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Template:Infobox revolution biography

Ernesto Guevara de la Serna (June 14, 1928 – October 9, 1967), commonly known as Che Guevara or el Che, was an Argentine-born Marxist revolutionary, political figure, and leader of Cuban and proletarian internationalist guerrillas. As a young man, Guevara studied medicine and traveled "" throughout Latin America, activities that brought him into direct contact with the poverty in which many lived. Through these experiences he became convinced that only revolution could remedy the region's economic inequality, leading him to study Marxism and become involved in Guatemala's social revolution under President Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán.

Later while in Mexico in 1956, Guevara joined Fidel Castro's revolutionary 26th of July Movement that fought a guerrilla war and ultimately seized power from the regime of the U.S.-supported Cuban dictator General Fulgencio Batista in 1959. For a few months after the success of the Cuban Revolution, Guevara was assigned the role of supreme prosecutor, overseeing the revolutionary tribunals and executions of suspected war criminals associated with the previous regime.

After serving in several important posts in the new government, writing various articles and books about the theory and practice of guerrilla warfare, and touring the world to meet with leaders on behalf of Cuban socialism, Guevara left Cuba in 1965 to foment revolutions, first in Congo-Kinshasa and then in Bolivia, where he was captured in a military operation supported by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the U.S. Army Special Forces. Guevara was summarily executed by the Bolivian Army in the town of La Higuera near Vallegrande on October 9, 1967.

After his death, Guevara became an icon of socialist revolutionary movements worldwide. An Alberto Korda photo of him (shown) has received wide distribution and modification. The Maryland Institute College of Art called this picture "the most famous photograph in the world and a symbol of the 20th century."

Early life

Ernesto Guevara de la Serna was born in Rosario, Argentina, the eldest of five children in a family of Spanish and Irish descent; both his father and mother were of Basque ancestry. One of Guevara's forebears, Patrick Lynch, was born in Lydican Castle, County Galway, Ireland, in 1715. As a young man, Patrick left for Bilbao, Spain, and traveled from there to Argentina. Francisco Lynch (Guevara's great-grandfather) was born in Buenos Aires in 1817, and Ana Lynch (his grandmother) was born in California, USA in 1868. When Ana was in her twenties, her parents took their family back to Argentina where Ana soon met and married Roberto Guevara; their son, Ernesto Guevara Lynch (Guevara's father), was born in Buenos Aires in 1900. Guevara Lynch married Celia de la Serna y Llosa in 1927 (one of her non-lineal ancestors was José de la Serna e Hinojosa, Spanish viceroy of Peru), and they had three sons and two daughters.

Growing up in this leftist-leaning déclassé family of aristocratic lineage, Ernesto Guevara became known for his dynamic personality and radical perspective even as a boy. He idolized Francisco Pizarro and yearned to have been one of his soldiers. Though suffering from the crippling bouts of asthma that were to afflict him throughout his life, he excelled as an athlete. He was an avid rugby union player despite his handicap and earned himself the nickname "Fuser" — a contraction of "El Furibundo" ("The Raging") and his mother's surname, "Serna" — for his aggressive style of play. Ernesto was nicknamed "Chancho" ("pig") by his schoolmates because he rarely bathed, something he was rather proud of.

Guevara learned chess from his father and began participating in local tournaments by the age of 12. During his adolescence, he became passionate about poetry, especially that of Pablo Neruda. Guevara, as is common practice among Latin Americans of his class, also wrote poems throughout his life. He was an enthusiastic and eclectic reader, with interests ranging from adventure classics by Jack London, Emilio Salgari, and Jules Verne to essays on sexuality by Sigmund Freud and treatises on social philosophy by Bertrand Russell. In his late teens, he developed a keen interest in photography and spent many hours photographing people, places and, during later travels, archaeological sites.

In 1948 Guevara entered the University of Buenos Aires to study medicine. As a student, he spent long periods traveling around Latin America. In 1951 his older friend, Alberto Granado, a biochemist, suggested that Guevara take a year off from his medical studies to embark on a trip they had talked of making for years, traversing South America. Guevara and the 29-year-old Granado soon set off from their hometown of Alta Gracia astride a 1939 Norton 500 cc motorcycle they named La Poderosa II  ("The Mighty One, the Second") with the idea of spending a few weeks volunteering at the San Pablo Leper colony in Peru on the banks of the Amazon River. Guevara narrated this journey in The Motorcycle Diaries, which was translated into English in 1996 and used in 2004 as the basis for a motion picture of the same name, directed by Walter Salles.

Witnessing the widespread poverty, oppression and disenfranchisement throughout Latin America, and influenced by his readings of Marxist literature, Guevara decided that the only solution for the region’s inequalities was armed revolution. His travels and readings also led him to view Latin America not as a group of separate nations but as a single entity requiring a continent-wide strategy for liberation. His conception of a borderless, united Hispanic America sharing a common 'mestizo' culture was a theme that would prominently recur during his later revolutionary activities. Upon returning to Argentina, he expedited the completion of his medical studies in order to resume his travels in Central and South America and received the diploma accrediting him as a medic on 12 June 1953.

Guatemala

On 7 July 1953, Guevara set out on a trip through Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, Panama, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, and El Salvador. During the final days of December 1953 he arrived in Guatemala where President Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán headed a democratically elected government that, through land reform and other initiatives, was attempting to end the U.S.-dominated latifundia system. In a contemporaneous letter to his Aunt Beatriz, Guevara explained his motivation for settling down for a time in Guatemala: "In Guatemala", he wrote, "I will perfect myself and accomplish whatever may be necessary in order to become a true revolutionary."

Shortly after reaching Guatemala City, Guevara acted upon the suggestion of a mutual friend that he seek out Hilda Gadea Acosta, a Peruvian economist who was living and working there. Gadea, whom he would later marry, was well-connected politically as a result of her membership in the socialist American Popular Revolutionary Alliance (APRA) led by Víctor Raúl Haya de la Torre, and she introduced Guevara to a number of high-level officials in the Arbenz government. He also re-established contact with a group of Cuban exiles linked to Fidel Castro whom he had initially met in Costa Rica; among them was Antonio "Ñico" López, associated with the attack on the "Carlos Manuel de Céspedes" barracks in Bayamo in the Cuban province of Oriente, and who would die at Ojo del Toro bridge soon after the Granma landed in Cuba. Guevara joined these "moncadistas" in the sale of religious objects related to the Black Christ of Esquipulas, and he also assisted two Venezuelan malaria specialists at a local hospital. It was during this period that he acquired his famous nickname, "Che", due to his frequent use of the Argentine interjection Che (IPA: [tʃe]), which is used in much the same way as "hey", "pal", "eh", or "mate" are employed colloquially in various English-speaking countries. Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, and southern Brazil (where the interjection is rendered 'tchê' in written Portuguese) are the only areas where this expression is used, making it a trademark of the Rioplatense region.

Guevara's attempts to obtain a medical internship were unsuccessful and his economic situation was often precarious, leading him to pawn some of Hilda's jewelry. He maintained a distance from any political organization, even though his political thinking at that time manifested a clear sympathy towards communism. Despite Guevara’s financial woes, he rejected an offer to work as a state medic when it transpired that he would have to affiliate himself with the Communist Party of Guatemala. Political events in the country began to move quickly after May 15, 1954 when a shipment of Škoda infantry and light artillery weapons sent from Communist Czechoslovakia for the Arbenz Government arrived in Puerto Barrios aboard the Swedish ship Alfhem. The amount of Czechoslovak weaponry was estimated to be 2000 tons by the CIA though only 2 tons by Jon Lee Anderson.

Guevara briefly left Guatemala for El Salvador to pick up a new visa, then returned to Guatemala only a few days before the CIA-sponsored coup attempt led by Carlos Castillo Armas began. The anti-Arbenz forces tried, but failed, to stop the trans-shipment of the Czechoslovak weapons by train. However, after pausing to regroup and recover energy, Castillo Armas' column seized the initiative and, apparently with the assistance of US air support, started to gain ground. Guevara was eager to fight on behalf of Arbenz and joined an armed militia organized by the Communist Youth for that purpose; but, frustrated with the group's inaction, he soon returned to medical duties. Following the coup, he again volunteered to fight but his efforts were thwarted when Arbenz took refuge in the Mexican Embassy and told his foreign supporters to leave the country. After Gadea was arrested, Guevara sought protection inside the Argentine consulate where he remained until he received a safe-conduct pass some weeks later. At that point, he turned down a free seat on a flight back to Argentina that was offered to him by the embassy, preferring instead to make his way to Mexico.

The overthrow of the Arbenz regime by a coup d'état backed by the Central Intelligence Agency cemented Guevara's view of the United States as an imperialist power that would implacably oppose and attempt to destroy any government that sought to redress the socioeconomic inequality endemic to Latin America and other developing countries. This strengthened his conviction that socialism achieved through armed struggle and defended by an armed populace was the only way to rectify such conditions.

Cuba

Guevara arrived in Mexico City in early September 1954, and shortly thereafter renewed his friendship with Ñico López and the other Cuban exiles whom he had known in Guatemala. While living in Mexico, Guevara worked in the allergy ward of the General Hospital, taught on the medical faculty of the National University (UNAM), and supplemented his salary as a photographer. It was during this time in June 1955, that López introduced him to Raúl Castro. Several weeks later, Fidel Castro arrived in Mexico City after having been amnestied from prison in Cuba, and on the evening of 8 July, 1955, Raúl introduced Guevara to the older Castro brother. During a fervid overnight conversation, Guevara became convinced that Fidel was the inspirational revolutionary leader for whom he had been searching, and he immediately joined the "26th of July Movement" that intended to overthrow the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista. Although it was planned that he would be the group's medic, Guevara participated in the military training alongside the other members of the 26J Movement, and at the end of the course, was singled out by their instructor, Col. Alberto Bayo, as his most outstanding student. Meanwhile, Hilda Gadea had arrived from Guatemala and she and Guevara resumed their relationship. In the summer of 1955, she informed him that she was pregnant, and he immediately suggested that they marry. The wedding took place on August 18, 1955, and their daughter, whom they named Hilda Beatríz, was born on February 15, 1956.

When the cabin cruiser Granma set out from Tuxpan, Veracruz for Cuba on November 25, 1956, Guevara was one of only four non-Cubans aboard. Attacked by Batista's military soon after landing, about half of the expeditionaries were killed or executed upon capture. Guevara wrote that it was during this confrontation that he laid down his knapsack containing medical supplies in order to pick up a box of ammunition dropped by a fleeing comrade, a moment which he later recalled as marking his transition from physician to combatant.

Guevara became a leader among the rebels, a Comandante (English translation: Major), respected by his comrades in arms for his courage and military prowess, he gained a reputation for bravery and military prowess second only to Fidel Castro himself." During the guerrilla campaign, Guevara was also feared for his ruthlessness, and was responsible for the execution of a number of men accused of being informers, deserters or spies. In March 1958, Guevara was tasked with directing a training camp for new volunteers high in the Sierra Maestra at Minas del Frío, one of a number of military schools set up by the 26th of July Movement. Though wishing to push the battlefront forward and frustrated by his more stationary role, Guevara spent the period developing contacts with sympathetic locals. He also conducted a brief relationship with eighteen-year-old Zoila Rodríguez, the daughter of a local guajiro.

As the war extended throughout eastern Cuba, Guevara and a new column of fighters were dispatched west for the final push towards Havana. In the final days of December 1958, he directed his "suicide squad" (which undertook the most dangerous tasks in the rebel army) in the attack on Santa Clara that turned out to be one of the decisive events of the revolution, although the series of ambushes first during la ofensiva in the heights of the Sierra Maestra, then at Guisa—and the whole Cauto Plains campaign that followed—probably had more military significance. Batista, upon learning that his generals — especially General Cantillo, who had visited Castro at the inactive sugar mill, Central Oriente — were negotiating a separate peace with the rebel leader, fled to the Dominican Republic on January 1, 1959.

On February 7, 1959, the government proclaimed Guevara "a Cuban citizen by birth" in recognition of his role in the triumph of the revolutionary forces. Shortly thereafter, he initiated divorce proceedings to put a formal end to his marriage with Gadea, from whom he had been separated since before leaving Mexico on the Granma. On June 2, 1959, he married Aleida March, a Cuban-born member of the 26th of July movement with whom he had been living since late 1958.

He was appointed commander of the La Cabaña Fortress prison, and during his five-month tenure in that post (January 2 through June 12, 1959), he oversaw the trial and execution of many people, among whom were former Batista regime officials and members of the "Bureau for the Repression of Communist Activities" (BRAC), a unit of the secret police known by its Spanish acronym. José Vilasuso, an attorney who worked under Guevara at La Cabaña preparing indictments, said that these were lawless proceedings where "the facts were judged without any consideration to general juridical principles" and the findings were pre-determined by Guevara. It is estimated that between 156 and 550 people were executed on Guevara's extra-judicial orders during this time. Of note, Che biographer Jon Lee Anderson has contended that through his five years of research that he was "unable to find a single credible source pointing to a case where Che executed an innocent."

Guevara recorded the two years he spent in overthrowing Batista's regime in a detailed account entitled Pasajes de la Guerra Revolucionaria. Individual chapters of Pasajes, which was based on the war diary Guevara kept during the guerrilla campaign, first appeared in Verde Olivo, the official magazine of the Cuban armed forces, beginning in 1961. It came out in book format in 1963, and an English translation was issued in 1968 under the title Reminiscences of the Cuban Revolutionary War.

On 12 June 1959, Guevara set out on a three-month tour of fourteen countries, most of them Bandung Pact members in Africa and Asia. He spent twelve days in Japan (15 - 27 July), participating in negotiations aimed at expanding Cuba's trade relations with that nation. While there, he requested that the Japanese government arrange for him to visit the city of Hiroshima, where the American military had detonated an atom-bomb fourteen years earlier. When the Japanese government refused to add Hiroshima to his delegation's itinerary, Guevara surreptitiously left his Osaka hotel to secretly visit Hiroshima by night train along with his aide Omar Fernández. According to Fernández, who served as the deputy head of the mission, Guevara was "really shocked" at what he saw and by their visit to a hospital where A-bomb survivors were being treated.

Later, Guevara became an official at the National Institute of Agrarian Reform, and President of the National Bank of Cuba. He signed all Cuban banknotes issued during his fourteen-month presidency with his nickname, "Che". Throughout his time in the Cuban government, Guevara refused his due salaries of office, insisting on drawing only his wages as army comandante in order to set a "revolutionary example".

During this time his fondness for chess was rekindled, and he attended and participated in most national and international tournaments held in Cuba. He was particularly eager to encourage young Cubans to take up the game, and organized various activities designed to stimulate their interest in it.

Even as early as 1959, Guevara helped organize revolutionary expeditions overseas, all of which failed. The first attempt was made in Panama; another in the Dominican Republic (led by Henry Fuerte, also known as "El Argelino", and Enrique Jiménez Moya) took place on 14 June of that same year.

In 1960 Guevara provided first aid to victims when the freighter La Coubre, a French vessel carrying munitions from the port of Antwerp, exploded while it was being unloaded in Havana harbor. A rescue operation immediately ensued but went awry when a second explosion occurred, resulting in well over a hundred dead. It was at the memorial service for the victims of this explosion that Alberto Korda took the most famous photograph of him.

Guevara later served as Minister of Industries, in which post he helped formulate Cuban socialism, and became one of the country's most prominent figures. He called for the diversification of the Cuban economy, and for the elimination of what he called "material incentives". He believed that volunteer work and dedication of workers would drive economic growth, all that was needed was will. To display this Guevara led by example, working endlessly at his ministry job, in construction, and even cutting sugar cane. Time was also set aside to write several publications. In his book Guerrilla Warfare, he advocated replicating the Cuban model of revolution initiated by a small group (foco) of guerrillas without the need for broad organizations to precede armed insurrection. His essay El socialismo y el hombre en Cuba (1965) (Man and Socialism in Cuba) advocates the need to shape a "new man" (hombre nuevo) in conjunction with a socialist state. Some saw Guevara as the simultaneously glamorous and austere model of that "new man."

During the 1961 Bay of Pigs Invasion, Guevara did not participate in the fighting, having been ordered by Castro to a command post in Cuba's westernmost Pinar del Río province where he was involved in fending off a decoy force. He did, however, suffer a bullet wound to the face during this deployment, which he said had been caused by the accidental discharge of his own gun.

Guevara played a key role in bringing to Cuba the Soviet nuclear-armed ballistic missiles that precipitated the Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962. During an interview with the British newspaper Daily Worker some weeks later, he stated that, if the missiles had been under Cuban control, they would have fired them against major U.S. cities.

Disappearance from Cuba

In December 1964 Guevara traveled to New York City as the head of the Cuban delegation to speak at the UN(listen, requires RealPlayer; or read). He also appeared on the CBS Sunday news program Face the Nation, met with a gamut of individuals and groups including U.S. Senator Eugene McCarthy, several associates of Malcolm X, and Canadian radical Michelle Duclos, and dined at the home of the Rockefellers. On 17 December, he flew to Paris and from there embarked on a three-month international tour during which he visited the People's Republic of China, the United Arab Republic (Egypt), Algeria, Ghana, Guinea, Mali, Dahomey, Congo-Brazzaville, and Tanzania, with stops in Ireland, Paris, and Prague. He also visited Pyongyang and told the press that North Korea was a model to which revolutionary Cuba should aspire.

In Algiers on 24 February, 1965, he made what turned out to be his last public appearance on the international stage when he delivered a speech to the "Second Economic Seminar on Afro-Asian Solidarity" in which he declared, "There are no frontiers in this struggle to the death. We cannot remain indifferent in the face of what occurs in any part of the world. A victory for any country against imperialism is our victory, just as any country's defeat is our defeat." Guevara also displayed his disillusionment with the Soviet Union, by attacking Moscow and questioning its commitment to international socialism. In his criticism he declared: "The socialist countries are, in a way, accomplices of imperialist exploitation." He went on to say that "The socialist countries have the moral duty of liquidating their tacit complicity with the exploiting countries of the West." He proceeded to outline a number of measures which he said the communist-bloc countries should implement in order to accomplish this objective. He returned to Cuba on 14 March to a solemn reception by Fidel and Raúl Castro, Osvaldo Dorticós and Carlos Rafael Rodríguez at the Havana airport.

Two weeks later, Guevara dropped out of public life and then vanished. His whereabouts were the mystery of 1965 in Cuba, as he was generally regarded as second in power to Castro himself. His disappearance was attributed to the relative failure of the industrialization scheme he had advocated while minister of industry, to pressure exerted on Castro by Soviet officials disapproving of Guevara's pro-Chinese Communist bent as the Sino-Soviet split grew more pronounced, and to serious differences between Guevara and the Cuban leadership regarding Cuba's economic development and ideological line.

Following the Cuban Missile Crisis and what he perceived as a Soviet betrayal of Cuba when Khrushchev agreed to withdraw the missiles from Cuban territory without consulting Castro, Guevara had grown increasingly skeptical of the Soviet Union. As revealed in his last speech in Algiers, he had come to view the Northern Hemisphere, led by the U.S. in the West and the Soviet Union in the East, as the exploiter of the Southern Hemisphere. He strongly supported Communist North Vietnam and the Viet Cong in the Vietnam War, and urged the peoples of other developing countries to take up arms and create "100 Vietnams".

Pressed by international speculation regarding Guevara's fate, Castro stated on 16 June, 1965, that the people would be informed about Guevara when Guevara himself wished to let them know. Numerous rumors about his disappearance spread inside and outside Cuba. On 3 October that year, Castro revealed a handwritten undated letter purportedly written to him by Guevara some months earlier in which Guevara reaffirmed his enduring solidarity with the Cuban Revolution but declared his intention to leave Cuba to fight abroad for the cause of the revolution. He explained that "Other nations of the world summon my modest efforts," and that he had therefore decided to go and fight as a guerrilla "on new battlefields". In the letter Guevara announced his resignation from all his positions in the government, in the party, and in the Army, and renounced his Cuban citizenship, which had been granted to him in 1959 in recognition of his efforts on behalf of the revolution.

During an interview with four foreign correspondents on 1 November, Castro remarked that he knew where Guevara was but would not disclose his location, and added, denying reports that his former comrade-in-arms was dead, that "he is in the best of health." Despite Castro's assurances, Guevara's fate remained a mystery at the end of 1965 and his movements and whereabouts continued to be a closely held secret for the next two years.

Congo

During their all-night meeting on March 14–March 15, 1965, Guevara and Castro had agreed that the former would personally lead Cuba's first military action in Sub-Saharan Africa. Some sources state that Guevara persuaded Castro to back him in this effort, while other sources maintain that Castro convinced Guevara to undertake the mission, arguing that conditions in the various Latin American countries that had been under consideration for the possible establishment of guerrilla focos were not yet optimal. Castro himself has said the latter is true. Guevara previously in August of 1964 laid out why he believed the Congo was a major battleground against imperialism, stating that the North-American monopolies were installing themselves in a battle to "own the Congo", in order to control the copper, radioactive minerals, and strategic raw materials.

According to Ahmed Ben Bella, who was president of Algeria at the time and had recently held extended conversations with Guevara, "The situation prevailing in Africa, which seemed to have enormous revolutionary potential, led Che to the conclusion that Africa was imperialism’s weak link. It was to Africa that he now decided to devote his efforts."

The Cuban operation was to be carried out in support of the pro-Patrice Lumumba Marxist Simba movement in the Congo-Kinshasa (formerly Belgian Congo, later Zaire and currently the Democratic Republic of the Congo). Guevara, his second-in-command Victor Dreke, and twelve of the Cuban expeditionaries arrived in the Congo on 24 April 1965; a contingent of approximately 100 Afro-Cubans joined them soon afterwards. They collaborated for a time with guerrilla leader Laurent-Désiré Kabila, who helped Lumumba supporters lead a revolt that was suppressed in November of that same year by the Congolese army. Guevara dismissed Kabila as insignificant. "Nothing leads me to believe he is the man of the hour," Guevara wrote.

Although Guevara was 37 at the time and had no formal military training, he had the experiences of the Cuban revolution, including his successful march on Santa Clara, which was central to Batista's finally being overthrown by Castro's forces. His asthma had prevented his being drafted into military service in Argentina, a fact of which he was proud given his opposition to Perón's government.

South African mercenaries including Mike Hoare and Cuban exiles worked with the Congolese army to thwart Guevara. They were able to monitor his communications, arrange to ambush the rebels and the Cubans whenever they attempted to attack, and interdict his supply lines. Despite the fact that Guevara sought to conceal his presence in the Congo, the U.S. government was aware of his location and activities: The National Security Agency (NSA) was intercepting all of his incoming and outgoing transmissions via equipment aboard the USNS Valdez, a floating listening post which continuously cruised the Indian Ocean off Dar-es-Salaam for that purpose.

Guevara's aim was to export the Cuban Revolution by instructing local Simba fighters in communist ideology and foco strategies of guerrilla warfare. In his Congo Diary, he cites the incompetence, intransigence and infighting of the local Congolese forces as key reasons for the revolt's failure. Later that year, ill with dysentery, suffering from asthma, and disheartened after seven months of frustrations, Guevara left the Congo with the Cuban survivors (six members of his column had died). At one point Guevara considered sending the wounded back to Cuba, then standing alone and fighting until the end in the Congo as a revolutionary example; however, after being urged by his comrades and pressed by two emissaries sent by Castro, at the last moment he reluctantly agreed to leave the Congo. A few weeks later, writing the preface to the diary he kept during the Congo venture, he began: "This is the history of a failure."

Because Castro had made public Guevara's "farewell letter" to him — a letter Guevara had intended should only be revealed in case of his death — wherein he had written that he was severing all ties to Cuba in order to devote himself to revolutionary activities in other parts of the world, he felt he could not return to Cuba with the surviving combatants for moral reasons, and he spent the next six months living clandestinely in Dar-es-Salaam, and Prague. During this time he compiled his memoirs of the Congo experience, and wrote drafts of two more books, one on philosophy and the other on economics. He also visited several countries in Western Europe to test a new false identity and the corresponding documentation (passport, etc.) created for him by Cuban Intelligence that he planned to use to travel to South America. Throughout this period Castro continued to importune him to return to Cuba, but Guevara only agreed to do so when it was understood he would be there only for the few months needed to prepare a revolutionary effort somewhere in Latin America, and that his presence on the island would be secret.

Bolivia

Insurgent

Speculation on Guevara's whereabouts continued throughout 1966 and into 1967. Representatives of the Mozambican independence movement FRELIMO reported meeting with Guevara in late 1966 or early 1967 in Dar es Salaam, at which point they rejected his offer of aid in their revolutionary project. In a speech at the 1967 May Day rally in Havana, the Acting Minister of the armed forces, Major Juan Almeida, announced that Guevara was "serving the revolution somewhere in Latin America". The persistent reports that he was leading the guerrillas in Bolivia were eventually shown to be true.

At Castro's behest, a 3,700-acre (15 km) parcel of jungle land in the remote Ñancahuazú region had been purchased by native Bolivian Communists for Guevara to use as a training area and base camp. The evidence suggests that the training at this camp in the Ñancahuazú valley was more hazardous than combat to Guevara and the Cubans accompanying him. Little was accomplished in the way of building a guerrilla army. Former Stasi operative Haydée Tamara Bunke Bider, better known by her nom de guerre "Tania", who had been installed as his primary agent in La Paz, was reportedly also working for the KGB and is widely inferred to have unwittingly served Soviet interests by leading Bolivian authorities to Guevara's trail. The numerous photographs taken by and of Guevara and other members of his guerrilla group that they left behind at their base camp after the initial clash with the Bolivian army in March 1967 provided President René Barrientos with the first proof of his presence in Bolivia; after viewing them, Barrientos allegedly stated that he wanted Guevara's head displayed on a pike in downtown La Paz. He thereupon ordered the Bolivian Army to hunt Guevara and his followers down.

Guevara's guerrilla force, numbering about 50 and operating as the ELN (Ejército de Liberación Nacional de Bolivia; English: "National Liberation Army of Bolivia"), was well equipped and scored a number of early successes against Bolivian regulars in the difficult terrain of the mountainous Camiri region. In September, however, the Army managed to eliminate two guerrilla groups, reportedly killing one of the leaders.

Despite the violent nature of the conflict, Guevara gave medical attention to all of the wounded Bolivian soldiers whom the guerrillas took prisoner, and subsequently released them. Even after his last battle at the Quebrada del Yuro, in which he had been wounded, when he was taken to a temporary holding location and saw there a number of Bolivian soldiers who had also been wounded in the fighting, he offered to give them medical care. His offer was turned down by the Bolivian officer in charge. Miguel Costas, a La Higuera resident described meeting Che on September 26, 1967 to the San Francisco Chronicle on October 9th 2007. Miguel recalls that Che introduced himself as "Commander Che Guevara" and describes Che as follows: "He was a big man - well built. He drank with us and said he was fighting for the poor and the weak."

Guevara's plan for fomenting revolution in Bolivia appears to have been based upon a number of misconceptions:

• He had expected to deal only with the country's military government and its poorly trained and equipped army. However, after the U.S. government learned of his location, CIA and other operatives were sent into Bolivia to aid the anti-insurrection effort. The Bolivian Army was being trained and supplied by U.S. Army Special Forces advisors, including a recently organized elite battalion of Rangers trained in jungle warfare that set up camp in La Esperanza, a small settlement close to the guerrillas' zone of operations.
• Guevara had expected assistance and cooperation from the local dissidents. He did not receive it; and Bolivia's Communist Party, under the leadership of Mario Monje, was oriented towards Moscow rather than Havana and did not aid him, despite having promised to do so. Some members of the Bolivian Communist Party did join/support him, such as Coco and Inti Peredo, Rodolfo Saldaña, Serapio Aquino Tudela, and Antonio Jiménez Tardio, against the Party leadership's wishes.
• He had expected to remain in radio contact with Havana. However, the two shortwave transmitters provided to him by Cuba were faulty, so that the guerrillas were unable to communicate with Havana. In this, and in many other respects, Manuel Piñeiro, the man to whom Castro had assigned the task of coordinating support for Guevara's operations in Bolivia, performed abysmally. To further complicate matters, some months into the campaign, the tape recorder that the guerrillas used to record and decipher the one-time pad-encoded radio messages sent to them from Havana was lost while crossing a river, making de-coding such messages more difficult.

In addition, his penchant for confrontation rather than compromise appears to have contributed to his inability to develop successful working relationships with local leaders in Bolivia, just as it had in the Congo. This tendency had surfaced during his guerrilla warfare campaign in Cuba as well, but had been kept in check there by the timely interventions and guidance of Castro.

Capture and execution

Template:EismallThe hunt for Guevara in Bolivia was headed by Félix Rodríguez, a CIA agent, who previously had infiltrated Cuba to prepare contacts with the rebels in the Escambray Mountains and the anti-Castro underground in Havana prior to the Bay of Pigs invasion, and had been successfully extracted from Cuba afterwards. The Bolivian Special Forces were notified of the location of Guevara's guerrilla encampment by an informant. On 8 October, the guerrillas were outmanoeuvred and encircled in the Quebrada del Yuro ravine by 1,800 US-trained and armed Bolivian troops.

Guevara was captured while leading a detachment with Simeón Cuba Sarabia as they attempted to find a way out of the Yuro canyon. On October 12, 1970 Time Magazine reported that: "Che was hit in the left thigh by a bullet and his M-l carbine was shot out of his hands." According to some soldiers present at the capture, during the skirmish as they approached Guevara, he shouted, "Do not shoot! I am Che Guevara and worth more to you alive than dead." Bolivian General Gary Prado, the captain of the squad that captured Guevara, would later describe Che as: "disheveled, dirty, dying of hunger and demoralized." Gen. Prado remarks that: "It made you sorry to see him." Upon hearing of Guevara's capture, Rodríguez relayed the information to CIA headquarters at Langley, Virginia, via CIA stations in South American nations.

Barrientos promptly ordered his execution upon being informed of his capture. Guevara was taken to a dilapidated schoolhouse in the nearby village of La Higuera where he was held overnight. Early next afternoon he was executed. The executioner was Mario Terán, a sergeant in the Bolivian army who had drawn a short straw after arguments over who got the honor of killing Guevara broke out among the soldiers. To make the bullet wounds appear consistent with the official story to the public, Felix Rodriguez, the CIA asset, ordered the soldier who pulled the trigger to aim carefully to make it appear Che had been killed in action during a clash with the Bolivian army, and thus help cover up the official secret assassination. Guevara received multiple shots to the legs, so as to avoid maiming his face for identification and simulate combat wounds in an attempt to conceal his extrajudicial execution.

Moments before Guevara was executed he was asked if he was thinking about his own immortality. "No," replied Che, "I'm thinking about the immortality of the revolution." Che Guevara also had some last words before his death; he allegedly said to his executioner, "I know you are here to kill me. Shoot, coward, you are only going to kill a man". Another alleged comment was "Do you know who I am? Do you know what I'm worth?" His body was lashed to the landing skids of a helicopter and flown to neighboring Vallegrande where a photograph was shot showing a Christ-like figure lying on a concrete slab in the laundry room of the Nuestro Senor de Malta hospital. The autopsy cited eight bullet wounds, but none to the face that would soon be flashed across the globe.

A declassified memorandum dated October 11 1967 to President Lyndon B. Johnson from his senior adviser, Walt Rostow, called the decision to kill Guevara “stupid” but “understandable from a Bolivian standpoint.” After the execution, Rodríguez took personal items of Guevara's including a Rolex watch, often showing them to reporters during the ensuing years. Today, some of these belongings, including his flashlight are on display at the CIA. After a military doctor amputated his hands, Bolivian army officers transferred Guevara's cadaver to an undisclosed location and refused to reveal whether his remains had been buried or cremated.

On October 15, Castro acknowledged that Guevara was dead and proclaimed three days of public mourning throughout Cuba. The death of Guevara was regarded as a blow to socialist revolutionary movements in Latin America and the rest of the third world.

Photographs at that time gave rise to legends such as those of San Ernesto de La Higuera. Local people came to refer to Guevara as a saint, "San Ernesto de La Higuera", whom they ask for favors. Others claim his ghost walks the area.

In 1997, the skeletal remains of a handless body were exhumed from beneath an air strip near Vallegrande, identified as those of Guevara by a Cuban forensic team at the scene, and returned to Cuba. On 17 October, 1997, his remains, with those of six fellow combatants killed during the guerrilla campaign in Bolivia, were laid to rest with military honors in a specially built mausoleum in the city of Santa Clara, where he had won the decisive battle of the Cuban Revolution.

The Bolivian Diary

Also removed when Guevara was captured was his diary, which documented events of the guerrilla campaign in Bolivia. The first entry is on November 7 1966 shortly after his arrival at the farm in Ñancahuazú, and the last entry is on October 7 1967, the day before his capture. The diary tells how the guerrillas were forced to begin operations prematurely due to discovery by the Bolivian Army, explains Guevara's decision to divide the column into two units that were subsequently unable to re-establish contact, and describes their overall failure. It records the rift between Guevara and the Bolivian Communist Party that resulted in Guevara having significantly fewer soldiers than originally anticipated. It shows that Guevara had a great deal of difficulty recruiting from the local populace, due in part to the fact that the guerrilla group had learned Quechua rather than the local language which was Tupí-Guaraní. As the campaign drew to an unexpected close, Guevara became increasingly ill. He suffered from ever-worsening bouts of asthma, and most of his last offensives were carried out in an attempt to obtain medicine.

The Bolivian Diary was quickly and crudely translated by Ramparts magazine and circulated around the world. There are at least four additional diaries in existence — those of Israel Reyes Zayas (Alias "Braulio"), Harry Villegas Tamayo ("Pombo"), Eliseo Reyes Rodriguez ("Rolando") and Dariel Alarcón Ramírez ("Benigno") — each of which reveals additional aspects of the events in question.

Timeline

Template:Cgtimeline

Guevara's works

In English

• Argentine, by Ernesto Guevara, Ocean Press (AU), 2008, ISBN 1920888934

• A song written by Che for Fidel Castro (flyer), by Ernesto Guevara, FreeThought Publications, 2000, ASIN B0006RP426

• Back on the Road: A Journey Through Latin America, by Ernesto "Che" Guevara & Alberto Granado, Grove Press, 2002, ISBN 0802139426

• Che Guevara, Cuba, and the Road to Socialism, by Ernesto Guevara, Pathfinder Press, 1991, ISBN 0873486439

• Che Guevara on Global Justice, by Ernesto Guevara, Ocean Press (AU), 2002, ISBN 1876175451

• Che Guevara: Radical Writings on Guerrilla Warfare, Politics and Revolution, by Ernesto Che Guevara, Filiquarian Publishing, 2006, ISBN 1599869993

• Che Guevara Speaks: Selected Speeches and Writings, by Ernesto Guevara, Pathfinder Press (NY), 1980, ISBN 0873486021

• Che Guevara Talks to Young People, by Ernesto Guevara, Pathfinder, (2000), ISBN 087348911X

• Che: The Photobiography of Che Guevara, Thunder's Mouth Press, 1998, ISBN 1560251875

• Colonialism is Doomed, by Che Guevara, Ministry of External Relations: Republic of Cuba, 1964, ASIN B0010AAN1K

• Critical Notes on Political Economy: A Revolutionary Humanist Approach to Marxist Economics, by Ernesto Guevara, Ocean Press (AU), 2008, ISBN 1876175559

• Episodes of the Cuban Revolutionary War, 1956-58, by Ernesto Guevara, Pathfinder Press (NY), 1996, ISBN 0873488245

• Guerrilla Warfare: Authorized Edition , by Ernesto Guevara, Ocean Press (AU), 2006, ISBN 1920888284

• London Bulletin Number 7, Che's Diarys(sic), by Che Guevara, Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation, 1968, ASIN B000LARAC0

• Manifesto: Three Classic Essays on How to Change the World, by Ernesto Che Guevara, Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, & Rosa Luxemburg, Ocean Press (NY), 2005, ISBN 1876175982

• Marx & Engels: An Introduction, by Che Guevara, Ocean Press, 2007, ISBN 1920888926

• Our America And Theirs: Kennedy And The Alliance For Progress, by Ernesto Guevara, Ocean Press, 2006, ISBN 1876175818

• Reminiscences of the Cuban Revolutionary War: Authorized Edition, by Ernesto "Che" Guevara, Ocean Press (AU), 2005, ISBN 1920888330

• Self Portrait Che Guevara, by Ernesto Guevara & Victor Casaus, Ocean Press (AU), 2004, ISBN 1876175826

• Socialism and Man in Cuba, by Ernesto Guevara & Fidel Castro, Pathfinder Press (NY), 1989, ISBN 0873485777

• The African Dream: The diaries of the Revolutionary War in the Congo, by Ernesto "Che" Guevara, Grove Press, 2001, ISBN 0802138349

• The Bolivian Diary of Ernesto Che Guevara, by Ernesto "Che" Guevara, Pathfinder Press, 1994 ISBN 0873487664

• The Che Guevara Reader, by Ernesto Guevara, Ocean Press (AU), 2003, ISBN 1876175699

• The Diary of Che Guevara: Bolivia: November 7, 1966-October 7, 1967, by Che Guevara, Bantam Extra, 1968, ASIN B000BD037G

• The Diary of Che Guevara: The Secret Papers of a Revolutionary, by Che Guevara, Amereon Ltd, ISBN 0891902244

• The Great Debate on Political Economy, by Che Guevara, Ocean Press, 2006, ISBN 1876175540

• The Motorcycle Diaries: A Journey Around South America, by Ernesto Che Guevara, Verso, 1996, ISBN 1857023994

• The Role of Foreign Aid in the Deveopment of Cuba", by Che Guevara, Editorial en Marcha, 1962, ASIN B001159NRO

• To Speak the Truth: Why Washington's "Cold War" Against Cuba Doesn't End, by Ernesto Guevara & Fidel Castro, Pathfinder, 1993, ISBN 0873486331

Videography

Documentaries

• Aleida Guevara Remembers Her Father, Che, 2006 (34 min). Ocean Press (AU), Starring Aleida Guevara.

• Democracy Now: Che Guevara Episode, 2007 (33 min). Hosted by Amy Goodman.

• The Hands of Che Guevara, 2006 (59 min). Directed by Peter De Kock.

Theatrical films

• Che!, 1969, (96 min), Directed by Richard Fleischer.

• The Motorcycle Diaries (film), 2004, (126 min), Spanish with subtitles. Directed by Walter Salles.

• The Lost City (2005 film) directed by Andy Garcia.

Archival footage

• Che Reciting a Poem, (0:58), English subtitles, from El Che: Investigating a Legend - Kultur Video 2001, Video Clip

• Che Showing Support for Fidel Castro, (0:21), English subtitles, from El Che: Investigating a Legend - Kultur Video 2001, Video Clip

• Che Speaking about Labor, (0:27), English subtitles, from El Che: Investigating a Legend - Kultur Video 2001, Video Clip

• Che Speaking about the Bay of Pigs Invasion, (0:17), English subtitles, from El Che: Investigating a Legend - Kultur Video 2001, Video Clip

• Che Speaking at the United Nations, 1964, (1:28), Español, Video Clip

• Che Speaking on the U.S. Presidency, (0:32), English subtitles, from El Che: Investigating a Legend - Kultur Video 2001, Video Clip

• Che Speaking out Against Imperialism, (1:19), English subtitles, from El Che: Investigating a Legend - Kultur Video 2001, Video Clip

• Che Speaking to Santa Clara, Cuba Sugar Workers, March 28 1961, (6:59), Español, Video Clip

• Che Speaking French: L'interview de Che Guevara, 1964, (9:43), Français, Video Clip

Content notes

•  rough: (Definition: "To live without the usual comforts and conveniences"

During his youthful travels, Guevara carried a minimal amount of money and tried to spend it only on food. While making their 1952 trip, he and Alberto Granado received along the way several "collections" given to them by local people and/or other travellers who were concerned about their apparent destitution. It is hoped that the following lists will cast further light on the circumstances in which they made this trip and the meaning of the phrase travelling rough.

• Conveyances used: motorcycle "La Poderosa II" (broke down completely and was abandoned in Santiago de Chile on 2 March 1952); various launches; steamboat; freighter (as stowaways); taxi; bus; various trucks (hitch-hiking); Land-Rover (lent by a friend); train; horse; riverboat; raft "Mambo Tango"; Indian dugout canoe; sea plane; armored police van; cargo plane
• Nights spent in: houses of friends, acquaintances and strangers; hospital rooms; police sentry box; shack; shed; jail cell; outside "under the stars"; garage; lean-to; kitchen of forest ranger's cabin; hayloft; police barracks; boathouse; hut; fire station attic; derelict ("haunted") house; cab of truck; Centre for the Prevention of Yellow Fever; police headquarters; forest ranger sentry post; railroad station; Chilean National Guard barracks; bus station; boarding house; guest house room; "dump"; municipal parks (in Miami)

Additionally, in 1950 Guevara made a solo tour of the northern provinces of Argentina on his motorized bike "Micrón" (1950); in that same year, he also travelled up and down the eastern coast of South America aboard petrol tankers and other ships while working as a nurse in the Argentine Merchant Marine and visited many port cities along their routes.

•  Basque: Re origin of the surname Guevara — "Basque: Castilianized form of Basque Gebara, a habitational name from a place in the Basque province of Araba. The origin and meaning of the place name are uncertain; it is recorded in the form Gebala by the geographer Ptolemy in the 2nd century ad. This is a rare name in Spain." Dictionary of American Family Names, Patrick Hanks, ed., London: 2003, Oxford University Press. His mother, Celia de la Serna, had also inherited Basque blood through her father, Juan Martín de la Serna Ugalde. One of Celia's collateral ancestors was the last Viceroy of Perú, General José de la Serna e Hinojosa, who was likewise of documented Basque origin.
  

•  Galway: The Lynch family was one of the famous 14 Tribes of Galway. Patrick travelled extensively around South America before finally settling in Argentina where he became a prosperous merchant. His descendants include the Chilean rear admiral Patricio Lynch Zaldívar (1824-1886), and the distinguished Argentine writers Benito Lynch (1882-1951) and Adolfo Bioy Casares (1914-1999). The misconception exists that Ana María Isabel Lynch was born in Ireland, whereas she was actually born (1868) in San Francisco, California, USA where her father, Francisco Lynch, had traveled from Argentina during the Gold Rush years. Francisco had married a young Californian widow, Eloísa Ortiz, ca. 1860 and they had several other American-born children in addition to Ana Isabel. The man Ana Isabel would eventually marry, Roberto Guevara Castro, had also been born in California, USA of an Argentine father and a Californian mother who was the grand-daughter of the Spanish aristocrat Don Luís María Peralta who had been given large land grants (including 44,800 acres (181 km) encompassing the East Bay region of California) by the King of Spain. Despite the fact that they were both born in the Bay area of California, Ana Isabel and Roberto did not meet until after their respective families had returned to Argentina in the 1880s. During Che Guevara's childhood, listening to his Grandmother Ana Isabel's tales of frontier life in California was one of his greatest delights.
  

•  Diploma: While commonly referred to as a doctor, the medical degree conferred was of a medic, a lower degree of the time. Also note, the below sources show record of a medic education, but then identify it as a "doctor", confused with the fact that medical education of the time could lead to two outcomes, that of a medic, or after clinical training that of a doctor.

The University de Buenos Aires has no record of him receiving a medical degree or a medic degree, though it is likely his educational records were lost or destroyed.

Employed as a medic because he was unable to get his clinical internship years (i.e. the required clinical years to become a doctor; medical studies could be completed to become either a medic (sans clinical training) or a doctor (with clinical years)

"In March (1953), he passed his finals and obtained his diploma as a physician. His specialty was dermatology. A few months later he went back on the road, never to return to Argentina until he had become the world-famous Comandante Che Guevara."

"In June (1953), Ernesto received a copy of his doctor's degree, and a few days later he celebrated his twenty-fifth birthday"

"12 de junio de 1953.- La Facultad de Ciencias Médicas de la Universidad de Buenos Aires le expide a Ernesto Guevara de la Serna el certificado de haber concluido la carrera de medicina. Esto se refleja en el legajo 1058, registro 1116, folio 153. Después participa en una fiesta de despedida que sus compañeros de la Clínica del doctor Salvador Pisani le hacen en la hacienda de la señora Amalia María Gómez Macías de Duhau."

"One year later, having completed his medical degree, he left Argentina for good."

"He received a medical degree from the University of Buenos Aires in 1953."

"he completed medical studies in 1953" (as a medic)

•  Ibero-America: In a brief speech at the San Pablo leprosarium in Peru on the occasion of his 24th birthday, Guevara said: "Although we're too insignificant to be spokesmen for such a noble cause, we believe, and this journey has only served to confirm this belief, that the division of America into unstable and illusory nations is a complete fiction. We are one single mestizo race with remarkable ethnographical similarities, from Mexico down to the Magellan Straits. And so, in an attempt to break free from all narrow-minded provincialism, I propose a toast to Peru and to a United America."
  

•  non-Cubans: "There were four non-Cubans on board -- Guevara, from Argentina; Gino Doné, an Italian; Guillén, a Mexican; and the pilot Ramón Mejía del Castillo ('Pichirilo'), a Dominican who had been on the abortive Cayo Confites expedition."
  

•  Knapsack: "Quizás esa fue la primera vez que tuve planteado prácticamente ante mí el dilema de mi dedicación a la medicina o a mi deber de soldado revolucionario. Tenía delante de mí una mochila llena de medicamentos y una caja de balas, las dos eran mucho peso para transportarlas juntas; tomé la caja de balas, dejando la mochila ..." (English: "Perhaps this was the first time I was confronted with the real-life dilemma of having to choose between my devotion to medicine and my duty as a revolutionary soldier. Lying at my feet were a knapsack full of medicine and a box of ammunition. They were too heavy for me to carry both of them. I grabbed the box of ammunition, leaving the medicine behind ...".)
  

•  Children: 

With Hilda Gadea (married 18 August 1955; divorced 22 May 1959):

• Hilda Beatriz Guevara Gadea, born 15 February 1956 in Mexico City; died 21 August 1995 in Havana, Cuba.

With Aleida March (married 2 June 1959):

• Aleida Guevara March, born 24 November 1960 in Havana, Cuba
• Camilo Guevara March, born 20 May 1962 in Havana, Cuba
• Celia Guevara March, born 14 June 1963 in Havana, Cuba
• Ernesto Guevara March, born 24 February 1965 in Havana, Cuba

With Lilia Rosa López (extramarital):

• Omar Pérez, born 19 March 1964 in Havana, Cuba
  

•  INRA: Appointed Director of the Industrialization Department of the National Institute for Agrarian Reform on October 7 1959.
  

•  BNC: Appointed President of the National Bank of Cuba on November 26 1959.
  

•  Signature: "If my way of signing is not typical of bank presidents ... this does not signify, by any means, that I am minimizing the importance of the document — but that the revolutionary process is not yet over and, besides, that we must change our scale of values." — Ernesto Guevara
  

•  MININD: appointed Minister of Industries on February 23 1961.
  

•  Algeria: In September 1962, Algeria asked Cuba for assistance when Morocco declared war on it over their dispute concerning the territory formerly known as the Spanish Sahara. Cuba responded by sending a contingent of Cuban officers and troops totalling 686 men and some 60 tanks to support the Algerian forces. Shortly after news of the landing of the Cuban troops at Oran leaked to the press, King Hassan II of Morocco agreed to sign a cease-fire with President Ben Bella of Algeria. The Cuban expeditionary force remained in Algeria for six months, during which time they set up the military equipment they had brought and trained their Algerian counterparts in its use. Guevara played a major role in organizing and executing the Cuban deployment.
  

•  Kabila: In May 1997, Laurent-Désiré Kabila overthrew the government of Mobutu Sese Seko and became President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. He held that position until his assassination on January 16, 2001 and was succeeded in the presidency by his son, Joseph Kabila.
  

•  NSA: "The intercept operators knew that Dar-es-Salaam was serving as a communications center for the fighters, receiving messages from Castro in Cuba and relaying them on to the guerrillas deep in the bush. Guevara transmitted his progress reports and requests for supplies back through that same channel. Every day at 8:00 A.M., 2:30 P.M., and 7:00 P.M., one of Guevara's radio operators would also make contact with the jungle base at Kigoma."
  

•  Camp: The purchase of the acreage in the Ñancahuazú region was in direct contravention of Guevara's directive that the land for the camp should be purchased in the Alto Beni region. When presented with the fait accompli that the Bolivian Communists had acquired land in the Ñancahuazú region instead, he at first complained but eventually decided to utilize it in order not to lose time while waiting for them to purchase a parcel in the Alto Beni.
  

•  USMilitary: "U.S. military personnel in Bolivia never exceeded 53 advisors, including a sixteen-man Mobile Training Team (MTT) from the 8th Special Forces Group based at Fort Gulick, Panama Canal Zone. Commanded by Major Ralph ('Pappy') Shelton, the MTT set up a training camp near Santa Cruz. The advisors arrived on April 29 and instituted a 19 week counter-insurgency training program for the Bolivian 2nd Ranger Battalion. The intensive course included training in weapons, individual combat, squad and platoon tactics, patrolling, and counter-insurgency. The Bolivians responded well to the training and quickly developed into a spirited, confident, and effective counter guerrilla unit."
  

•  Message: For example, on August 31 1967 Che wrote in his diary "Hay mensaje de Manila pero no se pudo copiar.", i.e. "There is a (coded radio) message from Manila ('Manila' being the code name for Havana) but we couldn't copy it." The content of this message has not been revealed, but it may have been of critical importance since by then Castro and the other Cubans who were directing the guerrillas' support network from Havana had to be aware of their dire straits.
  

•  Barrientos: Although Barrientos never revealed his motives for ordering the summary execution of Guevara, some of his associates have suggested that he took this decision primarily in order to avoid the spectacle of a "show trial" that would have brought unwelcome international attention to Bolivia, and that he was also concerned that, had Guevara been sentenced to a lengthy term in a Bolivian prison, he might have escaped or eventually been released (as in Fidel Castro's case), and subsequently resumed his guerrilla activities.
  

•  Amputation: Castañeda, Jorge G., Che Guevara: Compañero, New York: 1998, Random House, pp. xiii - xiv; pp. 401–402. Guevara's amputated hands, preserved in formaldehyde, turned up in the possession of Fidel Castro a few months later. Castro reportedly wanted to put them on public display but was dissuaded from doing so by the vehement protests of members of Guevara's family.
  

•  Mausoleum: On December 30 1998 the remains of ten more guerrillas who had fought alongside Guevara in Bolivia and whose secret burial sites there had been recently discovered by Cuban forensic investigators were placed inside the "Che Guevara Mausoleum" in Santa Clara. Also inside the mausoleum is the original letter Guevara wrote to Castro in which he stated that he was leaving Cuba to fight abroad for the cause of the revolution, resigned all his party, military and governmental posts, and renounced his Cuban citizenship.
  

Source notes / References

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1. Maryland Institute of Art, referenced at BBC News, "Che Guevara photographer dies", 26 May 2001.Online at BBC News, accessed January 42006.
2. Anderson, Jon Lee. Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life, New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 446.
3. Anderson, Jon Lee. Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life, New York: 1997, Grove Press, ISBN 0802135587, p. 28.
4. Digital Granma Internacional, "Simultaneous chess game on 37th anniversary of Che’s death", 13 October 2004. Online at Granma International English Edition, accessed January 5, 2006.
5. Guevara Lynch, Ernesto. Aquí va un soldado de América. Barcelona: Plaza y Janés Editores, S.A., 2000, p. 26.
6. Radio Cadena Agramonte, "Ataque al cuartel del Bayamo" Online, accessed February 25 2006.
7. Granma.cu, "Walking towards sunrise" Online, accessed February 25 2006.
8. ^ Anderson, Jon Lee. Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life, New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 139–141
9. ^ U.S. Department of State, "Foreign Relations, Guatemala, 1952–1954". Online, accessed March 4 2006.
10. Anderson, Jon Lee. Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life, New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 144
11. Holland, Max. "Private Sources of U.S. Foreign Policy: William Pawley and the 1954 Coup d'Etat in Guatemala", Journal of Cold War Studies, Volume 7, Number 4, Fall 2005, pp. 36–73
12. "Che's Habanos" ... During his Years in the Jungle, Cigars Were Che Guevara's Faithful Companion]October 1997, Cigar Aficionado
13. History of Cuba
14. Anderson, Jon Lee. Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life, ISBN 0-8021-1600-0, New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 194.
15. Taibo, Paco Ignacio II. Ernesto Guevara, también conocido como el Che, p. 104.accessed October 6 2006.
16. U. S. Central Intelligence Agency, "CIA Biographic Register on Ernesto 'Che' Guevara". Online, accessed July 12, 2006.
17. Anderson pp. 269–270, 277–278.
18. Anderson p. 317.
19. Testimonio de Zoila Rodríguez García, novia de Ernesto Guevara en Sierra Maestra; incluido en el libro Che entre nosotros(1992), de Adys Cupull y Froilán González
20. Ernesto Che Guevara, "Suicide Squad: Example Of Revolutionary Morale (an excerpt from Episodes of the Cuban Revolutionary War - 1956-58). The Militant Online, accessed March 27 2006.
21. Castro, Fidel (editors Bonachea, Rolando E. and Nelson P. Valdés). Revolutionary Struggle. 1947–1958. Cambridge, Massachusetts and London: MIT Press, 1972, pp. 439–442.
22. Castro, Fidel. ( Speech given in Palma Soriano, Cuba. Online
23. Dorschner, John and Roberto Fabricio. The Winds of December: The Cuban Revolution of 1958, New York: 1980, Coward, McCann & Geoghegen, ISBN 0698109937, pages 41–47, 81–87.
24. Anderson, Jon Lee. Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life, New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 372 and p. 425
25. "Executions at La Cabaña fortress under Ernesto "Ché" Guevara". Document written by José Vilasuso. Online accessed October 18, 2006.
26. Different sources cite different numbers of executions. Anderson states that "several hundred people were officially tried and executed across Cuba." p.387. Dr. Armando M. Lago of the Cuba Archive, gives the figure as 216 documented executions in two years. Others give far higher figures.
27. Jon Lee Anderson:PBS: THE LEGACY OF CHE GUEVARA
28. PBS: Che Guevara, Author
29. Aide reveals Che Guevara's secret trip to Hiroshima, 14 October 2007, by Manabu Niwata, Mainichi correspondent
30. Anderson, Jon Lee. Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life, ISBN 0-8021-1600-0, New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 503.
31. chessgames.com, "Miguel Najdorf vs Ernesto Che Guevara". Online at chessgames.com, accessed January 5 2006.
32. ar.geocities.com/carloseadrake/AJEDREZ/, Ernesto "Che" Guevara – Ajedrez Online, accessed June 29 2006.
33. Puerto Padre website, "Cronologia" (List of anniversaries) Online at Puerto Padre website, accessed January 4 2006.
34. Peña, Emilio Herasme," La Expedición Armada de junio de 1959", 14 June 2004. Online at 'Listín Diario (Dominican Republic), accessed January 4 2006.
35. Cuban Information Archives, "La Coubre explodes in Havana 1960." Online, accessed February 26 2006; pictures can be seen at Cuban site fotospl.com.
36. PBS: Che Guevara, Popular but Ineffective
37. Anderson, Jon Lee. Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life, ISBN 0-8021-1600-0, New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 508.
38. ^ Anderson, Jon Lee. Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life, New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 628.
39. Che Guevara speaking French: L'interview de Che Guevara, 1964, (9:43), Français, Video Clip
40. You know how much I admire Che Guevara. In fact, I believe that the man was not only an intellectual but also the most complete human being of our age: as a fighter and as a man, as a theoretician who was able to further the cause of revolution by drawing his theories from his personal experience in battle.” — Jean Paul Sartre Remembering Che Guevara, October 09 2006, The International News, by Prof Khwaja Masud
41. "Che Guevara is part of the great myths of this century--our era's most perfect man." - Jean Paul Sartre Amazon Review of: The Bolivian Diary: Authorized Edition
42. Montreal Gazette, "Liberals picked the wrong issue". Online, accessed February 26 2006.
43. Guaracabuya.org, "TERRORISTS CONNECTED TO CUBAN COMMUNIST GOVERNMENT". Online, accessed February 26 2006.
44. Gálvez, William. Che in Africa: Che Guevara's Congo Diary. Melbourne: Ocean Press, 1999, p. 28.
45. Bruce Cumings, "Korea’s Place in the Sun: A Modern History", updated edition, W.W. Norton & Company, 2005, p. 404.
46. Ernesto Che Guevara, (editors Rolando E. Bonachea and Nelson P. Valdés), Che: Selected Works of Ernesto Guevara, Cambridge, MA: 1969, p. 350.
47. ^ Ernesto Che Guevara, "English Translation of Complete Text of Algiers Speech", Online at Sozialistische Klassiker, accessed January 4 2006.
48. PBS: Che Guevara, Critic of the Soviets
49. Ernesto Che Guevara, (editors Rolando E. Bonachea and Nelson P. Valdés), Che: Selected Works of Ernesto Guevara, Cambridge, MA: 1969, pp. 352-59.
50. Guevara, Ernesto Che. The Great Debate on Political Economy, New York: 2006, Ocean Press, 430 pages (entire book is devoted to this subject).
51. Ernesto Che Guevara, "English Translation of Complete Text of his Message to the Tricontinental", or see Original Spanish text at Wikisource.
52. ^ Ernesto Che Guevara, "Che Guevara's Farewell Letter", 1965. English translation of complete text: Che Guevara's Farewell Letter at Wikisource.
53. Miná, Gianni. An Encounter with Fidel, Melbourne, 1991: Ocean Press, p 223.
54. Materials for Dr. Jeffrey C. Barnett's "The Cuban Story" (Lit 295), Washington and Lee University
55. Ahmed Ben Bella. "Che as I knew him". Online at Le Monde Diplomatique, accessed June 19, 2006.
56. Heikal's account of Guevara's conversations with Nasser in February and March of 1965 lends further credence to this interpretation. See Heikal, Mohamed Hassanein. The Cairo Documents, pp 347–357.
57. Gálvez, William. Che in Africa: Che Guevara's Congo Diary, Melbourne, 1999: Ocean Press, p 62.
58. Gott, Richard. Cuba: A new history, Yale University Press 2004, p219.
59. BBC News, "Profile: Laurent Kabila", 26 May 2001. Online at BBC News, accessed January 5 2006.
60. African History Blog, "Che Guevara's Exploits in the Congo", Che Guevara's Exploits in the Congo Online at African History, accessed January 5 2006.
61. Mad Mike Hoare Site, "Mad Mike". Online at Geocities.com, accessed January 5 2006.
62. Ireland's Own, "From Cuba to Congo, Dream to Disaster for Che Guevara". Online at irelandsown.net, accessed January 11 2006.
63. Ernesto Che Guevara, translated from the Spanish by Patrick Camiller, The African Dream, New York: Grove Publishers, 2000, p.1.
64. Castañeda, Jorge G., Che Guevara: Compañero, New York: 1998, Random House, p 316.
65. Ernesto Che Guevara, Apuntes Filosóficos, draft.
66. Ernesto Che Guevara, Notas Económicas, draft.
67. Mittleman, James H. Underdevelopment and the Transition to Socialism - Mozambique and Tanzania, New York: 1981, Academic Press, p. 38.
68. Major Donald R. Selvage - USMC, "Che Guevara in Bolivia", 1 April 1985. Online at GlobalSecurity.org, accessed January 5 2006.
69. Taibo, Paco Ignacio II. Ernesto Guevara, también conocido como el Che, Barcelona, 1999: Editorial Planeta, p 726.
70. Bolivia marks capture, execution of 'Che' Guevara 40 years ago, SF Chronicle, October 9, 2007
71. U.S. Army, "Memorandum of Understanding Concerning the Activation, Organization and Training of the 2d Ranger Battalion – Bolivian Army (28 April 1967)". Accessed June 19 2006.
72. Ryan, Henry Butterfield. The Fall of Che Guevara : A Story of Soldiers, Spies, and Diplomats, New York, 1998: Oxford University Press, p 82–102, inter alia.
73. Ernesto Che Guevara, "Excerpt from Pasajes de la guerra revolucionaria: Congo", Online at Cold War International History Project, accessed April 26 2006.
74. Castañeda, Jorge G. Che Guevara: Compañero, New York: 1998, Random House, pp 107–112; 131–132.
75. Rodriguez, Felix I. and John Weisman. Shadow Warrior/the CIA Hero of a Hundred Unknown Battles (Hardcover), New York: 1989, Publisher: Simon & Schuster.
76. NewsMax, "Félix Rodríguez:Kerry No Foe of Castro". Online, accessed February 27 2006.
77. "V&A - Che Guevara: Revolutionary & Icon". www.vam.ac.uk. Retrieved 2008-02-28.
78. "Che: A Myth Embalmed in a Matrix of Ignorance", Time Magazine, Oct 12, 1970
79. Anderson, Jon Lee. Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life, New York: 1997, Grove Press, p.733
80. McDonnell, Patrick J. "Che Guevara's legacy looms larger than ever in Latin America". travel.latimes.com. Retrieved 2008-02-28. {{cite web}}: Text "Video - Travel - LATimes.com" ignored (help)
81. "CIA man recounts Che Guevara's death", BBC News, October 8, 2007.
82. "Che: A Myth Embalmed in a Matrix of Ignorance", Time Magazine, Oct. 12 1970
83. Anderson, Jon Lee. Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life. New York: Grove Press, 1997.
84. Bolivia marks capture, execution of 'Che' Guevara 40 years ago, SF Chronicle, October 9 2007
85. Richard Gott, "Bolivia on the Day of the Death of Che Guevara".Online at Mindfully.org, accessed February 26 2006.
86. Che Guevara's legacy looms larger than ever in Latin America, LA Times, October 8 2007
87. Lone Bidder Buys Strands of Che’s Hair at U.S. Auction, by Marc Lacey, Oct 26 2007, NY Times
88. National Security Archive. Electronic Briefing Book No. 5 Online, accessed March 25 2007.
89. NotiSur - Latin American Political Affairs. Online, accessed February 4 2007.
90. Online, accessed November 28 2007.
91. Ernesto Che Guevara, "Diario (Bolivia)". Online, accessed February 26 2006.
92. Major Donald R. Selvage - USMC, "Che Guevara in Bolivia", 1 April 1985. Online at GlobalSecurity.org, accessed January 5 2006;
93. Alarcón Ramírez, Dariel dit "Benigno". Le Che en Bolivie, Paris: 1997, Éditions du Rocher
94. http://urumelb.tripod.com/che/biografia-del-che-guevara.htm
95. For detailed genealogical information about Che Guevara, including his family tree, see Genealogy of Ernesto Guevara de la Serna
96. For more information, see Dictionary of Irish Latin American Biography Guevara, Ernesto
97. Ernesto Che Guevara: Mito Y Realidad , by Enrique Ros (ISBN 0897299884)
98. Anderson, Jon Lee. Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life, New York: 1997, Grove Press, p. 139–141
99. James, Daniel. Che Guevara: A Biography, New York: Stein and Day, 1969, p. 71.
100. Jon Lee Anderson. Che Guevara: A revolutionary life, p-98.
101. Che en el tiempo
102. PBS http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/castro/peopleevents/p_guevara.html
103. MSN Encarta http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761558812/Che_Guevara.html
104. : Encyclopedia Britannica. http://concise.britannica.com/ebc/article-9366272/Che-Guevara
105. Guevara, Ernesto Che, Motorcycle Diaries, London: Verso Books, 1995, p.135.
106. Thomas, Hugh. Cuba or the Pursuit of Freedom, Cambridge, MA: Da Capo Press, April 1998 (Updated edition), p. 894.
107. First published in an article in Verde Olivo, La Habana, Cuba, February 26 1961.
108. Subsequently published in the book, Guevara, Ernesto Che. Pasajes de la Guerra Revolucionaria, La Habana, Cuba: 1963, Ediciones Unión.
109. Castañeda, Jorge G. Che Guevara: Compañero, New York: 1998, Random House, pp 264–265.
110. Aleksandr Alexeiev in Cuba después del triunfo de la revolución ("Cuba after the triumph of the revolution")
111. Revista de América Latina (Moscow), no. 10, October 1984, p. 57 (referenced in Castañeda, op. cit, p. 169).
112. Piero Gliejeses, "Cuba's First Venture in Africa: Algeria, 1961–1965", Journal of Latin American Studies, no. 28, London: Cambridge University Press, Spring 1996, p. 188
113. Castañeda, pp. 244–245.
114. Bamford, James, Body of Secrets: Anatomy of the Ultra-Secret National Security Agency, New York: Anchor Books, 2002 (Reprint edition), p. 181.
115. Che Guevara in Bolivia by Major Donald R. Selvage.

External links

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Photos/interactive media

• ABC News: Life and Death of Che Guevara
• BBC Audio: CIA Agent Felix Rodriguez Recounts Che's Death, Oct 8 2007
• BBC Video: Fidel Castro Visits Boyhood Home of Che Guevara, Jul 23 2006
• BBC Video: Che Remembered 40 Years On, Oct 8 2007
• BBC: Your Che Guevara Images Set 1 --- Set 2
• MSNBC Slideshow: In Cuba, Che Still Sells Revolution
• NY Daily News: Photos of Che and his Wife (Alieda March)
• NY Times Interactive Gallery: A Revolutionary Afterlife
• Reuters Slideshow: "Honoring Che"
• Smithsonian Global Sound: Che Guevara Speaks

v t e Che Guevara
Events	Guatemalan Coup Cuban Revolution Landing of the Granma Battle of Alegría de Pío Battle of La Plata (1957) Battle of Santa Clara Consolidation of the Cuban Revolution La Coubre explosion Guanahacabibes camp Bay of Pigs Invasion Cuban Missile Crisis Four Year Plan (Cuba) Great Debate (Cuba) Congo Crisis Bolivian Campaign
People	Alberto Granado Hilda Gadea Aleida March Aleida Guevara Raúl Castro Fidel Castro Camilo Cienfuegos Tamara Bunke Simeon Cuba Sarabia Harry "Pombo" Villegas Régis Debray Félix Rodríguez Orlando Borrego Canek Sánchez Guevara Mario Terán
Books	The Motorcycle Diaries Guerrilla Warfare Episodes of the Cuban Revolutionary War
Films	The Motorcycle Diaries Che (Part 1 & Part 2) Che! The Hands of Che Guevara Che: Rise and Fall Chevolution
Theatre	Che'r Cycle
Iconography	Guerrillero Heroico photo Legacy In popular culture In fashion Guevarism Foco Mausoleum Alberto Korda Jim Fitzpatrick
Comics	Vida del Che
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