocean off
Dar-es-Salaam for that purpose.
Guevara's aim was to export the Cuban Revolution by instructing local Simba fighters in communist ideology and
foco strategies of
guerrilla warfare. In his ''Congo Diary'', he cites the incompetence, intransigence, and infighting of the local Congolese forces as the key reasons for the revolt's failure.
[58] Later that same year, ill with dysentery, suffering from his asthma, and disheartened after seven months of frustrations, Guevara left the Congo with the Cuban survivors (six members of his column had died). At one point Guevara had considered sending the wounded back to Cuba, then standing alone and fighting until the end in the Congo as a revolutionary example; however, after being urged by his comrades in arms and pressured by two emissaries sent by Castro, at the last moment he reluctantly agreed to leave the Congo. A few weeks later, when writing the preface to the diary he had kept during the Congo venture, he began it with the words: "This is the history of a failure."
[59]
Interlude
Because Castro had made public Guevara's "farewell letter"
[49] to him — a letter Guevara had intended should only be revealed in case of his death — wherein he had written that he was severing all ties to Cuba in order to devote himself to revolutionary activities in other parts of the world, he felt that he could not return to Cuba with the other surviving combatants for moral reasons, and he spent the next six months living clandestinely in
Dar-es-Salaam, and
Prague. During this time he compiled his memoirs of the Congo experience, and wrote the drafts of two more books, one on philosophy
[61] and the other on economics.
[62] He also visited several countries in Western Europe in order to "test" a new false identity and the corresponding documentation (passport, etc.) created for him by
Cuban Intelligence that he planned to use to travel to South America. Throughout this period Castro continued to importune him to return to Cuba, but Guevara only agreed to do so when it was understood that he would be there on a strictly temporary basis for the few months needed to prepare a new revolutionary effort somewhere in Latin America, and that his presence on the island would be cloaked in the tightest secrecy.
Bolivia
Insurgent
Speculation on Guevara's whereabouts continued throughout 1966 and into 1967. Representatives of the
Mozambican independence movement
FRELIMO reported meeting with Guevara in late 1966 or early 1967 in
Dar es Salaam, at which point they rejected his offer of aid in their revolutionary project.
[63] In a speech at the 1967
May Day rally in Havana, the Acting Minister of the armed forces, Major
Juan Almeida, announced that Guevara was "serving the revolution somewhere in Latin America". The persistent reports that he was leading the guerrillas in Bolivia were eventually shown to be true.
At Castro's behest, a 3,700 acre parcel of jungle land in the remote ĂancahuazĂș region had been purchased by native Bolivian Communists for Guevara to use as a training area and base camp. The evidence suggests that the training at this camp in the ĂancahuazĂș valley was more hazardous than combat to Guevara and the Cubans accompanying him. Little was accomplished in the way of building a guerrilla army. Former
Stasi operative
Haydée Tamara Bunke Bider, better known by her ''
nom de guerre'' "Tania", who had been installed as his primary agent in La Paz, was reportedly also working for the
KGB and is widely inferred to have unwittingly served Soviet interests by leading Bolivian authorities to Guevara's trail.
[64] The numerous photographs taken by and of Guevara and other members of his guerrilla group that they left behind at their base camp after the initial clash with the Bolivian army in March 1967 provided President
René Barrientos with the first proof of his presence in Bolivia; after viewing them, Barrientos allegedly stated that he wanted Guevara's head displayed on a pike in downtown
La Paz. He thereupon ordered the Bolivian Army to hunt Guevara and his followers down.
Guevara's guerrilla force, numbering about 50 and operating as the ELN (''Ejército de Liberación Nacional de Bolivia''; English: "
National Liberation Army of Bolivia"), was well equipped and scored a number of early successes against Bolivian regulars in the difficult terrain of the mountainous Camiri region. In September, however, the Army managed to eliminate two guerrilla groups, reportedly killing one of the leaders.
Despite the violent nature of the conflict, Guevara gave medical attention to all of the wounded Bolivian soldiers whom the guerrillas took prisoner, and subsequently released them. Even after his last battle at the Quebrada del Yuro, in which he had been wounded, when he was taken to a temporary holding location and saw there a number of Bolivian soldiers who had also been wounded in the fighting, he offered to give them medical care. (His offer was turned down by the Bolivian officer in charge.)
[65]
Guevara's plan for fomenting revolution in Bolivia appears to have been based upon a number of misconceptions:
★ He had expected to deal only with the country's military government and its poorly trained and equipped army. However, after the U.S. government learned of his location, CIA and other operatives were sent into Bolivia to aid the anti-insurrection effort. The Bolivian Army was being trained and supplied by
U.S. Army Special Forces advisors, including a recently organized elite battalion of
Rangers trained in
jungle warfare that set up camp in La Esperanza, a small settlement close to the guerrillas' zone of operations.
[66][67]
★ Guevara had expected assistance and cooperation from the local dissidents. He did not receive it; and Bolivia's Communist Party, under the leadership of
Mario Monje, was oriented towards Moscow rather than Havana and did not aid him, despite having promised to do so. (Some members of the Bolivian Communist Party did join/support him, such as Coco and Inti Peredo, Rodolfo Saldaña, Serapio Aquino Tudela, and Antonio Jiménez Tardio, against the Party leadership's wishes.)
★ He had expected to remain in radio contact with Havana. However, the two shortwave transmitters provided to him by Cuba were faulty, so that the guerrillas were unable to communicate with Havana. (In this, and in many other respects,
Manuel Piñeiro, the man to whom Castro had assigned the task of coordinating support for Guevara's operations in Bolivia, performed abysmally.) To further complicate matters, some months into the campaign, the tape recorder that the guerrillas used to record and decipher the
one-time pad-encoded radio messages sent to them from Havana was lost while crossing a river, making de-coding such messages more difficult.
In addition, his penchant for confrontation rather than compromise appears to have contributed to his inability to develop successful working relationships with local leaders in Bolivia, just as it had in the Congo.
[68] This tendency had surfaced during his guerrilla warfare campaign in Cuba as well, but had been kept in check there by the timely interventions and guidance of Castro.
[69]
Capture and execution
RodrĂguez with the captured Che Guevara
(La Higuera, Bolivia - 9 October 1967) 
The schoolhouse in
La Higuera where Che Guevara was executed at 1:10 p.m. on 9 October 1967.
The Bolivian Special Forces were notified of the location of Guevara's guerrilla encampment by an informant. On 8 October, the encampment was encircled, and Guevara was captured while leading a detachment with
SimeĂłn Cuba Sarabia in the Quebrada del Yuro ravine. According to some soldiers present at the capture, during the skirmish as they approached Guevara, he allegedly shouted, "Do not shoot! I am Che Guevara and worth more to you alive than dead."
[70]
Barrientos promptly ordered his execution upon being informed of his capture. Guevara was taken to a dilapidated schoolhouse in the nearby village of
La Higuera where he was held overnight. Early the next afternoon he was executed. The executioner was
Mario TerĂĄn, a Sergeant in the Bolivian army who had drawn a short straw after arguments over who got the honour of killing Guevara broke out among the soldiers. Guevara received multiple shots to the legs, so as to avoid maiming his face for identification purposes and simulate combat wounds in an attempt to conceal his execution. Che Guevara did have some
last words before his death; he allegedly said to his executioner, "I know you are here to kill me. Shoot, coward, you are only going to kill a man."
[71] His body was lashed to the landing skids of a helicopter and flown to neighboring
Vallegrande where it was laid out on a laundry tub in the local hospital and displayed to the press.
[72] Photographs taken at that time gave rise to legends such as those of ''San Ernesto de La Higuera'' and ''
El Cristo de Vallegrande'' (Local people came to refer to Guevara as a saint, "San Ernesto de La
Higuera", whom they ask for favors. Others claim his ghost walks the area.
[73]). After a military doctor surgically amputated his hands, Bolivian army officers transferred Guevara's cadaver to an undisclosed location and refused to reveal whether his remains had been buried or cremated.
The hunt for Guevara in Bolivia was headed by
FĂ©lix RodrĂguez, a
CIA agent, who previously had infiltrated Cuba to prepare contacts with the rebels in the
Escambray Mountains and the anti-Castro underground in
Havana prior to the Bay of Pigs invasion, and had been successfully extracted from Cuba afterwards.
[74][75] Upon hearing of Guevara's capture, RodrĂguez relayed the information to CIA headquarters at
Langley, Virginia, via CIA stations in various South American nations. After the execution, RodrĂguez took several personal items of Guevara's including a
Rolex watch, often proudly showing them to reporters during the ensuing years. Today, some of these belongings, including his flashlight, are on display at the CIA.
[76]
On October 15, Castro acknowledged that Guevara was dead and proclaimed three days of public mourning throughout Cuba. The death of Guevara was regarded as a severe blow to the socialist revolutionary movements in Latin America and the rest of the
third world.
Che Guevara's Monument and Mausoleum in Santa Clara, Cuba
In 1997, the skeletal remains of a handless body were exhumed from beneath an air strip near Vallegrande, identified as those of Guevara by a Cuban forensic team working at the scene, and returned to Cuba. On
17 October,
1997, his remains, along with those of six of his fellow combatants killed during the guerrilla campaign in Bolivia, were laid to rest with full military honors in a specially built mausoleum in the city of Santa Clara, where he had won the decisive battle of the Cuban Revolution.
''The Bolivian Diary''
Also removed when Guevara was captured was his diary, which documented events of the guerrilla campaign in Bolivia.
[77] The first entry is on
November 7 1966 shortly after his arrival at the farm in ĂancahuazĂș, and the last entry is on
October 7 1967, the day before his capture. The diary tells how the guerrillas were forced to begin operations prematurely due to discovery by the Bolivian Army, explains Guevara's decision to divide the column into two units that were subsequently unable to reestablish contact, and describes their overall failure. It records the rift between Guevara and the Bolivian Communist Party that resulted in Guevara having significantly fewer soldiers than originally anticipated. It shows that Guevara had a great deal of difficulty recruiting from the local populace, due in part to the fact that the guerrilla group had learned
Quechua rather than the local language which was
TupĂ-GuaranĂ. As the campaign drew to an unexpected close, Guevara became increasingly ill. He suffered from ever-worsening bouts of asthma, and most of his last offensives were carried out in an attempt to obtain medicine.
The Bolivian Diary was quickly and crudely translated by ''
Ramparts'' magazine and circulated around the world. There are at least four additional diaries in existence — those of Israel Reyes
Zayas (Alias "Braulio"), Harry Villegas Tamayo ("Pombo"), Eliseo Reyes Rodriguez ("Rolando")
[78] and Dariel AlarcĂłn RamĂrez ("Benigno")
[79] —
each of which reveals additional aspects of the events in question.
Legacy
In its mid-November (#46) 2005 issue, the German newsweekly ''
Der Spiegel'' writes about Europe's "peaceful revolutionaries" whom it describes as the heirs of Gandhi and Guevara.
While pictures of Guevara's dead body were being circulated and the circumstances of his death debated, his legend began to spread. Demonstrations in protest against his execution occurred throughout the world, and articles, tributes, songs and poems were written about his life and death.
[80] In Argentina, graphic novelist
HĂ©ctor Oesterheld published a biography of Che in 1968 that would later be linked to Oesterheld's own politically-motivated disapearance, torture and death.
[81] Latin America specialists advising the
U.S. State Department immediately recognized the importance of the demise of âthe most glamorous and reportedly most successful revolutionaryâ, noting that Guevara would be eulogized by communists and other leftists as âthe model revolutionary who met a heroic deathâ.
[82]
Such predictions gained increasing credibility as Guevara became a potent symbol of rebellion and revolution during the global
student protests of the late 1960s.
[83] Left wing activists responded to Guevara's apparent indifference to rewards and glory, and concurred with Guevara's sanctioning of violence as a necessity to instill socialist ideals.
[84] The slogan 'Che lives!' began to appear on walls throughout the west,
[85] while
Jean-Paul Sartre, a leading figure in the movement, encouraged the adulation by describing Guevara as "the most complete human being of our age".
[86]
Typically, responses to Guevara's legacy followed partisan lines. The US State Department was advised that his death would come as a relief to non-leftist Latin Americans, who had feared possible insurgencies in their own countries.
Subsequent analysts have also shed light on aspects of cruelty in Guevaraâs methods, and analysed what Fidel Castro described as Guevaraâs âexcessively aggressive qualityâ.
[87] Studies addressing problematic characteristics of Guevara's life have cited his principal role in setting up Cuba's first post-revolutionary labor camps, his unsympathetic treatment of captured fighters during various guerrilla campaigns, and his frequent humiliations of those deemed his intellectual inferiors.
[88] Though much opposition to Guevara's methods has come from the
political right, critical evaluation has also come from groups such as
anarchists and
civil libertarians, some of whom consider Guevara an authoritarian, anti-working-class
Stalinist, whose legacy was the creation of a more bureaucratic, authoritarian regime.
[89] Detractors have also theorized that in much of Latin America, Che-inspired revolutions had the practical result of reinforcing brutal militarism for many years.
[90]
Legacy in Cuba
In Cuba, Guevara's death precipitated the abandonment of guerrilla warfare as an instrument of foreign policy, ushering in a ''rapprochement'' with the
Soviet Union, and the reformation of the government along Soviet lines. When Cuban troops returned to Africa in the 1970s, it was as part of a large-scale military expedition, and support for insurrection movements in Latin America and the Caribbean became logistical and organizational rather than overt. Cuba also abandoned Guevara's plans for economic diversification and rapid industrialization which had ultimately proved to be impracticable in view of the country's incorporation into the
COMECON system. of the Ministry of Industries (MININD) from 1961 to 1965, this building was the MININD's headquarters and his office was on the top floor.]] As early as 1965, the Yugoslav communist journal
Borba observed the many half-completed or empty factories in Cuba, a legacy of Guevara's tenure as Minister of Industries, "standing like sad memories of the conflict between pretension and reality".
[91]
The Cuban state continued to cultivate Guevaraâs
cult of personality, constructing numerous statues and artworks in his honor throughout the land; adorning school rooms, workplaces, public buildings, billboards, and money with his image.
[92] Children across the country begin each school day with the chant "''ÂĄPioneros por el Comunismo, Seremos como el Che!''" (English: Pioneers for Communism, We will be like Che!). Guevara's mausoleum in
Santa Clara has become a site of almost religious significance to many Cubans,
while the nationâs burgeoning
tourist industry has benefited greatly from the ongoing international interest in Guevara's life. Some 205,832 people visited the mausoleum during 2004, of whom 127,597 were foreigners.
Reverence among Cubans for Guevara's memory is by no means universal. Many
Cuban exiles have spoken of Guevara in less than favorable terms, and he is remembered by some as the "The Butcher of
la Cabaña", a reference to Guevaraâs post-revolutionary role as âsupreme prosecutorâ at the Cabaña fortress. The epithet was repeated by Cuban-born musician
Paquito D'Rivera, who wrote an open letter castigating fellow musician
Carlos Santana, for wearing a T-shirt displaying Guevaraâs image to the 2005
Academy Awards ceremony.
[93] Similar sentiments have been shared by
Cuban-American actor and director
Andy Garcia, who stated in 2004 that "Che has been romanticized over the years, but there is a darker side to his story. He looks like a rock star, but he executed a lot of people without trial or defense."
[94] Garciaâs 2005 film
The Lost City, which was reportedly banned in several Latin American countries, portrayed the ruthless brutality at the heart of the Cuban revolution.
[95] Actor
Jsu Garcia as Guevara is shown casually shooting wounded Batista foot soldiers where they lie.
[96]
The "Cult of Che"
Despite the controversies, Guevara's status as a
popular icon has continued throughout the world, leading commentators to speak of a global "cult of Che". A
photograph of Guevara taken by photographer
Alberto Korda[97] has became one of the century's most ubiquitous images, and the portrait, transformed into a monochrome graphic, is, somewhat ironically, reproduced endlessly on a vast array of merchandise, such as T-shirts, posters, coffee mugs, and baseball caps largely for profit. The saying "Viva la revolucion!" has also become very popular and synonymous with Guevera.
[98][99]
In Latin America, the failures of the
neo-liberal reforms of the 1990s intensified opposition to the
Washington consensus,
[100]
leading to a resurgence in support for many of Guevaraâs political beliefs including
Pan-Americanism, support for
popular movements in the region, the
nationalization of key industries and
centralization of government.
[101] In
Nicaragua, the
Sandinistas, a group with
ideological roots in
Guevarism were
re-elected to government after 16 years. Supporters wore Guevara T-Shirts during the 2006 victory celebrations.
[102] Bolivian president Evo Morales has paid many tributes to Guevara and installed a portrait of the Argentinian made from local
coca leaves in his presidential suite.
[103] In 2006, Venezuelan president
Hugo ChĂĄvez, who has been known to address audiences in a Che Guevara T-shirt,
[104] accompanied Fidel Castro on a tour of Guevaraâs boyhood home in
CĂłrdoba, describing the experience as âa real honorâ. Awaiting crowds of thousands responded with calls of âWe feel it! Guevara is right with us!"
[105] Guevaraâs daughter Aleida also transcribed an extensive interview with ChĂĄvez where he outlined his plans for âThe New Latin Americaâ, releasing the interview in book form.
[106] Guevara
remains a key inspirational figure to the Colombian guerrilla movement, the
FARC,
[107] and the Mexican
Zapatista group.
[108]
In North America, Western Europe and many regions outside Latin America, the image had been likened to a global brand, long since shedding its ideological or political connotations, and the obsession with Guevara has been dismissed by some as merely "adolescent revolutionary romanticism".
In the United States, a country often the focus of Guevara inspired protests in the hemisphere,
[109] his image was removed from a CD carrying case after significant public opposition which compared Guevara to
Osama bin Laden and
Adolf Hitler. Retail group
Target Corporation issued a public apology for producing the item.
[110] American, Latin American and European writers, Jon Lee Anderson,
RĂ©gis Debray,
Jorge Castañeda and others contributed to demystify the image of Guevara via articles and biographies, which detailed his life and legacy in more unidealistic terms; and, in the case of
Octavio Paz, was accompanied by a critical indictment of the
Marxism espoused by many in the Latin American left.
[111] Political writer
Paul Berman went further, asserting that the "modern-day cult of Che" obscures the work of dissidents and what he believes is a "tremendous social struggle" currently taking place in Cuba.
[112] Author
Christopher Hitchens, who was a socialist and a supporter of the Cuban revolution in the 1960s but has since changed his views, summarised Guevara's legacy thus: "Che's iconic status was assured because he failed. His story was one of defeat and isolation, and that's why it is so seductive. Had he lived, the myth of Che would have long since died."
Timeline
Guevara's published works
'In English (translations)'
★ ''Back on the Road: A Journey to Central America (Harvill Panther S.)'', The Harvill Press, paperback, ISBN 0-8021-3942-6.
★ ''Bolivian Diary'', Pimlico, paperback, ISBN 0-7126-6457-2
★ ''Che Guevara: Radical Writings on Guerrilla Warfare, Politics and Revolution'', Filiquarian Publishing LLC, paperback, ISBN 1-59986-999-3.
★ ''Che Guevara Reader: Writings on Guerrilla Warfare, Politics and History'', Ocean Press, paperback
★ ''Che Guevara Speaks'', Pathfinder, paperback
★ ''Che Guevara Talks to Young People'', Pathfinder, paperback
★ ''Critical Notes on Political Economy'', Ocean Press, paperback
★ ''
Guerrilla Warfare'', Souvenir Press Ltd, paperback, ISBN 0-285-63680-4; PDF version of 1961 edition available at
★ ''Our America and Theirs'', Ocean Press (AU), paperback, ISBN 1-876175-81-8.
★ ''
Reminiscences of the Cuban Revolutionary War'', Monthly Review Press, paperback, 1998
★ ''Self-Portrait: Che Guevara'', Ocean Press, 320pp, paperback, 2005
★ ''Socialism and Man in Cuba: Also Fidel Castro on the Twentieth Anniversary of Guevara's Death'', Monad, paperback
★ ''The African Dream: The Diaries of the Revolutionary War in the Congo'', Grove Press, paperback.
★ ''The Diary of Che Guevara'', Amereon Ltd,
★ ''The Great Debate on Political Economy'', New York: 2006, Ocean Press, ISBN-10: 1876175540, ISBN-13: 978-1876175542
★ ''
The Motorcycle Diaries: Notes on a Latin American Journey'', Perennial Press, ISBN 0-00-718222-8
'In Spanish'
★ – Guevara's notebooks written during his clandestine stay in Prague in 1966
★ – Guevara's diary of the guerrilla war in Bolivia
★ – Guevara's selected works in Spanish, including his most important speeches
★ – Guevara's complete Congo Diary in Spanish
★ – A selection of Guevara's writings in Spanish, including ''El socialismo y el hombre nuevo''
See also
Source notes
1. The date of birth recorded on was June 14, 1928, although one tertiary source (Julia Constenla, quoted by Jon Lee Anderson) asserts that he was actually born on May 14 of that year (Constenla alleges that she was told by an unidentified astrologer that his mother, Celia de la Serna, was already pregnant when she and Ernesto Guevara Lynch were married and that the birth date of their son was forged a month later than the actual date to avoid scandal). Source: Anderson, Jon Lee. ''Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life'', New York: 1997, Grove Press, pp. 3 and 769.
2. Che Guevara. (2007). In ''EncyclopĂŠdia Britannica''. Retrieved July 19, 2007, from ''Britannica Concise Encyclopedia''.
3. "Throughout January, suspected war criminals were being captured and brought to La Cabana daily. For the most part, these were not the top henchmen of the ancien régime;most had escaped before the rebels assumed control of the city and halted outgoing air ans sea traffic, or remained holed up in embassies. Most of those left behind were deputies, or rank and file ''chivatos'' and police torturers. The trials began at eight or nine in the evening, and, more often than not, a verdict was reached by two or three in the morning. Duque de Estrada, whose job it was to gather evidence, take testimonies, and prepare the trials, also sat with Che, the "supreme prosecutor," on the appellate bench, where Che made the final decision on the men's fate." Source: Anderson, Jon Lee. ''Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life'', New York: 1997, Grove Press, pp. 386-387.
4.
Death of Che Guevara National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 5 - Declassified top secret document
5.
Rostow, Walter W. ''Memorandum for the President:"Death of 'Che' Guevara"'', dated 11 October 1967. Online at GWU National Security Archive accessed 08 October 2006.
° Ryan, Henry Butterfield. ''The Fall of Che Guevara: A Story of Soldiers, Spies, and Diplomats'', New York, 1998: Oxford University Press, pp 129â135.
6. Maryland Institute of Art, referenced at BBC News, "Che Guevara photographer dies", 26 May 2001.Online at BBC News, accessed January 42006.
7. Anderson, Jon Lee. ''Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life'', New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 446. "At one time I wanted to be one of Pizarro's soldiers; but [to fulfill] my quest for adventures and my yearnings to overlook climatic moments, that isn't a necessity any longer; today it is all here, and with an ideal to fight for, together with the responsibility of leaving an example." -- excerpt from a December 1959 letter to his parents.
8. Anderson, Jon Lee. ''Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life'', New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 28.
9. Digital Granma Internacional, "Simultaneous chess game on 37th anniversary of Cheâs death", 13 October 2004.
Online at Granma International English Edition, accessed January 5, 2006.
10. Guevara Lynch, Ernesto. ''Aquà va un soldado de América''. Barcelona: Plaza y Janés Editores, S.A., 2000, p. 26. "En Guatemala me perfeccionaré y lograré lo que me falta para ser un revolucionario auténtico." This statement in a letter written in Costa Rica on 10 December 1953 is important because it proves that, whereas many authors have asserted that Guevara became a revolutionary as a result of witnessing the US-sponsored coup against Arbenz, he had in fact already made the decision to become a revolutionary before arriving in Guatemala and indeed went there for that express purpose.
11. Radio Cadena Agramonte, "Ataque al cuartel del Bayamo" Online, accessed February 25 2006
12. Granma.cu, "Walking towards sunrise" Online, accessed February 252006
13. Anderson, Jon Lee. ''Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life'', New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 139â141
14. U.S. Department of State, "Foreign Relations, Guatemala, 1952â1954". Online, accessed March 04 2006
15. Anderson, Jon Lee. ''Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life'', New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 144
16. U.S. Department of State. "Foreign Relations, Guatemala, 1952â1954". Online, accessed March 04 2006
17.
Holland, Max."Private Sources of U.S. Foreign Policy: William Pawley and the 1954 Coup d'Etat in Guatemala", ''Journal of Cold War Studies'', Volume 7, Number 4, Fall 2005, pp. 36â73
18. [1]
19. Anderson, Jon Lee. ''Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life'', ISBN 0-8021-1600-0, New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 194.
20. Taibo, Paco Ignacio II. ''Ernesto Guevara, también conocido como el Che'', p. 104. See also The Guardian online, ''Making of a Marxist'', Online, in Guevara's words ''"Since February 15 1956 I am a father: Hilda Beatriz Guevara is my first-born"'' accessed October 62006.
21. U. S. Central Intelligence Agency, "CIA Biographic Register on Ernesto 'Che' Guevara". Online, accessed July 12, 2006."Commander of one of the largest of the five rebel columns (Column 4), he gained a reputation for bravery and military prowess second only to Fidel Castro himself."
22. Anderson pp. 269â270, 277â278.
23. Anderson p. 317.
24. ''Testimonio de Zoila RodrĂguez GarcĂa, novia de Ernesto Guevara en Sierra Maestra''; incluido en el libro ''Che entre nosotros''(1992), de Adys Cupull y FroilĂĄn GonzĂĄlez
25. Ernesto Che Guevara, "Suicide Squad: Example Of Revolutionary Morale (an excerpt from ''Episodes of the Cuban Revolutionary War - 1956-58''). The Militant Online, accessed March 272006.
26. Castro, Fidel (editors Bonachea, Rolando E. and Nelson P. ValdĂ©s). ''Revolutionary Struggle. 1947â1958''. Cambridge, Massachusetts and London: MIT Press, 1972, pp. 439â442.
°Castro, Fidel. (December 27, 1983). Speech given in Palma Soriano, Cuba. Online. In this speech, given at the dedication of a publishing house and commemorating the 25th anniversary of the taking of Palma, Castro discussed the importance to the revolution of the taking of Palma on the way to Santiago. He talked about the previous recent fighting at Guisa, Baire, Jiguani and in the Sierra Maestra and how as a result of revolutionary successes the Cuban army in Bayamo was unable to consolidate forces with its surrounding units. Castro went on to describe the strategic importance of the revolutionary position along the banks of the Cautillo River as a position from which the army at Bayamo could be contained while, on the other side, the army at Santiago could be targeted once Palma was taken and the revolutionary forces re-armed. With respect to the planned attack against Santiago, Castro said: ''We established our defensive line on the Cautillo River. We had Mapos surrounded, but there was still Palma. There were approximately 300 enemy soldiers. We had to take Palma. We were also anxious to take the arms that were to be found in Palma, because when we left La Plata, in the Sierra Maestra, because of the latest offensive, we left with 25 armed soldiers and 1,000 unarmed recruits. We armed those troops along the way. We armed them during the fighting, but we really finished fully arming them in Palma.'' Castro then described the battle in detail and mentioned how, after the overthrow of Batista, the final war orders to the rebels were issued from Palma on January 1, 1959.
27. Dorschner, John and Roberto Fabricio. ''The Winds of December: The Cuban Revolution of 1958'', New York: 1980, Coward, McCann & Geoghegen, ISBN 0698109937. Here the significant and prolonged action at Guisa (approximately November 20 to November 30th 1958) is described in rare detail on pages 41â47, 81â87.
28. Anderson, Jon Lee. ''Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life'', New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 372 and p. 425
29. "Executions at La Cabaña fortress under Ernesto "ChĂ©" Guevara". Document written by JosĂ© Vilasuso. Online accessed October 18, 2006. In this document, Vilasuso (who, along with most of the other legally-trained participants, quit due to its excesses) described the La Cabaña tribunal as the âPurging Commissionâ. He described a process where â[t]he statements of the investigating officer constituted irrefutable proof of wrongdoingâ and where "[t]here were relatives of victims of the previous regime who were put in charge of judging the accused." He also provided vivid recollections of the final hours of the condemned with their family and friends, and he gave a graphic description of the execution details. He recalled that Guevara "chastised us all: 'Donât delay these trials. This is a revolution, the proofs are secondary. We have to proceed by conviction. They are a gang of criminals and murderers. Besides, remember that there is an Appeals Tribunals [sic]'." But the Appeals Tribunal, according to Vilasuso, "never decided in favor of the appeal. It simply confirmed the sentences. It was presided by Commander Ernesto Guevara Serna."
30. "He worked at La Cabana prison, where a great number of people were executed, including some of his former comrades-in-arms who refused to abandon their democratic beliefs. 'I can't be the friend of anyone who doesn't share my ideas,' he once said." Source: Courtois, Stephanie et al. ''The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression''. Harvard University Press, 1999 p. 652
31. Different sources cite different numbers of executions. Anderson states that "several hundred people were officially tried and executed across Cuba." p.387. Hugh Thomas states that 156 people were executed after trials at La Cabaña in ''Cuba: The Pursuit of freedom''. Dr. Armando M. Lago of the Cuba Archive, gives the figure as 216 documented executions in two years. Others give far higher figures. Thomas E. Skidmore, Professor of History and Director of the Center for Latin American Studies at Brown University, estimated the number executed in the first six months of 1959 to have been "about 550". Skidmore, Thomas E. (and Peter H. Smith), ''Modern Latin America'', 4th paperback ed., 2000, p 273. "The first major political crisis arose over what to do with the captured Batista officials who had been responsible for the worst of the repression. The revolutionaries resorted to arbitrary procedures in trying their victims, appealing to sentiments of 'ordinary justice' to legitimize their executions. In the first six months of 1959 about 550 were put to death, following trial by various revolutionary courts. These executions, punctuated by cries of ''paredón'' (to the wall!), worried the liberals in Cuba and their sympathizers abroad, especially in the United States."
32. Anderson, Jon Lee. ''Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life'', ISBN 0-8021-1600-0, New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 503
33. chessgames.com, "Miguel Najdorf vs Ernesto Che Guevara".
Online at chessgames.com, accessed January 52006.
34. ar.geocities.com/carloseadrake/AJEDREZ/, ''Ernesto "Che" Guevara â Ajedrez'' Online, accessed June 292006.
35. Puerto Padre website, "Cronologia" (List of anniversaries)
Online at Puerto Padre website, accessed January 42006.
36. Peña, Emilio Herasme," La ExpediciĂłn Armada de junio de 1959", 14 June 2004.Online at 'ListĂn Diario (Dominican Republic), accessed January 42006.
37. Cuban Information Archives, "La Coubre explodes in Havana 1960." Online, accessed February 26 2006; pictures can be seen at Cuban site fotospl.com.
38. Anderson, Jon Lee. ''Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life'', ISBN 0-8021-1600-0, New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 508.
39. Anderson, Jon Lee. ''Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life'', ISBN 0-8021-1600-0, New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 545: "In an interview with Che a few weeks after the crisis, Sam Russell, a British correspondent for the socialist Daily Worker, found Guevara still fuming over the Soviet betrayal. Alternately puffing on a cigar and taking blasts from an inhaler, Guevara told Russell that if the missiles had been under Cuban control, they would have fired them off. Russell came away with mixed feelings about Che, calling him 'a warm character whom I took to immediately... clearly a man of great intelligence though I thought he was crackers from the way he went on about the missiles.'"
40. Chronology (1964â66)
41. Montreal Gazette, "Liberals picked the wrong issue". Online, accessed February 26 2006
⥠Guaracabuya.org, "TERRORISTS CONNECTED TO CUBAN COMMUNIST GOVERNMENT". Online, accessed February 26 2006
42. GĂĄlvez, William. ''Che in Africa: Che Guevara's Congo Diary''. Melbourne: Ocean Press, 1999, p. 28.
43. Bruce Cumings, "Koreaâs Place in the Sun: A Modern History", updated edition, W.W. Norton & Company, 2005, p. 404
44. Ernesto Che Guevara, (editors Rolando E. Bonachea and Nelson P. Valdés), ''Che: Selected Works of Ernesto Guevara'', Cambridge, MA: 1969, p. 350.
⥠Ernesto Che Guevara, "English Translation of Complete Text of Algiers Speech",
Online at Sozialistische Klassiker, accessed January 42006.
45. Ernesto Che Guevara, (editors Rolando E. Bonachea and Nelson P. Valdés), ''Che: Selected Works of Ernesto Guevara'', Cambridge, MA: 1969, pp. 352-59.
46. Ernesto Che Guevara, "English Translation of Complete Text of Algiers Speech", Online at Sozialistische Klassiker, accessed January 42006.
47. Guevara, Ernesto Che. ''The Great Debate on Political Economy'', New York: 2006, Ocean Press, 430 pages (entire book is devoted to this subject).
48. Ernesto Che Guevara, "English Translation of Complete Text of his ''Message to the Tricontinental''", or see
.
49. Ernesto Che Guevara, "Che Guevara's Farewell Letter", 1965. English translation of complete text: .
50. Anderson, Jon Lee. ''Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life'', New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 628
51. MinĂĄ, Gianni. ''An Encounter with Fidel'', Melbourne, 1991: Ocean Press, p 223.
52. Ahmed Ben Bella. "Che as I knew him". Online at ''Le Monde Diplomatique'', accessed June 19, 2006. Heikal's account of Guevara's conversations with Nasser in February and March of 1965 lends further credence to this interpretation. See Heikal, Mohamed Hassanein. ''The Cairo Documents'', pp 347â357.
53. GĂĄlvez, William. '' Che in Africa: Che Guevara's Congo Diary'', Melbourne, 1999: Ocean Press, p 62.
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70. Anderson, Jon Lee. Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life, New York: 1997, Grove Press, p.733. "When they were a few feet away, a short, sturdy highland Indian named Sergent Bernardino Huanca broke through the bush and pointed his gun at them. He later claimed Che had told him, "Do not shoot! I am Che Guevara and worth more to you alive than dead."
71. Anderson, Jon Lee. ''Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life''. New York: Grove Press, 1997.
72. Richard Gott, "Bolivia on the Day of the Death of Che Guevara". Online at Mindfully.org, accessed February 26 2006
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74. Rodriguez, Felix I. and John Weisman. ''Shadow Warrior/the CIA Hero of a Hundred Unknown Battles (Hardcover)'', New York: 1989, Publisher: Simon & Schuster
75. NewsMax, "FĂ©lix RodrĂguez:Kerry No Foe of Castro". Online, accessed February 27 2006
76. National Security Archive. Electronic Briefing Book No. 5 Online, accessed March 25 2007
77. Ernesto Che Guevara, ''"Diario (Bolivia)"''. Online, accessed February 262006.
78. Major Donald R. Selvage - USMC, "Che Guevara in Bolivia", 1 April 1985.
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80. 
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° Loudspeaker.png
81. HĂ©ctor GermĂĄn Oesterheld
82. U.S. Department of State : Guevara's Death, The Meaning for Latin America p.6. October 12, 1967: Thomas Hughes, the Latin America specialist at the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research providing an interpretive report for Secretary of State Dean Rusk
83. "The Cult of Che". Time Magazine. Friday, May 17, 1968.Online. Accessed October 24 2006
84. Trento, Angelo. ''Castro and Cuba : From the revolution to the present". p.64. Arris books. 2005.
85. The Guardian. "Just a pretty face?" Online. Accessed October 25 2006
86. Michael Moynihan, "Neutering Sartre at Dagens Nyheter". Online at Stockholm Spectator. Accessed February 26 2006
87. Fidel Castro on Che Guevara : Speech by Fidel Castro was given on October 18, 1967. Online. Ocean Press Pty Ltd website. Accessed October 242006.
88. Samuel Farber, "The Resurrection of Che Guevara", Summer 1998. William Paterson University online, accessed June 18, 2006.
° Anderson, Jon Lee. ''Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life'', New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 567. "Once, when he took economist Regino Boti with him to the farm and tested some of the men on their reading comprehension. One man did so badly that Che insulted him, saying: "Well, if you keep studying maybe you'll get to be as smart as an ox in twenty years" and turning on his heel. The poor ''guajiro'' was so humiliated he began crying. Boti went back to talk to Che, telling him that he had been wrong to be so harsh, to go back and talk like a man, to lift his spirits again. Such episodes were commonplace."
89. Libertarian Community, "Ernesto "Che" Guevara, 1928â1967". [2]
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98. Loudspeaker.png
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99. A popular T-shirt in Mexico mocks the Cult of Che. It depicts Che with a clown nose, and is entitled "ChepillĂn", in reference to the popular children's clown from Mexican television, the squeeky-voiced CepillĂn.
100. BBC News. ''How the US 'lost' Latin America''. Online accessed 10 January 2007
° Washington Post. ''Anti-U.S. Protests Flare at Summit''. Online accessed 10 January 
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