The life of Che Guevara, one of the leading revolutionaries of this century, was neatly summarized by a statement he himself made: I was born in Argentina, I fought in Cuba, and I began to be a revolutionary in Guatemala. However, contrary to expectation, Che, or to give him his full title, Ernesto Guevara de la Serna, was actually born into a privileged Spanish/Irish family in Argentina in 1928. Crucially, his parents encouraged him to be free-thinking and critically aware. As a family friend, Ricardo Rojo noted that in the Guevara household there existed: 'a passion for justice, the rejection of fascism, religious indifference, an interest in literature and love of poetry, and a prejudice against money and the ways of making it.' As a youth, Che was dynamic, unconventional and independent in outlook. He constantly defied any problems that set him back, particularly a severe asthma complaint. This drove him to become a prominent athlete and itinerant traveller and enabled him to complete a six year University course in just three years, passing sixteen major exams in six months despite forty-five severe asthma attacks. Ironically, at eighteen years of age, he was rejected for military service. Che decided to take up medical studies, albeit in a somewhat sporadic fashion. His desire for 'hitting the road' was deep-set and on one occasion he and a friend Alberto Granados took off on a hobos tour of Latin America. Taking up menial jobs to pay his way, Che was able to observe at first hand the living conditions of the bulk of the Latin American population. He saw a dispossessed and poverty stricken people, crushed by a privileged elite. This experience was to affect Che deeply.
By 1953 Che had completed his studies and visited Bolivia to support the new reformed government. However, his attempts to relate to the Bolivian Indians proved frustrating and he and his friends moved on to Guatemala. Here Che was to meet up with Jacobo Arbenz, head of the Guatemalen government. Arbenz argued passionately that: 'Man is not just a stomach. We believe that, above all, he hungers for dignity.' Boldly, Arbenz nationalized the United Fruit Company, in defiance of the United States. The reaction to this was swift and devastating. The CIA began training the troops of rebel Castillo Armas and supplied them with weapons and ammunition. A brief and bloody coup d'etat ensued and the Arbenz regime was toppled. Che was suddenly vulnerable and retreated to the safety of the Argentine embassy. Eventually he was able to escape to Mexico City where he began to study revolutionary theory in much greater depth. His passion for justice grew and was to find its focus after a meeting with Fidel Castro. Having failed once to overthrow the Cuban regime, Castro was keen to assemble a new army and signed up Che and a motley assortment of amateur revolutionaries. A total of eighty two men set out to remove the dictator Fulgencio Batisto. Sadly their skill did not match their enthusiasm. A tragic succession of basic military errors led to their betrayal and ambush, reducing their number to just twelve. Fortunately the local peasants supported them in their desperate plight and slowly they were able to renew their strength. In 1957 they made their first successful attack on the La Plata barracks. With their morale boosted they launched more raids and became a shrewd, battle-hardened force. New recruits were still hard to come by, but the local peasants supported them with food, shelter and information. Their fame grew, greatly aided by their insistence on humane treatment of their enemy; Che developed new organisational skills to facilitate the continued efforts of the guerilla force.
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In 1959 the Cuban government was overthrown and the guerillas faced a new challenge; running the country. Che took on the task of putting together a coherent and systematic ideological stance. Perhaps surprisingly, it was only at this point that Che embraced communism. Che, however, remained sceptical of the official Soviet outlook. In his book Guerilla Warfare he argued that a rural uprising was the best route to revolutionary success. In the six years that Che remained in Cuba, he took up a variety of ministerial posts in an attempt to press home long cherished agrarian reforms. At heart though, Che was a fighter and he became bored with the intricacies and challenges of government. In 1965 he and a handful of veterans left for Bolivia to aid the revolutionary movement in the very centre of Latin America. Bolivia, however, proved a much tougher proposition than Cuba. The guerillas were never able to mobilize popular peasant support and were constantly betrayed and isolated. Che was eventually captured and executed with much pomp and ceremony. His body was burnt and his ashes spread over the continent for which he had given his life.
For further thought : 1. In what sense can we refer to Che Guevara as a Marxist? 2. How did Che Guevara criticise orthodox Marxism? 3. Why do you think that Che Guevara became a revolutionary? Source: Frank Kermode, Guevara (Fontana, 1970).