[News] Che - The face of rebellion everywhere

[Anti-Imperialist News]

http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=52&ItemID=13990

The face of rebellion everywhere
by Mahir Ali; October 09, 2007

IN a small Bolivian town called Vallegrande, somewhat to the 
discomfiture of the resident priest, local Catholics commonly offer 
prayers not only to the Lord but also to a certain Saint Ernesto. The 
reference is not to some revered religious figure from the distant 
past but to a devout atheist who blazed a revolutionary trail in the 
latter half of the 20th century.



It is hard to say whether Che Guevara would have been amused or 
repulsed by the Vallegrande variety of veneration. "When I go to bed 
and when I wake up," says a 27-year-old local, "I first pray to God 
and then I pray to Che - and then everything is all right. Che's 
presence here is a positive force." In many houses, representations 
of Guevara are displayed next to those of Jesus Christ and the Virgin 
Mary; others feature altars built in his memory, and there is no 
dearth of stories about miracles that Che is believed to have facilitated.



The laundry room of a Vallegrande hospital has been turned into a 
shrine. This is where Guevara's mortal remains were displayed 40 
years ago on Tuesday, after his summary execution by US-trained 
Bolivian troops in nearby La Higuera. There is also a massive irony 
in the fact that he is thus honoured in a region where his attempt to 
foment revolt floundered chiefly on account of the absence of local support.



The final chapter in Guevara's brief life - he was not yet 40 when he 
breathed his last - was monumentally tragic. There was a variety of 
reasons why the lessons imbibed during the successful guerrilla war 
to overthrow the Batista dictatorship in Cuba could not be replicated 
in Bolivia. Among other factors, the Cuban campaign was waged under 
the leadership of Fidel Castro, who was  a well-known figure in his 
homeland, and his force, with one notable exception, consisted 
entirely of Cubans. An Argentinian doctor leading a troop of mainly 
Cuban fighters was unlikely to produce a comparable impact in Bolivia.



Che himself was an exemplary internationalist to whom boundaries and 
flags were of little significance. The first mission he undertook 
after deciding to leave Cuba was in the Congo, where he hoped to 
assist the forces purportedly intent on re-establishing the legacy 
of  Patrice Lumumba. Egypt's Gamal Abdel Nasser had warned Che 
against the risk of being perceived as a Tarzan figure, but that 
turned out to be the least of his problems: it was his disenchantment 
with the local leadership, particularly Laurent Kabila, that drove 
him out of Africa.



By then it was too late, in Guevara's view, for him to return to a 
useful role in Cuba. He did go back, but only in secret, with the aim 
of preparing his next mission. Che hoped eventually to devote his 
energies to establishing socialism in Argentina. He accepted Bolivia 
as an interim task, little knowing that his expedition to that 
country would be betrayed by the local communist party, which went 
back on a promise to provide assistance, possibly at Moscow's direction.



Orthodox communists in Latin America and elsewhere viewed Guevara as 
a reckless adventurer and spared little sympathy for his view that 
instead of waiting for the appropriate circumstances to arise, 
Marxists were duty-bound to contribute towards creating revolutionary 
conditions. A trenchant critique of Soviet trade policy at a 1965 
conference in Algiers had done little to endear him to the party 
faithful. Quite a few of them viewed his death in Bolivia as a 
convenient conclusion to a turbulent career.



However, by then it was too late for anyone to prevent Guevara from 
being transformed into an iconic harbinger of radical change. The 
image that immeasurably aided this process was snapped by Castro's 
official photographer, Alberto Korda, on March 5, 1960, during a 
funeral for 80 Cuban victims of an explosion aboard a French cargo 
ship loaded with ammunition. Korda noticed the head of Cuba's 
national bank gazing into the distance, his handsome features 
reflecting wrath, sorrow and righteous indignation coupled with 
steely determination.



The photograph remained unpublished for many years. By 1967, however, 
it had made its way to Europe. One of the people reputedly 
responsible for its dissemination was the French philosopher 
Jean-Paul Sartre, who had described Guevara as "the most complete man 
of his age". It was a young Irish graphic artist called Jim 
Fitzpatrick who transformed it into the familiar two-tone image that 
became ubiquitous after Che's martyrdom.



During the rebellion among western youth in 1968, this representation 
of the heroic guerrilla was borne aloft at almost every 
demonstration. Before long it was transformed into a universal symbol 
of resistance, visible from Palestine to Peru. Even so, few could 
have imagined at the time that its appeal would prove so enduring.



In some ways, the face of Che Guevara became a fashion statement, 
coopted  by the very forces of capitalist commerce that the 
revolutionary leader sought to destroy. Yet the image has always - 
even when reworked by Andy Warhol and borrowed by vodka or underwear 
manufacturers - subliminally reflected an undercurrent of rebellion, 
a  refusal to accept the status quo.



In recent years it has been suggested that in order to reaffirm his 
stature as a relentless warrior against the multifarious wrongs 
inflicted on society, Che ought to be rescued from the T-shirt in 
which he has been trapped. It may well be the case that a sizeable 
proportion of those who slip into Guevara-adorned T-shirts or 
star-encrusted berets are only vaguely aware of what he stood for. On 
the other hand, let's not forget that this method of pledging 
allegiance to Che's vision is favoured even by the likes of Hugo 
Chavez and Evo Morales, the elected presidents of Venezuela and Bolivia.



Yes, that's right: Bolivia, the land where Guevara offered the 
ultimate sacrifice, now boasts a presidential palace decorated with a 
coca-leaf version of Korda's iconic snapshot. Bolivia and the 
Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela are both in some ways a crucial part 
of Che's legacy, even though Chavez and Morales acquired powers 
through democratic means. This is how, in the 21st century, the 
spirit of Che is being kept alive.



Ideological foes are keen to equate Guevara with Osama bin Laden or 
with suicide bombers inspired by Islamist zeal, but such comparisons 
are odious not only because Che was fundamentally averse to the idea 
of taking innocent lives, but also because his idealistic vision of a 
hard-working, non-exploitative society bears no resemblance to the 
deleterious goal of a shariah-governed caliphate.



Three decades or so ago, I was impressed by biographer Andrew 
Sinclair's description of Che as someone who dedicated his "life and 
death to the poorest of men without help from God". More recently I 
encountered Guevara's response, in 1964, to a letter he received from 
Maria Rosario Guevara, a Spanish woman who wondered whether they 
might be cousins. "I don't think you and I are very closely related," 
he replied, "but if you are capable of trembling with indignation 
each time an injustice is committed in the world, we are comrades, 
and that is more important."



Now there's an emotion that deserves a resounding Amen from believers 
and non-believers alike.





Email: <mailto:mahir.worldview at gmail.com>mahir.worldview at gmail.com







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