Understanding Che Guevara -- 42 Years After His Murder
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- Category: History
- Created on Tuesday, 13 October 2009 08:41
- Written by Mike Ely
Che was executed in cold blood 42 years ago by a U.S. lead death squad that captured him in Bolivia. Then, as now, he had emerged as a prominent symbol of self-sacrifice, armed struggle, internationalism and uncompromising opposition to U.S. domination. His death stands as a glaring example of the role the U.S. and its agents play in the brutal repression of humanity's highest aspirations. The torturers of the CIA were not invented on 9/11 -- but have a very long and bloody history.
Che is a highly romantic martyr of the people's cause. But he was also a revolutionary leader and thinker in a particular complex time; he was associated closely with a specific series of approaches and strategies.
Che (and the Cuban movement he was part of) had a particular line on the role of the people in their own emancipation. It was a view that exalted the actions of small military groupings of "heroic guerrillas" (called focos) in galvanizing revolution. Unlike the Maoists at that same time, Che and Fidel Castro were not advocates of a "land to the tiller" agrarian revolution, but sought to nationalize the existing plantation structure of Cuba and similar countries.
The fact that so many people revere him is a testimony to the deep desires for liberation throughout the world. And at the same time, revolution is not made by symbolism alone. The controversies surrounding Che's strategies have contemporary significance.
The following piece was written over ten years ago in appreciation of Che's impact -- while also making a critical assessment of his strategic concepts. There has been considerable excavation of these events since this piece was written. Kasama intends to publish other essays on Che reflecting a number of different assessments.
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October 9, 1967: The CIA Murder of Ernesto Che Guevara
By Mike Ely
Thirty years ago, on October 8, 1967, gunfire echoed through a steep ravine of the Andes Mountains in southern Bolivia. The guerrilla band led by Ernesto "Che" Guevara was pinned down and surrounded by Bolivian Army Rangers.
Less than a year earlier, Guevara and a team of cadres had secretly traveled from Cuba to Bolivia to launch a guerrilla war, hoping to topple Bolivia's pro-U.S. military government. Guevara had gone up into the mountains with about 50 supporters. Within months they were discovered by Bolivian troops. And an intense pursuit started.
Trying to escape the government forces, Guevara divided his supporters into two groups, and was never able to reunite them. His diary records that, by late August, his group was exhausted, demoralized and down to 22 men. On August 31 the other group was ambushed and wiped out crossing a river.
On September 26, Bolivian army units ambushed Che's remaining forces near the isolated mountain huts of La Higuera. The guerrillas found no way out of the encirclement. Several died in the shooting. Guevara himself was wounded in the leg. He and two other fighters were captured on October 8 and taken to an old one-room schoolhouse in La Higuera.
The next day, October 9, a helicopter flew in a man called "Felix Ramos" who wore the uniform of a Bolivian officer. "Ramos" took charge of the prisoner. Two hours later, Che Guevara and both other guerrillas were executed in cold blood. A look around the peasant village of La Higuera that day would have left no doubt who was responsible.
The U.S. Hand
The weapons and equipment of the killers were "Made in the U.S.A". The Bolivian officer who took Guevara prisoner had been trained at Fort Bragg--at a U.S. school for army coups, murder and counterinsurgency. And the man in charge at the scene, "Captain Ramos," was a veteran CIA field agent, Felix Rodriguez. For years, the U.S. government had armed the Bolivian military and riddled it with their paid agents. As soon as Guevara's new guerrilla force was discovered, Washington sent new teams of CIA and Green Berets killers into Bolivia--including Rodriguez and his fellow agent "Gonzalez." U.S. transport planes arrived loaded with more arms, radio equipment, and napalm.
Rodriguez, who was masquerading as a Bolivian army captain, had previously led a CIA death squad in Vietnam. Later, this same Felix Rodriguez would be personally appointed by George Bush to be the key CIA operative at El Salvador's Ilopango Air Force base during the 1980s, where Rodriguez oversaw the CIA's notorious cocaine-for-arms airflights.
On October 9, 1967, it was Rodriguez who ordered that Guevara's execution wounds should look like they were received in combat. It was Rodriguez who pocketed Che Guevara's wristwatch as a souvenir and flew Guevara's body to the nearby military base at Vallegrande. Early on October 11, after cutting off Guevara's hands as evidence, the killers dumped his body in an unmarked grave near Vallegrande's airstrip. Publicly, the Bolivian government insisted his body had been burned.
This whole operation was stamped "Made in the U.S.A". By killing Che Guevara and his fellow guerrillas, the rulers of the United States intended to send a bloody message to the people of South America and the world.
Bullets in the Backyard
The U.S. ruling class has always viewed Latin America as its "backyard" and they have used armed force against anyone who challenged them there.
U.S. forces labeled Pancho Villa a bandit and murdered Sandino in Nicaragua. They overturned elected governments--including the murder of Chilean president Salvador Allende and 30,000 people in 1973. Dozens of bloody invasions and aggressions over the last century maintained U.S. control of Panama, Haiti, Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, Mexico and Central America. And in the last decade, they have mobilized their squads of CIA agents, advisers and "anti-drug" troops to fight against the people's war led by the Communist Party of Peru.
While they oppressed the people of Latin America, the U.S. rulers have also threatened any foreign powers who tried to make their own inroads there--starting with their arrogant "Monroe Doctrine" of 1823. The U.S. declared its right to seize Cuba and Puerto Rico from Spain in 1898. In the 1960s, '70s and '80s, they deployed troops, naval armadas and death squads to prevent Soviet social-imperialism from "getting a beachhead on the mainland of the Americas." More recently, they imposed NAFTA to tighten their grip on the people of Mexico and to shut Japanese and European imperialists out.
In the 1960s, at the time of Che's final campaign in Bolivia, the U.S. pursued these policies with a vengeance. These were times, as Mao Zedong wrote, U.S. imperialism looked like a "paper tiger...panic-stricken at the mere rustle of leaves in the wind." A great wave of rebellion and revolution challenged the U.S. in Asia, Africa and Latin America. And the USSR had stepped out, as a new imperialist rival, to take advantage of the U.S. difficulties.
President John F. Kennedy responded with bloody means. He sent a CIA fleet to land at Bay of Pigs in 1961 to attempt to overthrow the popular revolution in Cuba. He started the flow of troops and "advisors" into southern Vietnam to fight the national liberation movement there.
New CIA-run armies were organized. The Green Berets were founded. U.S. training schools were cranking out torturers, coup-makers and counterrevolutionaries. Many places throughout the world were seeded with U.S.-trained agents and killers.
And on October 9, 1967, those forces executed Che Guevara and his followers in that tiny village of La Higuera.
The Quest for Liberation
Over the last 30 years, Che Guevara has been seen by many as a symbol of resistance to all that--to U.S. domination and military power. And today, in 1997, the fight against all that remains the burning issue--just as it was 30 years ago.
How do we fight the oppressors today in a way that can actually defeat them, overthrow them and create a new liberated society? That is the issue that confronts this new generation. The revolutionary process needs dreams of a better world and heroes that people can look up to. But it also needs a serious evaluation of historical experience. The people need revolutionary theory and strategy that can win.
Che Guevara advocated a particular path for the struggle against U.S. domination. And today, Guevarism--and the historical experience of those who followed it--needs to be critically evaluated. As a veteran communist once said, "We have to want revolution bad enough to be scientific about it."
The Cuban Road
When Che Guevara and the guerrilla fighters of Fidel Castro's July 26th Movement rode into Havana, Cuba, in 1959, people all over Latin America were thrilled. A popular revolution had overthrown the brutal, pro-U.S. Batista dictatorship--only 90 miles from U.S. shores.
The Cuban revolution had actually gone relatively easily: Castro, Guevara and a few supporters established guerrilla camps in the remote Sierra Madre mountains and carried out about 25 months of intermittent fighting. Powerful unrest had spread throughout the country, including in urban areas, and the Batista regime had crumbled.
After Fidel Castro's new government nationalized U.S. holdings, hostilities broke out between Cuba and the U.S. When Castro's forces defeated a major CIA invasion at the Bay of Pigs in 1961, the excitement throughout Latin America grew intense. Someone had broken with the U.S. and was still standing!
The long-range survival of the new Cuban government posed even more difficult challenges: The U.S. launched an economic embargo, and then a military blockade in 1963. The CIA constantly sent teams of assassins and saboteurs to the island--trying to "destabilize" Cuba and regain their grip.
In response to such pressures, the Cuban government made a series of fateful decisions: They decided to forgo land reform. They maintained the country's sugar plantations as the foundation of the economy. And, connected to that, they entered into a deepening alliance with the Soviet Union--which promised to buy Cuban sugar and provide the food, arms, manufactured goods and other necessities that Cuba was not producing for itself. Throughout Cuban history, the domination of the island had been tied to its sugar economy. And now, after the revolution of 1959, many things had changed about how the country was organized and run--but this central link of dependency remained unbroken. The anti-American revolution in Cuba had proven to be not consistently anti-imperialist.
Che's Theory of Focoism
For several years after coming to power, the Cuban government encouraged people throughout Latin America to start their own armed struggles against pro-U.S. dictatorships. Several groups were given training in Cuba.
Che Guevara was closely associated with this call for continental guerrilla warfare. In a series of essays he argued that the Cuban experience could be duplicated throughout Latin America. This idea had a powerful influence within the new generation of fighters rising up in Latin America.
Che argued that small groups of determined armed fighters (called "focos") could take to the mountains and use armed actions to rally other forces--triggering the crisis and collapse of hated governments.
At the time, many people saw this Guevarist theory of focoism as a fresh alternative to Latin America's pro-Soviet Communist parties. These rotten parties closely followed the lead of the Soviet Union and were openly hostile to armed struggle against pro-U.S. governments. They were revisionists--phony "communists."
Focoism had the added attraction of offering a hope of relatively easy victory. People were taught that revolution was fundamentally an act of will and daring--that they could become representatives of the people's discontent without organizing new vanguard parties or carrying out the agrarian revolution in the countryside. And as for facing down the inevitable U.S. responses--people were taught that, like Cuba, their new movements would be able to turn to the Soviet Union for support and backing.
In the early 1960s, several attempts at armed focos were made--in Peru, Argentina, Venezuela and other countries. None of them succeeded.
Meanwhile, the Soviet Union was showing its hand in its dealings with Cuba. Soviet advisers were urging conservative methods in industry and throughout society. Fidel Castro's July 26th Movement was formally merged with the rotten cadre of the Popular Socialist Party (the old pro-Soviet party in Cuba which had even supported Batista in his rise to power.) All kinds of pressure from Cuba's new Soviet "ally" was pushing the country into a dependent role within the Soviet bloc.
Che Guevara was right in the middle of these developments. He made several criticisms of the Soviet Union--for not firmly backing national liberation struggles and for their trade policies with countries like Cuba. And he was reportedly working on a critique of other Soviet economic policies.
But these criticisms never fundamentally questioned the essential framework of the Cuban road. Guevara's criticisms of the Soviet Union stayed as "quarrels within the family"--because Guevara deeply believed that the Soviets remained a socialist country, and could be coaxed into playing a positive role in the world--through criticism, pressure and the impact of successful revolutions.
Guevara also believed that his foco strategy could be made to work in Latin America by inserting a more experienced and authoritative leadership on the ground. His response to the problems of the "Cuban Road" was to go himself to Bolivia in November 1966--to personally develop a foco there in the heart of South America.
International Struggle over the Revolutionary Road
At the same time Che Guevara was formulating his theories, intense struggle and debate was sweeping through the international communist movement.
In the early 1960s, Mao Tsetung made a startling and penetrating analysis of developments within the Soviet Union. A fundamental change of power had happened, Mao said, in 1956 when Nikita Khrushchev seized power in the Soviet Union. Capitalist-roaders within the Communist Party there had carried out a restoration of capitalism. The Soviet Union, which had been a socialist country for decades, was now a social-imperialist power (socialist in name, imperialist in essence).
Mao warned about the danger of driving the tiger out the front door while letting the wolf in the back. Relying on this new imperialist power, he said, was extremely dangerous for the masses of people. The new rulers of the Soviet Union represented a new bourgeoisie--fundamentally opposed to liberation.
Today, 30 years later, such issues may seem "a thing of the past" to a generation that lives in a world where the Soviet bloc has collapsed and the U.S. is top dog of the imperialist heap. But it is impossible to evaluate the historical experience of Che and the "Cuban Road" without understanding the nature of Soviet social-imperialism and the negative impact that alliances with the Soviet Union had on the national liberation struggles of Latin America and around the world.
The path to power advocated by Maoists was radically different from the one formulated by Che Guevara. The Maoists argued that power won through shortcuts would not be able to resist the pressures of imperialism or lead to an all-the-way revolutionary society. For that, the masses needed to be mobilized and trained in the course of a protracted class struggle, led by the proletariat.
n the Third World, Maoists argued the armed struggle needed to take the form of a protracted people's war--that was waged by relying on the masses of people, surrounding the cities from the countryside and building up a new power within revolutionary base areas. Though this approach was based on the rich experience of the Chinese revolution, Mao warned revolutionaries around the world not to copy that experience but to creatively apply this strategic orientation to their own conditions.
In the beginning, Mao had hopes of possibly winning the Cuban leadership to a better path, and he personally met with Che during his 1960 trip to China. But Che Guevara remained convinced of his foco strategy and convinced that the Soviet Union should be embraced as a potential ally of the people's movements.
Many other issues were raised by this famous ideological struggle of the 1960s and 1970s: Whether to forge new, revolutionary, communist parties to lead the revolutionary struggle, the role of armed struggle in revolution and how to organize the people for revolutionary war, how to evaluate different class forces in the world--including especially the peasantry in the world's semi-colonial, semi-feudal countries--and how to continue the revolution after the seizure of power.
In this process, a new clarity emerged, based on advances in communist ideology--Marxism-Leninism-Maoism.
Today, 30 years after the murder of Che, there have been many changes in the world. Major transformations have happened--including increased "shantytownization" in the Third World--and new leaps have taken place in the linkages of the international production and world market. With these changes have come new questions of how people can liberate themselves from imperialism. But for several billion dispossessed, poor and uprooted people across the planet, imperialist development and technology is nothing but a nightmare. For them the future is either going to be desperation or revolution. And for those in the oppressed nations, the Maoist path of protracted people's war remains an urgent and practical solution to the problems of today.
There are many today, among the youth in the U.S. and Latin America, who have been attracted to Che Guevara--because they see in him a symbol of self-sacrifice, armed struggle and internationalism in the fight against U.S. imperialism. For all those motivated by deep love for the people, it is extremely important to dig deep into the historical experiences, to seriously struggle to grasp the differences between different lines and roads. Today, this is a life-and-death issue. It has everything to do with whether we can turn our revolutionary dreams into reality.
This article was first published in the Revolutionary Worker #927, October 12, 1997
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Guest (TOR)
PermalinkI'm going to read Debray's Revolution in the Revolution soon and hope to get something out of it in regards to the strategy of focoism and the factors that it depended on for success in the Cuban revolution. It seems like a good text on the subject.
I find the discussion of PPW here very interesting. I have heard some Maoists advocate an urban variant of it similar to the Tupamaros of 23 de Enero in Caracas in the imperialist centres, though I think they are getting a bit ahead of themselves. In addition, it seems that many people take what I would call an ultra-left line when they talk about the need for PPW in the imperialist centres, as they basically forego the important work of organizing elements already in the military and with access to weaponry to fight on the side of the revolution. While this kind of organizing would obviously be an important element of a real PPW strategy in the imperialist centres, the orientation of many Maoists seems to be such that they almost see the the police force and the military as an inhuman state apparatus rather than as people like anybody else who can and must be won over to the side of the revolution for it to succeed. However, I also think that waiting till you have won a majority of these forces over to your side would be equally wrong, though in a country with the military might of many of the imperialist states, it would be purely suicidal to take up arms against the state in any form without first building revolutionary cadres in the police and military. Of course, this is a very difficult job, as many revolutionaries would be correct to have doubts about giving up details regarding revolutionary organizing to people in these organizations, who may very well be spies or be attempting to gain information and the confidence of the revolutionaries so that they can show their dedication to the military/police apparatus and advance their career within it. Although, these concerns are not very important at the moment in the imperialist centres, as the police and the military aren't putting much effort into tracking the activities of Marxists who talk about mass revolutions, which they believe are now impossible, but instead mostly focus on those who aim to carry out terrorist activities without mass support.
In terms of Che himself, I used to greatly dislike him because I thought he wasn't very intelligent and was over-romanticized by both communists and the popular culture as a whole. After learning more about him, I still don't think he was a great Marxist thinker, though he did dedicate his life to the revolutionary movement in a way that few before or since have done. I admit to never having read him directly and base most of my opinions of him on his actual strategic and tactical decisions and orientations, though I hear he has written some good stuff. Can anyone recommend something by Che that might be useful in the present conjuncture?0 Like -
Guest (Rich)
PermalinkYou can't honestly say that a person who goes into another country to start a guerrilla war was murdered in cold blood. For the same reason you can't call him a martyr. A true martyr is someone who is killed because of their beliefs as Christ was. Warriors cannot be martyrs.
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Rich writes:
<blockquote>"You can’t honestly say that a person who goes into another country to start a guerrilla war was murdered in cold blood."</blockquote>
He was captured alive, and made a prisoner. His captors walked up to him and shot him in cold blood. It was the murder of an unarmed man.
<blockquote>"For the same reason you can’t call him a martyr. A true martyr is someone who is killed because of their beliefs as Christ was. Warriors cannot be martyrs."</blockquote>
Of course they can.
Humanity's history is full of warrior martyrs: Spartacus, Thomas Muncer, Sheikh Bedreddin, Edith Lagos, Nat Turner, Rosa Luxemburg, İbrahim Kaypakkaya, Charu Mazumdar, John Brown, Bhagat Singh, George Jackson, Lil Bobby Hutton, Damian Garcia, Crazy Horse, Pedro Albizu Campos and many many more.
And, rather obviously, Che is one especially well-known example of such warrior-martyrs.0 Like -
Guest (Stanley W. Rogouski)
Permalink<i>may we take it you’re referring to Latin America, Kennedy? Sind Sie ein Berliner?
</i>
I was thinking more the Kennedy who used to be a VJ on MTV.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pn_2UrBHJNY&hl=en_US&fs=1&]0 Like -
Guest (GS)
PermalinkThe Negro is indolent and lazy, and spends his money on frivolities, whereas
the European is forward-looking, organized, and intelligent.
Mexicans are a band of illiterate Indians.
Many people think he was a Mestizo...He was of Irish/Basque descent.
As he states in his book.
"To send men to the firing squad, judicial proof is unnecessary... These procedures are an archaic bourgeois detail. This is a revolution! And a revolutionary must become a cold killing machine motivated by pure hate"
"I ended the problem with a.32 caliber pistol, in the right side of his brain. His belongings were now mine."
"My nostrils dilate while savoring the acrid odor of gunpowder and blood. Crazy with fury I will stain my rifle red while slaughtering any enemy that falls in my hands! With the deaths of my enemies I prepare my being for the sacred fight and join the triumphant proletariat with a bestial howl!"
What a racist, murderous bastard - ME0 Like -
Guest (Stanley W. Rogouski)
PermalinkI'd have to see the context of those quotes. And I'd have to look at them in the original Spanish.
But I'm not sure why someone who at one time in his life made racist remarks would still be considered a racist after he fought in the Congo for black liberation.
And remember that the Cuban army had as much to do with ending apartheid in South Africa as American college students did.
Does anybody really think Batista would have sent troops to Angola to fight the South Africans?0 Like -
Guest (Stanley W. Rogouski)
Permalink<i>“My nostrils dilate while savoring the acrid odor of gunpowder and blood. Crazy with fury I will stain my rifle red while slaughtering any enemy that falls in my hands! With the deaths of my enemies I prepare my being for the sacred fight and join the triumphant proletariat with a bestial howl!”
</i>
Here's a quote from Thomas Jefferson
http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/jefferson/jeffworld.html
VIVA AMERICA!!!
<i>Sensing rising criticism of the excesses of the French Revolution in the letters of William Short (1759-1848), his handpicked chargé des affaires in Paris, Secretary of State Jefferson sharply chastised Short and praised the revolution despite its rising irrationality and violence: <b>"and was ever such a prize won with so little innocent blood? my own affections have been deeply wounded by some of the martyrs to this cause, but rather than it should have failed, I would have seen half the earth desolated. were there but an Adam and Eve left in every country, left free, it would be better than as it now is.</b>"
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Guest (Stanley W. Rogouski)
PermalinkMore from that murderous racist bastard Thomas Jefferson
http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/jefferson/jeffworld.html
<i>In a letter to Adams, Jefferson asserted that self-government in Europe and Spanish America would require a long and bloody revolution: "all will attain representative government, more or less perfect. This is now well understood to be a necessary check on kings, whom they will probably think it more prudent to chain and tame, than to exterminate. <b>to attain all this however rivers of blood must yet flow, </b>and years of desolation pass over."
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RIVERS OF BLOOD MUST FLOW!!!0 Like -
Guest (Stanley W. Rogouski)
Permalink<i>Many people think he was a Mestizo…He was of Irish/Basque descent.
</i>
Speaking of the Irish, an Irish neoconservative named Conor Cruise O'Brian wrote the same kind of hit piece on Jefferson you've done in pygmy form on Che Guevera.
This kind of pulls together the last two comments I made.
In other words, you can do an out of context hit piece on any revolutionary.
http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/96oct/obrien/obrien.htm
<i>Finally, the Jefferson who made a cult of the French Revolution provides aid and comfort not just to the far right in government but to the most ferocious militant extremists. In the paroxysms of his enthusiasm for the French Revolution, in January of 1793, Jefferson laid down the principle that there are (virtually) no limits to the slaughter that may legitimately be perpetrated in the name of liberty -- so that anyone in modern America who is planning any act of mass destruction may invoke the sanction of "the author of the Declaration of Independence," provided only that the act is deemed to be perpetrated in the holy cause of liberty.
For these and other reasons I believe that at some time in the coming century the cult of Jefferson may, as it were, split off from its present home in ACROV and find a new home on the wilder shores of American freedom.
I believe that the orthodox multiracial version of the American civil religion must eventually prevail -- at whatever cost -- against the neo-Jeffersonian racist schism. That the orthodox version should prevail is vital not only for America but also for the future of nonracial democracy, and of Enlightenment values generally, in those parts of the world where these are now dominant or where people are struggling to bring them into effective being.
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Guest (GS)
PermalinkMy point is this. Stop following anyone who thinks murder is a solution. Guevara deserves no more adoration than Stalin, Mao, Hitler, etc. Guevara was a murderous thug who has been romanticized by non-critical thinking elites. Don't blindly follow anyone or any political persuasion. It only gets people killed.
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Guest (Stanley W. Rogouski)
Permalink<i>My point is this. Stop following anyone who thinks murder is a solution. Guevara deserves no more adoration than Stalin, Mao, Hitler, etc</i>
Once again, does that include Thomas Jefferson?
I gave you several quotes where Jefferson acknowledges that "rivers of blood" must flow for there to be liberty. But you didn't address them.
Or let's take it a step further. Let's assume you're not a right wing troll and assume you're an honest pacifist. You mention BOTH Stalin and Hitler. But wan't it Stalin who defeated Hitler? Even if you buy into the normal American bullshit about who won WWII and forget the Russian part of the war (that is 90% of it), didn't the Americans and British use violence against the Nazis?
Why do you single out Che, who killed only a tiny percentage of the people that almost any American president kills in 4 years?
If you're an honest pacifist, don't you have to condemn ALL violence and all war?0 Like -
Guest (Stanley W. Rogouski)
Permalink<i>No no, Stanley. Don’t you understand? It’s only bad when left-wingers use violence.</i>
You know, when Bush abolished the rule of law for "terrorists" (and sending us down the slippery slop to abolishing the rule of law for everybody) and when Obama refused to reverse what Bush did), he also abolished the argument against revolutionary violence.
So let's take the American revolution. What would a "liberal" today argue? Well, he could argue that the people who signed the Declaration of Independence didn't sufficiently exhaust the legal remedies that they had at their disposal before turning to violence. That's what John Dickinson, in fact, was arguing with his "Olive Branch Proposal."
Or let's take the French Revolution. A lot of the Girondins argued that the National Convention had no right to sentance Louis XVI to death, that only a referendum of the entire French people had a right to send a king to the guillotine.
But all of those arguments for "correct legal procedure" went out the window when the American government abolished habeas corpus and reintoduced torture into the judicial process.
GS doesn't make any specific charges about Che Guevera. He post some out of context racist remarks Che said. And he posts some abstract quotes Che made in support of revolutionary violence. Knocking those down is almost like shooting fish in a barrel.
It would be interesting to see more specific and well made arguments against Che in order to evaluate them.0 Like -
Guest (friend of a friend)
PermalinkChe is not the "foco" theory, he was a revolutionary communist who wouldn't let the Russians and their local vassals act as brokers for revolution, who went where the fight was and gave his life for the pan-american and world revolution. He isn't a random symbol or a set of doctrine, he is our great martyr, beloved by people in every corner of the world. He didn't complain, he fought. Let those who fear revolution fear Che Guevara.
Mike, may be a Maoist, but Maoism as a doctrine in Latin America never produced a Che, nor will it. Nor could it judging by its legacy. Che belongs to the people, to their yearning and their spirit. Drop the old-style factional mentality and learn from the people. Mao's cri6ique of revisionism was better than Che's, but they were brothers in that fight.
To the hater of Che: sorry your family lost their sugar plantation or brothel or whatever other "horrible" problems you had when revolution came to Cuba. You hate Che because his aim was good.0 Like -
It is true that we should not reduce Che to just a symbol or a doctrine. Such a figure is complex -- and historically real.
However Che also <em>is</em> the foco theory, in one sense -- i.e. in the specific sense that this is what his experience and line brought to a whole generation in latin america (with disasterous results). He did (personally) take the experience of Cuba and assumed it was reproducible, and went to Bolivia to do that. Without speaking the language, without organizing a popular movement, without a mass line....
And Che was part of the larger Cuban effort to promote their experience as universal -- and even impose it as a specific Latin American form.
Che on the Soviet Union is far from mainly oppositional. He was part of the decision that brought Cuba into the Soviet camp -- and that chose not to allign with the more revolutionary ML forces.
I just don't think it is true that "Mao’s critique of revisionism was better than Che’s, but they were brothers in that fight." On the contrary, one of the legacies of the Cuban experience (and the work of both Castro and Che) was that the Latin American left (overall) was aligned with Soviet Social imperialism, and the more revolutionary currents were unable to break with that framework.
As an economic leader in Cuba he implemented methods that were drawn from the Soviet experience and were rather harshly opposed to experimental and popular forms of transforming production.
Ideologically, he appears to have been quite a typical comintern-type communist (who was to the left of the new-style Kruchchev-era "communists" who dominated most of the "official" communist parties.) Che (and the early Fidel and Regis Debray) then summed up the forms and events of the Cuban revolution somewhat schematically. (I.e. the ongoing problem of universalizing the particular -- something that has certainly happened among Maoists as well.)
He is a martyr -- murdered by U.S. imperialism. He was consistent in opposing U.S. imperialism and they killed him. And he is beloved for fighting, and for dying while fighting.
And I think we should recognize that -- and (for Maoists) that alone would be a leap and a correction.
On a final point by "Friend of a friend""
<blockquote>"Maoism as a doctrine in Latin America never produced a Che, nor will it."</blockquote>
It is also true that Guevarism as a doctrine has not produced a new che. It has not been a successful current -- even as it morphed in numerous ways (in the name of sandino or zapata or bolivar).
FOAF writes:
<blockquote>"Che belongs to the people, to their yearning and their spirit."</blockquote>
This divides into two: Che (as a symbol of revolution and antiimperialism and armed struggle) certainly belongs to the people -- and represents many of their highest aspirations. But he also has to be considered as a specific historical figure with actual actions and beliefs -- and in that sense he has serious mistakes exactly in his connection to the people (in his view of the mass line, in the form through which people come to the revolutionary front, in the relationship of "heroic guerrillas" to the heroic people as the makers of history.)
But Che also does have to be considered as the symbol and initiator of a distinctive Guevarist political current (with real politics and a real politics and real outcomes) -- like Tupac Amaru in Peru, or Weatherman in the U.S., Tupamaros in urban Uruguay, or countless other groups across Latin America (and other places like Turkey etc.) And it has to be summed up how that Guevarists current fell short in its connections to the people and in its view of the people. And those weaknesses are connected in various ways to Che and his actual politics -- and the ways he divides into two.0 Like -
Guest (Green Red)
PermalinkMore than that.
For example, PFLP (of George Habash), all the way to say Baader Meinhof, red brigades in Italy (and in Japan), people's fadayee guerrillas of Iran and what have you.
Sure, as a dedicated comrade, he is a martyr but, without mass base, great lives can be consumed and wasted without revolutionary outcome. Be it Weather Underground or SLA up to...., it just gives enemies more cards to play against the movement. Sure, sincerity of fallen comrades have their part but, staying alive and fighting on and on can have more long term results than few, saying let's change the world quickly!0 Like -
Guest (mike)
PermalinkIs it wrong for the USA to declare that no European or Asian power will be allowed to establich itself in the Americas? If the government of Bolivia decides to accept US weapons and aid to keep itself in power- is America wrong to seek to have influence there if it considers the stability of it's neighbors essential to it's own national security? Finally, Guevara was part of an invading force, however small, and they were intent on fomenting revolution and waging war - so , if Bolivia allows or administers the execution of this man and his comrades, captured red handed invading the territory of their country- how is that murder? If it is murder, than every German soldier who died in captivity in the USSR, particularly after 08May1945- was murdered.
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Guest (nando)
Permalink<blockquote>"Is it wrong for the USA to declare that no European or Asian power will be allowed to establich itself in the Americas?"</blockquote>
Yes. The Monroe Doctrine is a quintessentially imperialist document charting out a "sphere of influence" in ways that inherently rejects the notion of self-determination for other peoples (and has, in practice, justified the forcible U.S. domination over other people).
<blockquote>"If the government of Bolivia decides to accept US weapons and aid to keep itself in power- is America wrong to seek to have influence there if it considers the stability of it’s neighbors essential to it’s own national security?"</blockquote>
Yes. The Bolivian government was a shameful puppet force serving external domination and plunder of Bolivia. It didn't "decide" anything -- it did what puppets always do.... it nodded when told to nod. It signed when told to sign. It kept its mouth shut when told to keep its mouth shut. It participated in murder when the U.S. wanted it to participate.
<blockquote>"Finally, Guevara was part of an invading force, however small, and they were intent on fomenting revolution and waging war – so , if Bolivia allows or administers the execution of this man and his comrades, captured red handed invading the territory of their country- how is that murder?"</blockquote>
There is no "invasion" in the formation of a Latin American force for the liberation of Latin America. The Bolivian government had no legitimacy or right to kill liberation fighters. And people have every right to rise up for their liberation.
<blockquote>"If it is murder, than every German soldier who died in captivity in the USSR, particularly after 08May1945- was murdered."</blockquote>
This "example" reveals both the absurdity and the intentions behind your argument. Nazi invaders of the socialist Soviet Union were on a high tech mission of reaction and domination -- one of the most unjust and vicious missions in history. They can't be compared to a multinational Latin American force seeking to trigger continent wide revolution against feudalism and U.S. domination. One is unjust, the other is just. One is (by its nature) external violence aimed at the people of eastern Europe, the other was a heroic attempt to enable the people themselves to rise up for their own liberation.0 Like -
By Mike's logic in comment #40, Simon Bolivar would be a "foreign invader" of Bolivia, the country which bears his name. Bolivar fought and defeated the Spanish empire, leading to the creation of several republics. The division of Latin America has left it weak to US domination, and many – including Che – thought their duty was to the people, regardless of which side of the line they lived on. In Cuba, Che is the symbol of patriotism. They don't call him Argentine, but Commandante.
Today, Che Guevara's picture hangs in the presidential palace of Bolivia, put up by none other than Evo Morales – the first indigenous president in that country's history.
Venceremos.0 Like -
Guest (Philip Ferguson)
PermalinkI agree with Mike E's comment about there not being one, or even two, ways to power in Latin America (and elsewhere). Indeed, in Latin America this could be seen as early as 1979, with the FSLN overthrow of the Somoza regime.
The FSLN had three tendencies, which had split apart for a while and then reunited in 1978. It was the fact that they were able to fight in three ways, not one, which made them the only radical movement in Latin America post-Cuba to actually topple a dictatorship. They waged prolonged people's war and there was a section of the FSLN (led by Borge) devoted to that; they had an insurrectionalist tendency (led by the Ortega brothers) and a tendency oriented to the small but growing class of wage-labourers (the tendency led by Jaime Wheelock). Without bringing those aspects together in a multifaceted strategy, when the FSLN reunited in 1978, I think the July 1979 revolution would have been unimaginable.
Of course, what happened later was the succumbing to the pressures of imperialism (and the temptations of office/power) and the FSLN is now only a faint echo of the radicalism of Fonseca and the struggles of the 60s, 70s and its early years in power. But that is another story.
Phil F.0 Like -
The Sandinista experience has always suggested to me what I have called an "ecosystem approach" to revolutionary strategy. That is to say that real-life revolutions are not simply the result of the triumph of a single correct line over all the assorted incorrect lines, but rather a convergence or synchronization of sometimes competing but ultimately complementary strategies on the part of differently situated actors. Sometimes this occurs within a party or a formal front, but often not. I think, for example, of the role of Left SRs and anarchists in the October Revolution and its immediate aftermath. One trend is almost always primary in this relationship, but success depends on the contributions of multiple formations. This doesn't mean its not important to struggle over the correct line, but it does mean that we should expect some of those struggles to be incomplete in their resolution and for trends that divide in order that certain forms of work are able to mature can come back together in later moments. I'm not sure how this fits into Bill Martin's idea of a "vital mix" but Phil's comment brought it to mind.
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Guest (Gary)
PermalinkI see Che as (1) a profoundly moral man, (2) a sincere internationalist and communist, and (3) as someone deeply mistaken in his understanding of how to make revolution.
The reason he inspires people like Nathalie Cardone
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CwTBCvb_4zo http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86LSuXi5TLU&feature=related
or the millions of youth internationally who wear Che T-shirts isn't that he made any substantial contribution to Marxist theory, although we should appreciate the fact that at a crucial point in the history of the ICM (Feb 1964) having recently met with Mao in China (Mao btw suggested acupuncture to treat his asthma)criticized the Soviets in Algeria. He declared them complicit in the exploitation of the Third World; this at a time when the USSR was providing a lot of aid to Cuba and Che was Finance Minister. Fidel and Raul were unhappy with the speech and this was one reason Che elected to leave his adopted country for adventures in Africa and Bolivia.
The reason Che is loved is because he really did believe "a true revolutionary is guided by great feelings of love" and that he acknowledged being "an adventurer, only one a different sort: one of those who risks his skin to prove his platitudes.”
There's an enormous appropriateness in the Christ analogies. I recall as boy seeing the TV news photos of the dead Che and that comparison immediately came to my own mind. That before I knew much about the man at all. I only knew that he was a rebel (when I was just becoming one) who'd been shot after capture by these uniformed bastards. His sacrifice drew my attention and made me want to study communism.
Che is the ultimate "tragic hero" of the 20th century. He did not understand mass line, and his coincidental involvement in a successful revolution in Cuba perhaps encouraged an optimism about his personal ability to shape events. He was hopelessly romantic, a self-pronounced Don Quixote, and focoismo is arguably a quixotic theory. You might even say he brought his martrydom on himself by his misunderstanding of how to make revolution.
Still, it would be wrong (imho) to view him primarily as a revisionist and misleader, and to tell those kids wearing Che T-shirts to get rid of them and wear Mao ones instead. It's a good thing they're drawn to Che. It's a good thing the film The Motorcycle Diaries (about Che's travels through Latin Aemrica at age 23, with its beautiful soundtrack by Argentine composer Gustavo Santaolalla) was quite successful in this country. And that Madrid's punk rock artists celebrate Che, with enthusiastic audience participation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GmiNqHc8v8Q
Che is (or at least can be) a bridge to serious engagement with Marxism. We should uphold him as one of our own.0 Like -
Guest (Dave)
PermalinkI hope that the people who write off Che as a "typical Comintern-style communist" or say that he didn't "make any substantial contribution to communist theory" actually read his writings someday. Mike's article from a dozen years ago, and even his subsequent self-criticism of this article, seem to be based much more on accounts of Che Guevara's life (and possibly the theories of Regis Debray) than on anything Che himself said. I would encourage everyone to read "Contra el burocratismo," "Sobre la concepción de valor," and other articles that Che wrote on the topic of building a socialist economy. "Apuntes críticos a la economía política" was recently published by Ocean Press, and I hope to get my hands on a copy soon.
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Just to be clear: in writing this, I read everything by and about Che I could get my hands on. This obviously included a deep reading of his own works. I think it is true (and accurate) that he was a representative of the Comintern communist movement (of a kind before it split into the worst of pro-Soviet revisionism and the Maoist radical currents). His views on economics and social relations were pretty classic "stalin era" approaches. Obviously, as in all revolutions, the Cuban leaders improvised. They developed and then discarded then reinvented policies (as things soured or blossomed for them).
There is a whole discussion to be had on his views of economics -- and the cuban idea of "moral incentives" (which is rather different from questions of communist consciousness etc.) And there is more to say on the question of targeting "bureaucracy" at a time (the 1960s) where the attention of the most advanced communists were on "capitalist roaders" (and where Cuba itself was careening deep into the Soviet road <em>especially</em> around economics).
Unfortunately the project I was working on (within the RCP) and its attempt to bring some serious research up to a level of synthesis -- it was cut short. And the piece I published here (which was merely a trailer for the main movie) was all that ever appeared. We should consider how to truly engage those questions now at a high level.0 Like -
Guest (Tom)
PermalinkAs a member of the Communist Party USA I think that Che was a great man. That is why we also support Obama to change America. The day will come when America will see the shining path to Communist rule. Only then will America take it's place as a nation devoted to the collective.
Young people in America must support the Democratic Party as the Communist Party gains enough power in national elections. Our brothers and sisters in the struggle know that our end result will be a Communist United States to serve the workers of the world.
America's financial destruction will come. Obama is doing a great job in pushing America in the right direction. Che would be very proud of him.0 Like -
I think Tom is definitely a troll. That is a Glenn Beck-esque caricature of the CP's admittedly wreteched politics. The give-aways are: first the use of the phrases "the collective" and "Communist rule" like a villain in an Ayn Rand novel, second the use of "shining path" (completely incongruous with the politics of even vaguely attached to the CP), and third the view of Obama as deliberately hastening the financial destruction of the US, rather than heroically defending liberal democracy from the far right. In the topsy-turvy universe of the Tea Baggers, the teeny CP tail wags the big Democratic Party dog and not the other way around.
0 Like -
Guest (Single Sparks and Prarie Fires)
PermalinkMike -
<blockquote>"As an economic leader in Cuba he implemented methods that were drawn from the Soviet experience and were rather harshly opposed to experimental and popular forms of transforming production."</blockquote>
This is wrong, and comes alongside my critique of this article in general.
Mike said it best in saying "Che also is the foco theory" - this erroneous thinking has gotten a large section of the left to ignore Che's other and far more important work and contributions to Marxist-Leninist theory.
To mystify Che the guerilla is to ignore Che the staunch Marxist Leninist, who participated in complex discussions of socialist economics amongst major socialist economic thinkers, and was highly active in the Great Debate in the 60s in Cuba. Alongside this, Che contributed a large amount of thought on the ideological reconstruction of a socialist consciousness ("building a socialist man"), and on highlighting and stressing the importance of understanding imperialism.
Che was not simply some romantic man who went on capers in mountains with other armed guerillas, but a deep thinker and contributor - he served as President of the National Bank, was head of the Department of Industrialisation and was Minister of Industries from 1959-65. Che did not simply draw from the Soviet experience in organising the Cuban socialist economy - far from it, he contributed a thorough and lively Critique of the Soviet Manual of Political Economy (much as Mao did, and often crossing on similar points), and organised the Budgetary Finance System as a specific alternative to the Soviet Auto-Financing System.
To ignore Che's magnificent contributions on these, or to distort them (no doubt unintentionally, as I doubt this was ever your intention to do so - something that can't be said of the usual Trot "critiques" of Che) is to really obfuscate the matter, and will never get us anywhere.
Che made some brilliant contributions, and I urge every Marxist Leninist to really revisit Che's writings, speeches and actions - not just the "foco" theory - and in doing so to revisit their assumptions about a man who was a real Marxist Leninist thinker, no doubt.
Don't turn Che into a single thing - "the foco theory" - but really look at the man and the thought.0 Like -
Guest (mike e)
PermalinkFor clarity, CV:
Alastair writes (above):
<blockquote>"The Bolivian expedition was doomed from the start. While it is to some extent possible to put the blame on the failure of the Bolivian CP (pro-Moscow) to support the guerillas, denying them the essential urban mass movement and support network, the guerillas were mostly foreigners and they couldn’t even speak the language of the mostly Indian peasants in the area they operated in. In the entire struggle there, they never recruited a single peasant. "</blockquote>
Later I wrote:
<blockquote>"He did (personally) take the experience of Cuba and assumed it was reproducible, and went to Bolivia to do that. Without speaking the language, without organizing a popular movement, without a mass line….</blockquote>
Che did speak "a different language" from the peasants he met.
No one implied Che didn't speak Spanish -- the issue is that he (and his foco) didn't learn the language of the people of that area in Bolivia (which was not Spanish).
This is not just a matter of a tragic oversight (though it was, of course, a tragic oversight) -- but it illuminates a more common problem among communists that we are seeking to excavate. There is a legacy of overestimating the universality of experience, underestimating the particularity of time and place, assuming too mechanically that particular models are transferable, not paying attention to the ways that revolution (or counterrevolution for that matter) may be rising organically from a particular landscape.
Another example: The Comintern insisted for a while (1920s and 30s) that the road to revolution in China was urban soviets.
Another example: By 1960, there had been two major socialist revolutions: The October Revolution in Russia, and the victorious peoples war of China. Some communists then believed that there were two models for revolution that were applicable to most of the world: an October Road and a road of protracted peoples war. I suppose if there had been three revolutions by then, they might have argued there were three models. (And, of course, many in Latin America posited the Cuban road of rural focos and then nationwide uprising as such a new model).
Che did speak a differe0 Like -
Che spoke Spanish, but the Indian peasants he hoped to base his foco among spoke Aymara. It is worth noting that this sort of error occurred over and over in Latin America. The predecessor group of the Zapatistas, the National Liberation Forces (FLN) made several ill-fated attempts to establish a foco in the Lacandon Jungle before they learned their lessons and patiently recruited among the indigenous population before launching another guerrilla nucleus. It might be apocryphal, but the FLN supposedly translated the Communist Manifesto into Tzotzil. When the EZLN was initiated, three of the six founding members were indigenous and within a couple years it was overwhelmingly indigenous. While accounts vary Subcomandante Marcos apparently speaks competent Tzeltal and understands Tzotzil, Tojolabal and Chol and this fact clearly can not be separated from the respect and trust he commands among the indigenous base of the EZLN.
The failure of so many would-be guerrilla leaders to learn the language and the culture of the peoples they sought to lead reflects a common blindspot among many Marxists on the importance of ethnicity and culture that frankly reproduces the colonialist outlook of ruling elites.0 Like -
This suggests the importance of <a href="/http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jos%C3%A9_Carlos_Mari%C3%A1tegui" rel="nofollow">José Carlos Mariátegui</a> -- the early Peruvian Marxist. His <a href="/http://www.marxists.org/archive/mariateg/works/index.htm" rel="nofollow">work </a>makes the argument that the national liberation of Peru is inseparable from the liberation of the Indian peoples who make up its great majority -- connecting the revolutionary struggle of Peru (against imperialist domination) with the difficult struggle of the highland peoples against vicious, apartheid-like degradation and racism at the hands of Peru's white elite.
He also speculated on ways that memory and remnants of the Incan communes (<em>ayllus</em>
could form one contributing basis for communist revolution (and in that light makes interesting references to the Jesuit-founded Indian communities depicted in The Mission.
The contrast (as TNL say) is important. It may apocryphal, but I have read that a reporter asked Sandinista Interior Minister <a href="/http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom%C3%A1s_Borge" rel="nofollow">Tomas Borge</a> what his views were on the indigenous Miskito people on Nicaragua’s eastern coast, and he reportedly replied: “What do I look like, an anthropologist?” (I.e. suggesting that this mixed, creole speaking people are a marginalized, ethnological curiosity that are somehow outside the concerns of the revolutionary process.)
I have not been able to track down that particular quote again, but Louis Proyekt wrote a <a href="/http://www.columbia.edu/~lnp3/mydocs/indian/miskitos.htm" rel="nofollow">sketch</a> of the Sandinistas' initial racist indifference to the indigenous peoples.
There were then changes in policy after the Miskito people started to resist the Sandinistas in various ways -- and the danger of alienating them became more clear). Louis writes:
<blockquote>Tomas Borge was in charge of the negotiations with the Miskitos and said the following at their successful conclusion: "We are capable of demonstrating to the world that we are capable of overcoming our own mistakes...that we have the modesty to enrich our knowledge of reality. Practice has shown us that it is scientifically incorrect to reduce social reality to class distinctions...We therefore recognize that...ethnic diversity is among the moving forces of the revolution."</blockquote>0 Like -
Guest (Miles Ahead)
PermalinkWanted to add a personal experience that I found very poignant and something that drove the point home of not just looking at the world through our own, often times microscopic lens, and more keenly and respectfully educating ourselves, as much as possible, to differences culturally, socially, historically, language-wise, etc. with people around the globe.
Living in México for 15 years, I was able to travel extensively countrywide. I've been lucky enough to spend some quality time along the Ruta Puuc (which goes from Campeché to Merida—along the route Mayan pueblos still exist, where the people live much as they did 2,500 years ago) as well as Chiapas, and in particular, the Tzotzil community of Zinacantán.
(Within Chiapas, as is true of most parts of México, there isn’t some dominant or homogeneous language or customs even among the indigenous peoples.)
But the first time I went to Zinacantán, where dress and rituals have their own uniqueness/symbolism even to some of the surrounding pueblos, I met a young boy, Homero. He invited me to his “hogar” (“home”)—basically a cinder-block, dirt floor, no electricity, etc. to introduce me to his mother, who was a weaver by trade. She had formed a cooperative of 3 with other women who were artisans. They used a hand-loom, which was stretched from above, using a branch that was part of their roof, and without a doubt made some of the most beautiful creations I’d ever seen. (Homero's father shored the sheep and hand-dyed the wool.)
Homero spoke Spanish, which he learned in the local school. His mother spoke strictly Tzotzil, so Homero was translator and interpreter.
Had asked Homero if he liked sports. BBall was his fave. Thinking we had some automatic connection, told him about my oldest grandson, who was his age, and his love of BBall, etc., thinking we could converse in some universal language of children.
Before I left, Homero thought it would be the <i>grandest</i> idea ever to buy one of his mother’s traditional capes (and specifically Zinacantán) for my grandson, worn by the men in the pueblo for special events, for any upcoming fiestas my grandson might attend.
Though I’m sure these two young men would have gotten along famously, both very outgoing, kind, sensitive and beautiful—however, it hit me--their worlds were/are world’s apart. My grandson, living and growing up in East Oakland and what he would consider cool, had nothing to do with Homero’s idea of the same. Naturally would never have told that to Homero, who had visions of making a new friend.
I did buy the cape however, showed it to my grandson, and if nothing else, it sparked his interest in learning more about the indigenous people of México, most especially the Mayans. Furthermore, when I returned home, was inspired to do a painting of Homero, in his world. Brought it to him the next time we got together and while he was very pleased, am not sure he quite realized how much he had touched me so.0 Like -
Guest (Green Red)
PermalinkOne more time he is alive. as mentioned now, every shoe flying is memory of another Che's fan reporter with his photo in his house...
Thousands protest French crackdown on Gypsies
By JAMEY KEATEN
The Associated Press
Saturday, September 4, 2010; 3:44 PM
PARIS -- Thousands of people marched in Paris and around France on Saturday to protest expulsions of Gypsies and other new security measures adopted by President Nicolas Sarkozy's government.
Protesters blew whistles and beat drums in the capital, the largest demonstration among those in at least 135 cities and towns across France and elsewhere in Europe. Human rights and anti-racism groups, labor unions and leftist political parties were taking part in the protests.
They accuse Sarkozy of stigmatizing minority groups like Gypsies and seeking political gain with a security crackdown. They also say he is violating French traditions of welcoming the oppressed, in a country that is one of the world's leading providers of political asylum.
The protests mark the first show of public discontent since the conservative Sarkozy, a former hardline interior minister, announced new measures to fight crime in late July.
Sarkozy said Gypsy camps would be "systematically evacuated." His interior minister and other officials said last week that about 1,000 Roma have been given small stipends and flown home since then.
For years, Sarkozy has used his image as a tough, law-and-order politician to win political support. Sarkozy has linked Roma to crime, saying their camps are sources of prostitution and child exploitation. The latest moves by Sarkozy came after violence between police and youth in a suburban Grenoble housing project and other clashes in a traveling community in the Loire Valley.
Sarkozy also said naturalized citizens who threaten the lives of police officers should lose their citizenship - and his leftist critics slammed that proposal as anti-constitutional and evocative of nationalist measures during France's collaborationist past in the Vichy regime during World War II.
"Mr. Sarkozy is there to stand for the Constitution, not to trample it," said Jean-Pierre Dubois, president of France's Human Rights League. "So we consider this situation extremely dangerous, that's why we are here."
Paris police said some 12,000 people took part in the protest in the capital and that no violence took place. Organizers estimated that 50,000 people took part in the capital - half of the total nationwide.
Small groups of Gypsies took part, including women in flowered skirts, sandals or wearing looping earrings, and men in jeans and gold caps on teeth in the corners of their smiles. But they were far outnumbered by left-leaning political parties, labor unions, and dozens of activist groups like those supporting illegal immigrants or gays.
"It warms the heart to see so many people out here. Fortunately, there are nice people in the world," said Delia Romanes, walking behind a banner of a 17-year-old Gypsy circus that she heads in northeastern Paris. She said the government has recently sought to strip its performers of their work papers.
Other Roma without proper residency rights were more fearful.
"We are afraid. We aren't prepared for this," said David Anghel, a 24-year-old mason from Romania, who has lived in France for eight years. Holding the banner of a Gypsy-support association, he said his wife had been served with an order to leave their camp in Fleury-Merogis, south of Paris, about 10 days ago. They fear police will come to expel them in the next few days.
Similar peaceful protests took place outside French embassies elsewhere in Europe. In Belgrade, Serbia, dozens of Gypsies chanted anti-racist slogans and held banners calling for an end to the expulsions from France.
In Rome, Marcello Zuinisi, a Tuscany-based Gypsy leader, sought to remind the French about their "liberte, egalite, fraternite" motto: "We want those values to be respected today."
In an open letter to Sarkozy published Saturday in Le Monde daily, celebrated French-Moroccan writer Tahar Ben Jelloun - whom Sarkozy inducted into France's Legion d'Honneur in 2007 - said he felt the proposal about stripping citizenship had "threatened a little bit - or at least weakened - my French nationality."
Polls have shown the French are split about the policy of sending home the Gypsies to eastern Europe - mainly Romania - though slightly more favor it than oppose it.
France's recent and highly publicized crackdown has drawn criticism from the United Nations and the Vatican, among other institutions, and has exposed dissent within Sarkozy's own government. Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said he briefly considered resigning in the uproar over the policy.
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One, two, million shoes now on Obama too!0 Like -
Guest (Harsh Thakor)
PermalinkOn the day of his martyrdom today on Ocotober 9th I pay salutes to this great crusader who laid his life towards the liberation of mankind,very much in a Jesus-Christ mould.He may have had polemic weaknesses but it was his efforts that played a major role in the only morally succesful revolution in Latin America and sowed the seeds for revolution all over the continent.
What was significant is that he morally upheld the Chinese by upholding armed struggle.True ,officialy he adhered to a centrist line,being neutral in the great debate.However he praised the Chinese Communes in 1960 and was strongly critical of Kruschev's policies which compromised with revolution and promoted consumerism.He praised Mao's agricultural achievements and praised Mao amd the Chinese comrades for upholding path of armed struggle.Where che stryed is that he neglected protracted peoples War path and advocated foco-theory.He also denied the role of the proletarian party as a vanguard.
It is not for nothing that Jean Paul Sartre called him the most complete man of the Century.He paced great importance to revolutionary humanism and stressed on the freedom of intellectuals.Few revolutionaries placed so much stress on spiritual development in man.Che ,led by personal example,participating in production in the factories and farms.He was also an internationalsit who strived to take the revolution world over.It was Che who sowed the seeds for the most progressive society in modern times which was Cuba.
It is possible that Che may have corrected his errors had he lived on mass line and proletarian party leadership.He could have ultimately taken the Maoist path.Remember toady in the Maoist movement worldwide there are setbacks,with Peru being the best example in recent times.Che is legendary icon in the history of mankind's struggle for liberation,perhaps the most complete man of the modern age-a soul of the World Revolution.0 Like -
Guest (drew)
Permalinkmany consider comadante marcos to be the contemporary of che guevara, he is currently the voice of the zapatista army that controls the chiapas area, they went into effect the day the nafta agreement was signed in 94 or 95 i believe. Anyone who supports che's ideals would be wise to check them out. 60 minutes did an episode on them. Many of them are of mayan ancestry and do not speak spanish, although marcos himself was actually an educated professor in philosophy i believe, much like che was educated but spoke for the uneducated. They focus more on what they are against than what they are for, although communist, they declare that their purpose is a war on neo-liberalism, subsidization, globalization etc.
Che's ideals only grew stronger from being murdered by the CIA and his death only strengthened peoples drive to further his cause.
Jose zapata gave independence to mexico from spain.0 Like -
Guest (Ismael Maumane)
PermalinkWould the members of this forum kindly elaborate on the origins of the term, "The Struggle Continues" (La Lucha Continúa). Was the term coined by Che Guevara? Or did it originate during Mao's Long March?
I would appreciate any works/authors whom I could cite in connection with the origins of the term.
Regards,
Ismael0 Like -
Guest (Eu)
PermalinkHas anyone asked themselves, the guy who killed CHE is still alive? Actually yes, alive and kicking.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Felix_Rodriguez_06.jpg
In 2005, Rodriguez oversaw the opening of the Bay of Pigs Museum and Library in Little Havana, Florida, and also became Chairman of the Board of Directors.
How come, there are so many people who love CHE, and nobody took a bat to this guy's head? It's curious. The most famous picture in the world is that of CHE, and nobody asks himself who he is, is he still alive, and why did he died. Hey, if they filmed CHE dead, do you think they have the tape with the execution?0 Like -
Guest (Ali D Jr)
PermalinkObserver at Nr. 14 had covered various langugaes doing Hasta Siempre.
TO remain just and, due to its arrival around the fortieth anniversary of Siahkal Uprising in Iran - the move that shook Shah of Iran but, did not organize enough people to form Communist Party and suffered tremendously with Russiphile Tudeh Party agents infiltration and effects upon leadership, revolution was easily stolen in 1979 by Islamic backwards.
Still, on this 40 remembarance somebody back in Iran gave another part added to Observor's collection and, text will be made available upon requist. Santa Clara keeps calling you El Che
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=on5T3khpJ58&feature=related0 Like -
Guest (George)
PermalinkDoes anyone here think that Che's Bolivian mission had any chance at succeeding? Once the fighting was over in Cuba, Che was no longer trusted there. Part of the reason he left Cuba to try to spread revolution in South America was that his future there was bleak. The Cuban people didnt care if Fidel declared him "Cuban by birth". They still saw him as an Argentinian foreigner. And his disdain at the main Cuban sponsor, the Soviet Union, doomed his future in Cuba, and subsequently in Bolivia.
The Bolivian people would never trust him either. Most of the peasants of indian descent are tightly knitted, and distrust foreigners, and non-local Bolivians. And, by the way, CV and Mike E, Che knew that the main language in that area wasnt Spanish, so he ordered the study of Quechua, which is one of the official Bolivian languages, and is spoken by many of the natives. However, in southeast Bolivia, the peasants mostly speak Guarani. Even though Guarani is mostly a Paraguayan language, it is also spoken in northern Argentina, western Brazil and southeast Bolivia, as cultures in these remote areas do not follow nation boundary lines. Then, there is the questionable loyalty on Tania. She was an East German intelligence agent, and perhaps even of the KGB, so she may not necessarily wanted to see Ernesto succeed.
I would encourage all of you to read an excellent thesis of the analysis of Che's Bolivian campaign written by the military. You can find it at "www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/report/1985/SDR.htm". Thes thesis contains information from the diaries of Rolando, Pombo and Braulio in addition to that of Che, and these diaries talk much more of the facts that happened before his arrival to Bolivia in November, 1966.0 Like -
Guest (Tell No Lies)
PermalinkGeorge,
The common wisdom clearly holds that the Bolivia mission was doomed from the start. Rather than engaging in speculation about what precisely would have needed to go differently for it to succeed I think its more fruitful to try to understand the political context that led Ché to undertake it anyway. It is easy enough to list Ché's tactical errors if ones desire is to discredit him. Those errors were serious enough. But I seriously question the proposition that things would have gone significantly differently if Ché and his fighters had studied Guarani, though obviously they should have.
I think the nationalist reading of Ché's isolation within Cuba ("he was a foreigner") is simplistic and avoids the substance of his differences with the Soviet Union. I think Ché perceived correctly that the Soviet model that was taken up in Cuba was leading to the restoration of capitalism. He also understood that the international balance of forces was such that on its own Cuba could not strike out and chart an alternative path as China was attempting. In his "Critical Notes on Political Economy" which went unpublished for 40 years, Ché indicates an affinity for the Chinese view on this, but of course "the Chinese view" itself was an object of intense struggle in China at the very same time. What the situation demanded in Ché's view was an alteration of the international balance of forces by successful revolutionary movements in other countries. Both the Congo and the Bolivia Missions were undertaken with this objective in mind. Which is to say that the target of these efforst was not just imperialism but also the hegemony of the USSR within the International Communist Movement.
The problem of course was that neither the objective conditions in the Congo or Bolivia, nor Ché's subjective capacities as a political-military leader, favored the success of either mission in any direct sense. And of course the decision of many young Latin American revolutionaries to follow Ché's political-military theories had tragic consequences.
With all those caveats in mind, I think its still important to recognize what was essentially correct in Ché's analysis of the problems confronting the Cuban Revolution and the neccessity of some sort of bold action to break the ideological grip of the Soviets.
In rendering a verdict on the Bolivia Mission, the question must always be asked "compared to what?" Should Ché, on surveying the balance of forces, have suppressed his criticisms of the Soviets, subordinated his vision to theirs and become a dutiful apparatchik? Would that have served the revolutionary movement in Latin America or around the world better?
There is a Maoist orthodoxy that condemns Ché as an "armed revisionist" and suggests that what Latin America needed was a proper application of Mao's strategy of protracted peoples war. I tend to think that on the contrary what Latin America needed was to develop its own praxis grounded in its own historical particularities just as the Chinese Revolution did with respect to Chinese conditions. Ché understood this (and it should be remembered in this light that it was revolutionary Cuba that brought Mariategui's writings back into print). His attempt to make it happen failed tragically and it is important to understand the various reasons why, but his preception that something of this order was demanded was correct and should be upheld.0 Like -
TNL: I agree with what you write here.
It is true that Maoists have thought that the solution to these problems was that what Latin America needed was a proper application of Mao’s strategy of protracted peoples war. This both hints at some real problems in the Guevarist strategies (focoism, approach to land reform, get rich quick schemes, seeking of a friendly external power), but often exaggerates the ease and possibility of "applying" univeralized Maoist models.
<b>Valid Critiques, Mechanical Models</b>
Many of the Maoist critiques of the Cuban road were valid. And it is valid to criticize the transformation of the Cuban road into its own set of models (Guevarist focoism, Sandinista fronts, etc.) However, the solution to those problems is not simply to hoist and impose some <em>other</em> model in a mechanical way.
Applying those Maoist protracted war models have worked best in conditions that were closest to rural china (i.e. Ayacucho in Peru, Himalayan foothills in Nepal, remote tribal areas in India). Such models have much more limited applicability in other places. And it becomes a matter of studying methods and creative development -- not imposition of models.
<b>Who condemns Che?</b>
Meanwhile: It may be literally true (as you say) that there is a Maoist orthodoxy that "condemns" Che -- <em>if</em> you mean by that, that there are some currents within Maoism who have been openly hostile. For example the Communist Party of Peru (Shining Path) is often cited as a movement that dissed Che, and rejected his focoism as the doctrine of "roaming rebel bands." I have not read these supposed condemnations myself, so I can't speak to their existence or content.
But the summations of Maoism generally have been much more conflicted and diverse. It is generally well known that the Nepali Maoists have chosen to uphold as revolutionary figures various communists of the past whose approaches are not completely synched with their own (including specifically Che Guevara and <a href="/http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosa_Luxemburg" rel="nofollow">Rosa Luxemburg</a>.)
Within the RCP there were sharp differences over this -- and the organization was (as a result) not able to produce a single definitive piece on Che. I was responsible for a period of investigations into Che for the RCP and wrote the short stopgap piece (posted at the head of this thread).
The RCP for example did not generally "condemn" Che, nor did it label him "armed revisionism." They were, generally, silent on Che -- though at the street level, subtle politics often got distributed through a crude and dogmatic nozzle.
<b>Che's Death and the polarization over Soviet social imperialism</b>
It is known that Che had sharp criticisms of the Soviet economic models and anti-revolutionary foreign policy (and many people point to those). And at the same time, his criticisms of the Soviet Union were (up to the time of his departure from Cuba) confined to a specific framework which did not openly question the increasingly close alignment (and subordination) of Cuba to the Soviet Union.
Of course, Che was dead by 1967 -- and many of the most complex and painful splits within the international communist movement had just started. There were still significant parties (i.e. Vietnam) that occupied a middle ground in the great divide within the ICM. When Che died, Castro had not yet made his stunning endorsement of the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia (and the outrageous Brezhnev Doctrine declaring the Soviet right to impose regime change in any allied government).
Did he (as some claim) feel despair over the slide of Castro's Cuba into that Soviet sphere of influence? Or was it something he would ultimately have come to accept (if he had survived Bolivia)? In some ways, we will never (definitively) know where Che would have (ultimately) fallen out on many issues.
He fought and died in the struggle against U.S. imperialism. And his stance on key dividing lines of the communist movement were unresolved to the end. And I believe that is why he (like Ho Chi Minh) are included in the ranks of revolutionaries, not in the ranks of "armed revisionists."
Later Guevarist groups that turned Cuba's experience and Che's tactics into a "model" were, for various reasons, considered armed revisionists -- which made a distinction between what Che did and what others later did <em>in his name</em>. The political evaluation of Che Guevara and the political evaluation of those groups are separate matters.
<b>Lin Biaoism: Putting the Gun at the Center of Politics</b>
By the way, this raises a political question that is often not understood well:
The Lin Biaoist current treated armed struggle as the <em>main</em> and <em>decisive</em> dividing line between revolutionary communism and counterrevolutionary revisionism. There are those today who similarly insist that waging peoples war is the dividing line between those who are Maoists and those who are not.
So the concept of "armed revisionist" is a matter of some importance -- because it is important to assert that it is not just or only social pacifism and gradualist reformism that stands opposed revolutionary forms of communism. there are all kinds of reformist and non-revolutionary politics that are quite willing to take up arms, organize military coups etc. Peru's "leftist" military dictatorship in the 1970s was not opposed to "armed struggle" -- it was after all a military. There were in the 1980s all kinds of armed groups fighting as proxy forces for both the U.S. and Soviet blocs. It isn't like pro-Soviet forces were <em>defined</em> by a rejection of armed struggle -- first the Soviet imperialists (themselves) were armed with massive armies and nukes! And in the transition from the 60s to the 80s, all kinds of pro-soviet groups developed a tactical militancy and armed component <em>without abandoning their fundamentally non-revolutionary and non-communist conception of politics.</em>
People who (in the 1960s) thought of armed struggle being THE dividing line in communist politics were often very confused (by the 1970s and 80s) when the old hated rightist forces suddenly adopted a more and more militarized form. So there is value in asserting (as the Maoists did) that there were "armed revisionists" -- and this formulation allowed discussion to focus (as it should) on line, goals and strategy -- not simply on which tactics and means were employed.
A World To Win magazine an interesting article on India once, that critiqued a certain Indian Maoist group for "armed economism" -- saying that staying (semi-permanently over decades) in the stage of undefined "guerrilla zones" meant that the armed struggle of the Maoists (however militant) was being used to pressure for the demands of local peasants, rather than establishing popular revolutionary power.
In other words, these Maoist guerrilla bands were seen (by AWTW) as waging an economic struggle with guns (punishing and threatening particular landlords into concessions etc.), when a leap was actually needed (from guerrilla zones to increasingly stable political base areas with embryonic red power.) And there was reported to be an actual line (a belief) that stable base areas were not possible in India (because of the strength of the central state) -- which lost ground after 1996 when the Nepali peoples war took off with such power nearby.
In other words, there is value in the critiques embodied in these terms: Armed revisionism and armed economism. And they point out that revolution is not simply a matter of taking up arms, but that there remain at the core of politics key questions of direction, road and power.0 Like -
Guest (Green Red)
PermalinkVery clear writing and fair tone to talk with guest George... perhaps excluding with the part of talking about Cuban's way since, Cuban had its own conditions and does not necessarily match with Congo/Bolivia... up to focos. Thanks both party.
By any chance Mike is that AWTW article re particular Maoist group in India is available online?0 Like -
Guest (Tell No Lies)
PermalinkMike,
I think there are some grounds for seriously revising some of your verdicts on Ché. Dave mentions Ché's "Critical Notes on Political Economy." This is a lengthy set of notes written by Ché in 1965-66 towards a critique of the Soviet "Manual of Political Economy." His criticisms of the Soviet Union are far sharper here than in previously published materials that you probably had available when you undertook your investigation. The "Critical Notes" were published in Spanish in 2006 and are supposed to be out in English shortly. About 100 pages are available online in Spanish. Another very important book on Che is Helen Yaffe's "Che Guevara: The Economics of Revolution" which came out in 2009. It is an in depth study of his struggles against the Soviet model (which very decidely can not be reduced to the question of moral incentives) of economic planning based on research in the archives of the Cuban Ministry of Industry and interviews with several dozen folks who worked closely with him. It also includes a chapter on the "Critical Notes" that I found very eye-opening. Simply put, Ché had a much more thorough-going critique of the Soviet Union than he has previously been given credit for.
Critical Notes: http://www.amazon.com/Critical-Notes-Political-Economy-Revolutionary/dp/1876175559/ref=sr_1_12?ie=UTF8&qid=1302811403&sr=8-12
Yaffe: http://www.amazon.com/Che-Guevara-Revolution-Helen-Yaffe/dp/0230218210/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1302809175&sr=8-40 Like -
Guest (Tell No Lies)
PermalinkYaffe quotes Che from the "Critical Notes":
"In many aspects I have expressed opinions that could be closer to the Chinese side: guerrilla warfare, people's war, in the development of all these things, voluntary labour, to be against direct material incentives as a lever, a whole set of things which the Chinese also raise,"
There is much much more.0 Like -
Guest (Tell No Lies)
PermalinkHere is the first 100 or so pages in Spanish on Scribd:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/26852537/Che-Guevara-Apuntes-criticos-a-la-economia-politica-1
Actually the whole book seems to be up on Scribd, but you need to be subscribed.
And the next 100 or so are here:
http://misionconciencia.org.ve/website/apuntes_criticos_2.pdf
Provocatively it ends with a fragment from Mao's "On Contradiction" followed by a comment by Che that cuts off.
You can sign up on Amazon to be alerted when the English translation is available.0 Like -
Guest (Tell No Lies)
PermalinkIt seems that it is all available here:
http://misionconciencia.org.ve/website/apuntes_criticos_1.pdf
http://misionconciencia.org.ve/website/apuntes_criticos_2.pdf
http://misionconciencia.org.ve/website/apuntes_criticos_3.pdf
http://misionconciencia.org.ve/website/apuntes_criticos_4.pdf
http://misionconciencia.org.ve/website/apuntes_criticos_5.pdf
I was unable to open the fourth PDF, but maybe others will succeed.0 Like -
Guest (orinda)
PermalinkHey Mike,
So you are saying the RCP did not condemn Che? Interesting. That's not what got filtered down to many of us. There was certainly no engaging with any of Che's writings or thinking, but a condemnation of "focoism" and his not learning more from the local peasants. But maybe this was just true of where I was living, or the consequences of not having a real policy.
Personally, I am really interested in reading about how Che's politics and thinking were much more nuanced than I realized and appreciating that I no longer have a political party telling me what to think. Is it possible to have a political p[arty that doesn't do that?0 Like -
Guest (Tell No Lies)
PermalinkOrinda,
I was never in the RCP or even really its orbit (excepting a very brief involvement in World Can't Wait) and it was always my impression that the RCP had a pretty low opinion of Ché. It was certainly RCPers who introduced the term "armed revisionism" to me. So I find Mike's comments on the RCP's official line or lack thereof interesting too. I don't doubt Mike's account, I just think this is what happens when a group that has a position on almost everything doesn't have a position on something. The habits of mind just fill it in.0 Like -
Guest (Prado Pacayal)
PermalinkAn all-sided consideration of Che Guevara would reveal a pretty contradictory character. In the Cuban context, he played the most revolutionary role in the post-1959 period. Vis-a-vis other leading figures in Cuba, he consistently advocated for policies that had as their aim the transformation of human nature away from individualism and narrow self-interest. It is no accident that he was forced out of Cuba, and went on to attempt revolutions abroad, after suffering a year of defeats in struggles over policy just as China and the Soviet Union were becoming more and more openly antagonistic, and as Cuba was forced to decisively side with one side or the other (and, as we know, chose the Soviet Union for (among other reasons, but decisively for this reason) its perceived ability to deter a U.S. invasion).
In the affairs of the ICM, Che was always friendlier to the pro-Chinese than other major figures in Cuba. Even after many pro-Chinese Latin Americans had been arrested and deported from Cuba (mainly through France, not directly to their countries of origin, if only because those countries did not have relations with Cuba at the time), Guevara facilitated aid to at least one pro-Chinese party as it was founded in opposition to a pro-Soviet party (in Bolivia in 1965). (For a nice picture of Guevara and Mao shaking hands, see: http://worldhistoryconnected.press.illinois.edu/7.3/rothwell.html.)
Yet, Che also had strong pro-Soviet streak, despite some noteworthy public statements and actions to the contrary. As chronicled by K.S. Karol in Guerrillas in Power, he endorsed the use of Soviet manuals (including by Lysenko) in Cuba as a way to quickly educate the Cuban people in Marxism, despite being familiar with reality-based criticisms of these manuals (of course, this doesn't distinguish him from Mao in the least). As revealed by any examination of his economic works, which TNL has linked to, he also endorsed a fair amount of Soviet economics and thinking about the relationship between economics and human motivation/transformation that is transcended in the Shanghai Textbook and in Maoist economics in general. And fundamentally, despite some pro-Chinese inclinations and actions, Che did in fact endorse Cuba's ultimate decision to side with the USSR against China, both to protect Cuba and because he did not believe that capitalism had been restored in the USSR.
Che Guevara was a heroic figure, yet to the degree that his legacy is counterposed to the advances Mao, the Maoists in China, and those who have synthesized that experience since the fall of socialism in China, it is important to understand Che's centrism, even while grappling with and learning from the particular areas where he helped our movement advance both practically and in developing theory.
Apart from Che, the concept of 'armed revisionism' has considerable utility. There are tremendous prejudices among parts of the revolutionary left in favor of any armed group, and it is very important to bear in mind the ways in which groups waging armed struggle can in fact be revisionist. Arms are one way of pursuing political ends, not something that endows politics with a revolutionary essence.0 Like -
Guest (George)
PermalinkNow, how do we know that Che's differences with the Soviet Union were not sparked by his perception that it was not confronting the US as much as he thought they should. I think we can all agree here that he had great hatred to the US, not just on political grounds, but personal as well (he was expelled from Miami during his trip in the 50s). And during his trip to the UN, he angrily argued for the withdrawal of the US military from the base in Guantanamo, Cuba.
Che was happy with the introduction of Intermediate Range Ballistic Missiles in Cuba in 1962, and was angry at the Soviets for what he perceived as Nikita Khrushchev "caving in" to the US, by their withdrawal, later, that year. I think this may be just as important, if not more important than his differences in viewing the USSR as headed for "capitalism".
And I feel we could all agree that he was a complex person, and that like anybody else, was transformed by life experiences. I recently re-read the Bolivian diary, in its original Spanish version. What is striking is the contrast between the warrior at Cuba from the one in Bolivia. He is not executing dissenters, and punishment for shortcomings is relative mild, only threatening his men with expulsion from the guerrilla force, if they dont live up to his expectations. He lets captured Bolivian soldiers go (I dont think he did this in Cuba), after taking their equipment. Even Tania's jeep blunder (and it was a huge one!) is forgiven.
I am curious as to how he was during his Congo campaign. What information source would you guys recommend for this?0 Like -
Guest (Harsh Thakor)
PermalinkI will never regard Che Guevera as a Maoist and it is true that his methods violated the mass line.However we have to give him credit for raising some of the most fundamenatal points raised by critiques within the revolutionary camp today.For example his criticisms of aspects of Stalinism and the dogmatic approach to party leadership which even Comrade Mao spoke of.Some of Che's idaes matched those of Mao Tse Tung in the Cultural Revolution which emphasised the inner spiritual change in man and reforming him fundamentally.It is significant that Che graetly praised China in the 1960's and morally supported Mao's Communes.He also supported rural insurrections which Mao propounded.Above all Che with Castro successfull led the Cuban revolution which no Maoist force could do in Latin America today.The best example is the retreat of the Sendero Luminoso which propogated Maoist doctrine.Che adopted a military line that catered to the conditions of Cuba.Hypothetically if Che and Castro had folowed Mao after the Cuban Revolution it is possible that Cuba could have been a genuinely Socialist Society.
Che's weaknesss was that he did not theoretically grasp the fundamental practice of Leninism which was most important after the success of the Cuban Revolution,on internal and International questions.However when it comes to questions like dissent within a Socialist Society and freedom of intellectuuals Che's ideas have significance.Remember the persecution of writers and artists in the Stalinst and Maoist eras.0 Like -
Guest (G.G.Vergonzolli)
PermalinkTo all the admirers and followers of Ernesto Guevara De La Serna y Linch:
He was known as "Che" as we Argentinians are addressed. I must say, that his "Hasta la Victoria Siempre" will continue until a New Generation understand the meaning of his Sacrifice.
By the time Ernesto got assassinated in a miserable and deplorable Bolivian area, called "La Higuera", by a group of illiterate soldiers led by a CIA paid coward named Rodriguez, I had completed my tour of service in Viet Nam leading a Recon Platoon. Then, upon my return to the U.S., my curiosity to learn more about Ernesto grew to the point of learning as much as I could about him. Today, I am convinced that he had what I learned in OCS about Audie Murphy...Humility, Charisma, Honor and Self Respect as well as his dedication to fight on behalf of the politically oppressed. "Hasta La Victoria Siempre".0 Like -
Guest (O'Really?)
PermalinkDo you think ANY country would have aloud a Communist foothold so close to there borders? Who do you think is represented by the Communist party? Funny thing is if the world was under Communist rule, we wouldn't have the right to ask these questions or this article without being put to death. So you blame the US for this freedom your enjoying? The price of Freedom is high even for those who don't deserve it.
0 Like -
Guest (O'Really?)
PermalinkThe real Guevara was a reckless bourgeois adrenaline-junkie seeking a place in history as a liberator of the oppressed. But this fanatic’s vehicle of “liberation” was Stalinism, named for Soviet dictator Josef Stalin, murderer of well over 20 million of his own people. As one of Castro’s top lieutenants, Che helped steer Cuba’s revolutionary regime in a radically repressive direction. Soon after overthrowing Batista, Guevara choreographed the executions of hundreds of Batista officials without any fair trials. He thought nothing of summarily executing even fellow guerrillas suspected of disloyalty and shot one himself with no due process.
Che was a purist political fanatic who saw everything in stark black and white. Therefore he vociferously opposed freedoms of religion, speech, press, assembly, protest, or any other rights not completely consistent with his North Korean-style communism. How many rock music-loving teens sporting Guevara t-shirts today know their hero supported Cuba’s 1960s’ repression of the genre? How many homosexual fans know he had gays jailed?
Did the Obama volunteers in that Texas campaign headquarters with Che’s poster on the wall know that Guevara fervently opposed any free elections? How “progressive” is that?
How socially just was it that Che was enraged when the Russians blinked during the 1962 Cuban missile crisis and withdrew their nuclear missiles from the island, thus averting a nuclear war? Guevara was such a zealous ideologue that he relished the specter of millions of Cuban lives sacrificed on the altar of communism, declaring Cuba “a people ready to sacrifice itself to nuclear arms, that its ashes might serve as a basis for new societies.” Some humanitarian.
Che was a narcissist who boasted that “I have no house, wife, children, parents, or brothers; my friends are friends as long as they think like me, politically.” This is a role model for today’s “post-political” voters claiming we should get beyond partisanship?
It's hypocritical that it's ok for Che (or anyone else for that matter) to kill to enforce their beliefs with war, just not the United States of America. Pfft.0 Like -
Guest (Tyler Horvath)
PermalinkThis article basically boils down to Che wasn't friendly enough with China he was in the Soviet Unions pocket. Frankly I don't give a damn about some old feud between China and a country that no longer exists. Che is not a Maoist, Che is not Mao read Mao too, but also actually read Che, the author of this article clearly didn't. Che definitely was a harsh critic of the Soviet Union and their many economic errors and typical European arrogance but one that maintained a great respect for the Soviet people and their historical role in inspiring revolution around the world and their tremendous sacrifice to stop Nazism. Cuba traded with the Soviet Union because they could and they got a good deal, they are a sovereign nation with the right to make those decisions, it was an act of defiance and a declaration of economic independence from the US. After the illegal US embargo was imposed it became an act of neccessity as well as defiance. Though the Soviet Union no doubt had its own agenda they showed real solidarity with Cuba that the Cubans were grateful for. That said Cuba has never been a Soviet puppet and the two nations had many sharp disagreements. Also Che was not a dictator nor the president of Cuba so not all decisions of the Cuban government were made by him. Your comments on the agricultural situation in Cuba are not at all based in reality, some peasants have their own independent farms made up of land seized from the plantations. Others are part of communes, a pretty efficient and effective method for farming which allows people to work together and pool their resources, what kind of a communist is anti commune? The author did not attempt to explain the focoism concept just straight up said its wrong because I said so. Che didn't believe that a tiny group of guerrillas would make the revolution on their own. Rather they create a physical space, a liberated zone as well as a psychological space. People see that the enemy is not invincible, and that they can fight back too. Another crucial element of their strategy was their awareness that most of the soldier of Batista's army were mercenaries, mercenaries aren't willing to die they just want a paycheck their constant casualties from guerrilla raids combined with how well the guerrillas treated prisoners and the wounded sapped their morale as a fighting force. A guerrilla struggle like the kind Che talks about never succeeds if the masses aren't ready and willing for revolutionary change and organizing and struggling in other ways. It won't even survive without support from the peasants from where its supplies and most of its solders will come from. That was the mistake of Bolivia, in a sense Che was set up. Not by actual government agents per se, though thats a possibility, but by members of the Bolivian Communist Party and others in the Bolivian left who were disorganized, lazy and engaged in petty conflicts with each other. Che and his squads error was an error of judgment and lack of intel on the particular situation in Bolivia more than an error of theory. Ultimately the results in Cuba, the success of the Cuban revolution then and now speak for itself. The revolution however is different in every country and every time. Neither Ches model nor Maos nor Ho Chi Minh would apply directly in the United States given the highly industrialized and imperialist nature of this country. Che does however write a lot about how to build parties and movements and how a Communist should act as a person in terms of their conduct and character and values, those writing are very relevant in any time and place. I am not particularly opposed to the "cult of Che" myself because I believe the revolution needs heroes, if you however care about who Che is what he did and what he really stands for not just as a cool T-shirt design I urge you to read his books. They're very deep and revolutionary writings. Don't just read what others say about him, those who have their own agenda and those who are simply ignorant. Despite coming from a "Maoist" perspective I find this articles vague unfounded cynicism about the revolutionary Ernesto Guevara to be quite similar to what I might find from some liberal media source.
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