Re-thinking Che Guevara
Today Ernesto "Che" Guevara would be sixty-nine years old. On an island hemmed in by the constraints of the almighty dollar. In a continent ravaged by neoliberalism. In a world order he never imagined. What would Che think? What would he rethink? Janette Habel Buffeted by a chaotic world, Che's image is trapped between nonsense and trivia. An empty myth or a totalitarian and suicidal utopian. A heroic but militarily incompetent guerilla for some, pure organizer for others, and, for some, a pitiless and masochistic puritan abusing his power. A man whose irresponsibility and political inflexibility would have led to disaster (like that of the Congo and the Bolivian campaign and for the Cuban revolution, if it weren't for the pragmatic genius of Fidel Castro.
Now, at the end of the century, how can we get a sense of the fight carried on in the 1960s, that revolutionary decade? More is known about the end of his life than about his prodigious writings -held in Cuba where they remain largely unknown. His ideological development remains to be discovered.
The brevity of his political life (thirteen years, trom the CIA's victory against Arbenz in Guatemala to his death in Bolivia, including eight years in Cuba, two before and six after the revolution) and the dizzying acceleration of the historical period in which he took part make the interpretation of some of his writings more complicated. Che's thought
Che denied being a theoretician, and never belonged to a political party before his involvement with Cuba. And yet, all those who knew him in Cuba agree: in the Sierra Maestra, and after they took power, he was one of the major inspirations -perhaps even the most central reason for- the radical shift taken by the Cuban revolution.
His political consciousness would evolve a great deal in the following years. Only six years elapsed between his positive allusions to countries "behind the iron curtain" (in a letter from the Sierra Maestra to one of the leaders of the July 26 Movement, Rene Ramos Latour, a letter he later called "idiotic") and his implacable critique of the USSR and Eastern European countries of
In October of 1960 he went to Moscow. Cuba was being strangled by the American trade blockade, decreed on October 13th. He got credits from the Soviet bloc, and an agreement to buy the majority of the Cuban sugar crop. China would buy the rest. Present
TRES,
MELNA
at the annual celebration of the October Revolution, he was given a standing ovation by the crowd. Convinced that an Ămerican invasion was imminent (the Bay of Pigs would take place four months later) he came back certain that "the USSR and all the socialist countries are ready to go to war to defend our sovereignty."
In October 1962 the Missile Crisis dealt a vicious blow to his illusions. The guerillaMinister experienced for himself Soviet trade practices, and the diplomacy of Moscow-asSuperpower during the Missile Crisis. He discovered the sad reality of authoritarian and bureaucratic socialism and the provileges of those in power. In conferences at the Mini-
CH
COMANDANTE
HE ERA UN MAESTRO DE LA GUERRA CHE ERA UN ARTISTA DE LA LUCHA CUERBALLERAL Fiel
Gramne stry of Industry, he denounced what others would later call "really existing socialism".
His thinking was dominated by a humanism forged throughout his Latin American travels. Raised in Argentina, he was familiar with the populism and clientelism of the Peron regime. Later he would discover similar privileges among the "directors" and party leaders. "The New Man" he wanted to promote, the exemplary behavior he demanded and imposed as a leader himself, and the volunteer work he inaugurated were all at the opposite end of the spectrum from Stalinist
Che was inspired by an ethical conception of power as a political necessity. When he announced to sugar workers in 1961 that conditions were going to get worse (meet and milk would begin to be rationed) he took a stand which electrified listeners and bolstered their enthusiasm: "In the new stage of revolutionary struggle, no one will receive more than another, there will be neither privileged bureaucrats nor rich farmers. The only privileged group in Cuba will be children."
The population was already suffering from many deprivations: resistance to the expected American invasion required a huge popular mobilization which would have been impossible without support for the revolutionary project. Only such support explains the Cuban victory at the Playa Giron (Bay of Pigs) the first defeat of imperialism in Latin
Far from the nepotism and corruption common among Latin American leaders ("caudillos"), Che introduced the image of an austere leader, demanding of himself as much as he did of others. The anecdotes are endless: he eliminated the food supplements his family received, and he explained publically why when he was sick, he had temporarily stayed in a seaside house which his salary could not cover. Che quickly understood the need to struggle against privileges; the revolutionary project, according to him, must give birth to a new kind of leader who had no taint of corruption, who could reconcile his words and his actions. His personal
He led an unceasing struggle against the bureaucratization of the new administration, trying to create a radically new way of exercising power. He failed, and "the Argentine" as he was called with disdain by some bureaucrats, made many enemies.
His intransigeance has sometimes been given a psychoanalytical interpretation. To do this is to fail to understand why, in Cuba, the new powers had to embody a radical break with the corruption of the old regime. Because the "natural" state of things recovers quickly: witness the guerillas of the July 26th movement who, after the strategic victory of Santa Clara, once Batista had been defeated,
confiscated police Cadillacs for the trip to Havana. They were immediately repriman-
Today, some say that the sanctions and serious punishments of the period flowed from a specific type of Stalinism: the tropical gulag. This blurs the real difference between discipline imposed by guerillas in a struggle against a dictatorship supported by Washington, and Stalinist terror. True, the torturers of the Batista regime were executed in the Cabana barracks after the revolutionaries took power. But during the guerilla years Che also took care of wounded prisoners and let them go, afterwards. Those who served with him testified to his austere, but limitless Unfinished thoughts
A rereading of Che's last writings in the great economic debate which opposed him to supporters of the Soviet economic reforms on the 1960s -the first version of Perestroikaof his essay on "Socialism and Man in Cuba", , and his last speeches, especially the one he gave in Algiers in 1965 brings to light a critical and foresighted vision of the problems of the transitional society in the
In a book begun not long before his death, and left unfinished, he wrote "Many reversals await humanity before a final liberation but, I am convinced, that liberation cannot occur without a radical change in the strategy of the primary socialist powers. Will this change be the result of the inevitable pressures of imperialism or of the development of the masses of those countries, or of a combination of factors? History will tell. We must continue to carry our own small grain of sand even as we fear that the project is beyond our powers." 2
He quickly became aware of the difficult risks Cuba would run, given its dependence on its Soviet "Big Brother". From the moment of taking power he understood the need to break with the sugar monoculture in order to reduce the country's dependence and to try to ensure a more autonomous economic development. The emphasis placed on industry reflected this concern. But quickly the iron law of the world market made itself felt: the drop in sugarcane production - the major export- meant that sufficient imports for economic development could not be guaranteed, especially in a country with no energy resources and whose only income had derived from this single product since the monoculture was imposed by colonialism in the 19th century. This had to change. "We wanted to speed up che
30 International Viewpoint #291 industrialization. That was foolish. We wanted to replace all imports and make finished products here, without seeing the enormous complications that the import of intermediary goods entailed" Che told
Trade with the Soviet Union, and especially the deliveries of oil after the total break with the United States, were to guarantee the stability of Cuba's import-export system, and maintain a trade balance between a tiny, economically dominated country and a nuclear Superpower which called itself socialist and which had just begun the conquest of Space.
Unlike other Cuban leaders, Che quickly understand the risks and fragility of such a Transition and underdevelopment
Che also began to express doubts about the direction of domestic politics. The proposed market reforms introduced by Soviet economists (notably Liberman and Trapeznikov) were the subject of several debates, at a time when the island was already confronted with the need to redefine its development
The great economic debates of 1963-65 within the Ministry of the Industry, and then the whole Cuban leadership, had to do with building socialism. More precisely, they concerned the conditions for a transition from capitalism to socialism on an island locked into a sugar monoculture and directly subjected to the pressures of the international market. An island where development was hindered by a blockade mounted by the most powerful economy in the world.
The controversies included the role of the Law of Value during a transitional period, the degree to which companies should be centralized, the role of moral and material in-
Those who underlined the importance of the Law of Value gave market mechanisms a large place in a planned economy, even to the point of granting a great deal of financial autonomy to companies, and holding that financial incentives were needed to increase
Che and his supporters placed more emphasis on centralized management, taking into account the unequal development of Cuba. The telecommunications network and the transport infrastructure were quite developed but there were few technicians and a need for a tight control of scarce resources given the blockade; there was weak overall development, and above all, a critical lack of hard currency. enterprises would run the risk of undermining the nationally-decided priorities, in favor of profit for certain sectors. It would favor the growth of directors, in terms of investments and salaries, and would lay the basis for an uneven and unequal development. He doubted the likely effects of any system of labor organization which based itself on cash incentives, and believed that social differentiation would be the inevitable result.
He wrote prophetically: "We will come back to market theory... The whole organization of the market relies on financial incentives... and every time, it is the managers who profit. You only need to look at the latest project of the German Democratic Republic; the importance, there, of the director's management, or, even better, the rewards which the director receives for managing."* Twenty-five years later we have seen the consequences, as the masses of East Germany rose, disgusted with the economic morass they were in, with the lack of political freedom, and with the privileges of a corrupt
Inspired by an acutely anti-bureaucratic sensibility and guided by social and political considerations, Che spoke out against the primacy given to monetary/market relations in building socialism, though he had no illusions about the possibility of brutally supres-
Che insisted on the need for morale-building incentives, conceived as collective exhortations to work, went hand in hand with a wage policy closely linked to the development of skills. The most important being was "to carefully choose the instrument for mass mobilization". Without which, according to Che, the socialist project was doomed.
Equal rights, and the socialization of the
economy (despite the obvious excesses) were decisive in building popular resistance. Faced with foreign agression, another world was being built in Cuba. A world which seemed to be worth fighting for.
Che always reserved the "right to be wrong", saying that if his ideas "became a dangerous brake on the development of the productive forces, we must draw the proper conclusions and return to more familiar paths." s
He believed that the development of a revolutionary consciousness and education would forge a communist attitude towards work. This is why he led by example - not through masochism. but by necessity. "The creation of a new man and the development of technology," would ensure that the transition to socialism would not be derailed.
The relationship between humans and socialism were at the heart of his concerns. man as the essential element in the revolution, "actor in this strange and passionate drama which is the building of socialism". Education and consciousness were at the center of a more just society. "In this period of building socialism we are taking part in the birth of a new man. His image is not entirely clear yet; it cannot be, since this change goes hand in hand with the development of new economic structures... It is the man of the 21st century that we must create, even if this is still an aspiration and not a worked out reality." 6
Far from Stalinist deformations, Che's premises were both humanist and revolutionary. But it is true that he put too much of an emphasis on his critique of the economy, on the relative weight of market relations, and not enough on the repressive and police aspects of the Soviet political system. This is without a doubt one of the major weaknesses in his thought?
This weakness goes along with a certain naivety. It was not until 1966, when, commenting on the Manual of Economic Policies of the USSR, that he deepened his theoretical thought. He wrote then "The terrible historic crime of Stalin" was to "have despised communist education and installed the unlimted cult of authority." S Against dogmatism
In his diary in Bolivia, Che celebrated the July 26th movement as "a rebellion against oligarchies and against revolutionary dogmas." He vigorously criticized "the scholasticism which braked the development of marxist philosophy and systematically obstructed the study of any period of which the economic foundation has not been analyzed." (Socialism and Man).
His conception of the vanguard, guided by exemplary leaders. bore witness to a thought that was critical but incomplete, on the role and the place of the party in its relations with mass organizations. He wrote ironically "The Party has already decided for you and you have nothing left to do but swallow it... We must not create paid functionaries who are submissive to official thought, or "scholarship students' who live under the protection of the state budget while exercising their liberty in quotes"
But he did not analyse the faults of the single party/State Party: his experience of six years in the State leadership was too brief. He was marked by the war, the endless conflict with Washington, and the specificity of the Cuban situation; in the Sierra Maestra he was opposed to the urban wing of the July 25th movement, identified as a more rightwing current. The existence up to 1965 of three distinct political currents (the M-27-J, -the PSP, and the Directory became seen as an obstacle to the revolution. In fact, the single party was not built until 1975 because the fusion was so difficult. In the embattled climate of the early years of the revolution the key was resistance. Pluralism was left for
This did not stop him from putting into practice a political conception profoundly different from that introduced by the new power. In the first Conference on National Production in 1961, openness reigned: errors and those who were responsible for them were discussed publically. "You have just welcomed me with warm applause but I don't know whether you've done this as consumers or as accomplices- I think it is more as accomplices," he said in front of 3, 500
31
government officials.
He was the only one -at the price of a lot of criticism- to lead a public and controversial debate in the Ministry of Industry on the economic system of the country. The Ministry had been a refuge for those who found themselves cut off from their responsibilities: thus it included the former Minister of Communications, Oltuski, forced out of government in July 1960. The anecdote is even more telling when you consider that Che had conducted a bitter poliemic against Oltuski during the insurrection. A member of the left wing of the July 26th movement, Oltuski was judged too anti-Soviet once a rapprochement with the Soviet Union was the order of the day. In the same way, Che refused to give in to pressures from a trade union leader who demanded the firing of a bank employe accused of having been a Batista supporter: defending the honesty of the latter, Che denounced any possibility of a witch-hunt.
In a very significant text, (Un pecado de la revolucion; A Sin of the Revolution), Che recalled the errors made in regard to the Second front of l'Escambray, left behind on the march to Havana. Errors which he believed led to the departure of many cadre. His self-critical reflections on unity relations before coming to power are the only ones published to date. 32 hier
He was more 20 aware than any other third-world leader at the time of the flaws in actually existing socialism. Hostile to the coded language of the apparatchiks, he did not hesitate to make public and harsh criticisms: in his public speech in Algiers in 1965 (his last official speech as a Cuban official he denounced the "tacit complicity" Soviet leadership with imperialist exploitation and the continuation of unequal trade relations, in front of the Afro-Asian seminar gathered there.
It was also because he had foreseen the miserable difficulties that lay ahead of a tiny island trying to 20 build socialism, and the need for other revolutionary famous -and often caricatured- call for "Two, three, many Vietnams" at the Tricontinental Congress. Revolted by "the war of insults being waged by the two most powerful members of the socialist camp" he was seized "by the anguish of this illogical moment when humanity" confronted "the loneliness of Vietnam." Lucidly, Che sketched the historic evolution to come, foreseeing the dangers for isolated uprisings in a world configuration tragically dominated during the Cold War by imperialism and Stalinism, the death of the second of these already written in its trajectory.
Starting in 1962, one year after the official proclamation of the socialist nature of the Cuban Revolution and two years after the establishment of special relations with the USSR, the Missile Crisis destroyed his confidence in the solidity of the alliance and the strength of the commitment to aid. He was put in charge of negotiating for military aid from Moscow in the face of the ever increasing threat of American intervention atter the failure of the Bay of Pigs in 1961.
The proposed installation of nuclear missiles in Cuba -Moscow's idea- was intended to dissuade the Pentagon from embarking on that level of aggression. The proximity to American territory aggravated the nuclear threat, making a Soviet attack, in any conflict, much more quick and reducing the effectiviness of an American response. Kennedy demanded the withdrawal of the missiles at the risk of provoking a thermonuclear conflict: the world was on the brink of war. The Soviet government accepted the dismantling of all offensive weapons in
But the withdrawal of the missiles and the negotiations between Khruschev and Kennedy were conducted in the grand style of Soviet bureaucratic diplomacy, consulting no one, with total contempt for Cuban sovereignty. The Cubans' surprise and indignation were enormous and the October crisis (those shining sad days" invoked in his letter of farewell) marked the first breach in Soviet-Cuban relations.
BANCO NACIONA
The USSR's foreign policy, particularly its very grudging support for the people of Vietnam strengthened Che's increasingly critical view of the "socialist camp", ONVEICTISIE
ESTE BILLELE The mystery of the departure
Why did he leave Cuba? Because he understood the impossibility of socialism in one island? Because he needed to go back to the battlefield? Because he needed to break Cuba's dependence on the Soviet Union, with Fidel's blessing? This sharing of tasks between the man of State affairs and management and the rebel insurgent was perhaps the result of a compromise. But such a division of labor analysis doesn't take into account the failures or the conflicts which took place before he left, and doesn't explain the sequence of events afterwards.
Was he aware that he had less and less of a place in the political system then being put into place? His demands irritated the functionaries and the leading party members, his lifestyle was in itself a challenge to the nascent bureaucracy, whose incompetence he criticized. The lack of trained cadre had a catastrophic effect on the management of the economy, but he also blamed himself for mistakes that were made: "We are guilty, and we must say this frankly. Does the working class want to condemn us for that? Let them condemn us, replace us, even shoot us -they what they want to. That's the
He got angry with union leaders, the majority of whom had no support among the masses and who seemed to believe they had only rights, without duties. He said "Right now, unions could cease to exist and transfer their functions to the committees for labor justice. Only the union bureaucracy objects, because they would have to go back to work... most major business report that these people have been trade union officials for 18
Che also took the lead in denouncing early on the corruption of the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR) which he accused of being nests of opportunists; he reminded members of the security forces that "a counter-revolutionary is someone who fights against the revolution. But someone who uses his influence to get better housing, and then two cars, someone who violates the
20
"The year we were no-where"
There is no doubt that Africa was of major importance in Havana's understanding of the conflict of 1966 of the guerilla preparations." This almost accidental chain of events, the premature discovery of the training camp which forced unprepared battles, are they enough to throw light on the dramatic unwinding of the
VEINEE
PESOS between the third world and imperialism. But it is doubtful that
Che's personal was part of the
Apart from the diplomatic problems, his presence could only cause difficulties for
African leaders like Laurent Desire
Kabila, who did not hesitate to tell him so. As daring as Cuba's foreign guerilla campaign and the final result? No one today can answer these questions.
Deformed, mummified, Che still survives. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, among the debris of the revolutions of the twentieth century. He was both victor and vanquished. What is the source of his continuing message? A man of conviction, a warrior and a failed poet, insurgent and committed, Minister and then guerilla. He embodies the distrust of power, and redeems politics. There has never been, and still does not exist a guevarist model for building socialism.
But we still seek another way to organize
20 DE CUBA rationing system, someone who has everything the people don't is just as much a counterrevolutionary." 12
The recent biography by Paco Ignacio Taibo II does a good job of showing the mounting tension caused by the gap between the lack of economic and human resources and the urgency of development in a country always under threat. "We live in a difficult moment: we do not have the luxury of punishing errors this year: maybe next. Who's going to fire the Minister of Industry who signed off on a plan to produce 10 million shoes and other stupidities?" 14
He seemed to be consumed by an exhausting struggle, and poured forth criticisms and self-criticisms of a state planning system which demanded "immediate execution, unstated obligations... we begin to see people not as human beings but as soldiers, as numbers in a war that must be won. The tension is so high that we see nothing but our goal... and little by little we forget our daily reality... We must do something to make the Ministry a little more human." 15
Che fought on all these fronts: at the same time that he was the motor force behind industrial reorganization he was mounting a theoretical polemic in favor of seeking out a different kind of socialism, more and more convinced of the failure of the Soviet Union. But the economic debate -the stakes of which were the strategies that the island would pursue in its whole development- ended in failure for Che. He left on a long trip. His Algerian speech, very critical of Moscow, was poorly received: many witnesses confirm this and the whole text was not published in the Cuban press. One of the attachés at the Soviet Embassy, today living in exile (and wanting to remain anonymous) confirms that the Soviet government made it known that it felt this speech was unacceptable coming from a Cuban leader. Che was met by Fidel Castro at the airport, and the two were in discussion for two days. After this Che never appeared in a public role again. One month later, Guevara left quietly for the Congo.
policy was at the time-and it was of an extraordinary audacity-it is very unlikely that the direct involvement of the major Cuban leader after Fidel Castro had been planned. According to Taibo, in 1965, Che suggested to Nasser that he would eventually take part in the Congolese struggle. But he changed his mind, convinced by the Egyptian leader's arguments. What do these hesitations and shifts -so uncharacteristic of Che- mean?
A few months of being there convinced him that the situation was untenable given the weaknesses of the African liberation movements; he decided to organize his retreat. Clearly an attitude which undercuts any notion of his "suicidal" impulses. He opposed sending any more troops, which Fidel had proposed to do.!?
His African journals (titled "Passages from a revolutionary war: the Congo" 18) would only be published in excerpts, thirty years later. His letters to Fidel remain unknown. The final chapter
He stayed for several months in Prague, "a place where he tried to decide what he should do." '° His presence was not publicized because he distrusted the Czech secret service. We know nothing of the reasons for his long stay, and nothing of his correspondence with Fidel. He came back to Cuba secretly for a few months and continued to lay
What preparations were made before his departure for Bolivia at the end of 1966? What was the role played by the Bolivian CP, despite its already conflicted relationship
How are we to understand the flaws in his plan, "the lack of openness and the ambiguity of the project" according to Taibo II, when we know Che's typical rigorous style of organization and close attention to detail? Francois Maspero later discovered that he was the major support from the network outside Bolivia, Regis Debray scouted the terrain: a heavy responsibility for a young French student the selection of whom had already caused controversy
According to Taibo II who cites a CIA report, the Agency was informed by the end society, for "los de abajo" (those on the bottom) and not "los de arriba" (those on top), as it is phrased today in Latin America.
The bearer of an ethical conception of power, a new kind of political leader who reconciled his words with his actions, a ferocious critic of derailed "socialism" , his modernity aced this mixture of humanism and integrity. "Guevara has come, the masquerade is done!" shouted demonstrators in Montevideo in 1961.* 1) Paco Ignacio Taibo II Ernesto Guevara tambien conocido como el Che Ed. Planeta Madrid 1996 2) Unpublished text in possession of Carlos Tablada 3) Quoted in Paco Ignacio Taibo II p. 424 . At that time, the CEPAL suggested this "import substitution" policy 4) Ernesto Che Guevara Ecrits d'un revolutionnaire Ed. 5) Ernesto Guevara A propos du systeme budgetaire de financement Ed. Maspero Oeuvres III 1968 6) E. Guevara Textes Politiques Le socialisme et l'homme a Cuba 7) R. Massari Che Guevara pensiero e politica dell' 8).Unpublished. 1966. Mentioned in Tercer Milenio Juan Antonio Blanco p 83 La Havane 1995. 9) Unpublished manuscript in possession of C. Tablada. 10) cf Paco Ignacio Taibo II Op. cit 12) E. Che Guevara Textes inedits Oeuvres VI Ed. Maspero 1972 "L'influence de la revolution cubaine en 15) Ibid. p. 435 16) Raul Roa telephoned Che when he returned to Havana in March 1995. He asked Guevara to recieve Huberman et Sweezy, and congratulated him on his speech. "Eres uno de los pocos comemierdas a quien le gusto ese discurso," Guevara replied (conversation with the author. Paris 1997). 18) Extracts from Ernesto Che Guevara L'annee ou nous n'etions nulle part . P.I. Taibo II, Froilan Escobar, F.Guerra. Ed. Metailie . Paris 1995 19) In effect the second volume of "Passages de la guerre revolutionnaire" 20) According to an agent of the Cuban secret service, as reported in Paco Ignacio Taibo II Op. cit. 21) Ibid. p. 614. 22) Ibid. p.635.
33
----- pull-quotes on this page -----
DE CUBA
Women's lives in the new global economy
• £4/$5/35FF. Cheque payable to P. Rousset, IIRE, Postbus 53290, 1007 Amsterdam, Netherlands
* reviews Gays and the Left: Scratching the Surface The Early Homosexual Rights Movement (1864-1935), by John Lauritsen & David Thorstad, (Times Change Press, USA 1995), revised edition, $9.95 paper. Gay Men and the Sexual History of the Political Left, edited by Gert Hekma, Harry Oosterhuis & James Steakley, (Binghamton, NY: Harrington Park Press, 1995), $24.95 paperback. Reviewed by Peter Drucker
The contemporary movement for lesbian/ gay liberation was born out of the ferment of the New Left. Its leftist roots were openly acknowledged. Theorists such as Dennis Altman, John D' Emilio, David Fernbach and Mario Mieli. All identified with one socialist or communist current or anther. All acknowledged their debt to Marxism as well as feminism and psychoanalysis.
Times have changed. Lesbian/gay movements have grown and won some significant victories in the past quarter-century, while the socialist left has shrunk to a shadow of what it was. Unsurprisingly, nowadays lesbian/gay spokespeople and theorists are less likely to identify with the anti- capitalist left than they Back to basics
Lauritsen's and Thorstad's roots go back to the U.S. Socialist Workers Party. They broke with that group in the mid-1970s when the word came down from its leadership that lesbian/gay oppression was only a "secondary" contradiction for which members' energies often could not be spared. But
The 1995 re-edition of The Early Homosexual Rights Movement contains few major changes. Like the 1974 version, it treats the pioneers of lesbian/gay emancipation with only mildly critical sympathy and stresses the bright side of their alliance with