Was there a split between Che Guevara and Fidel Castro?
A rumor persists to this day that Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara and Fidel Castro had some sort of falling out near the end of Che’s life that caused him to leave Cuba and prompted Fidel to withhold support for the guerrilla effort Che lead in Bolivia. But with a little investigation, we find that there is no evidence whatsoever to support this rumor, which, it should be noted, originated with Felix Rodriguez, a wealthy Cuban-born CIA assassin who ordered Che’s murder.
![Che and Fidel Che and Fidel in Cuba.](http://web.archive.org./web/20100315171723im_/http://www.argentour.com/images/che_guevara_fidel_castro.jpg)
Che and Fidel in Cuba.
And what is the supposed source of major disagreement between Che and Fidel? Some have suggested that Che was critical of the USSR. A review of Fidel Castro’s speeches in the 1960’s, in which he criticized the USSR several times, easily dispels that myth. Still others have claimed that Che took the side of China while Fidel took the side of the USSR in the Sino-Soviet Split. This too, is easily disproven.
Che wrote that:
“When we analyze the lonely situation of the Vietnamese people, we are overcome by anguish at this illogical moment of humanity.
“U.S. imperialism is guilty of aggression — its crimes are enormous and cover the whole world. We already know all that, gentlemen! But this guilt also applies to those who, when the time came for a definition, hesitated to make Vietnam an inviolable part of the socialist world; running, of course, the risks of a war on a global scale-but also forcing a decision upon imperialism. And the guilt also applies to those who maintain a war of abuse and snares — started quite some time ago by the representatives of the two greatest powers of the socialist camp.”[1]
While, around the same time Fidel wrote in a similar vein that:
“Without a doubt, the South Vietnamese people and the people of North Vietnam are suffering all this and suffering it in their own flesh, because there it is men and women who die, in the south and in the north, victims of the shrapnel and Yankee bombings. They do not have the slightest hesitancy in declaring that they intend to continue to carry all that out because not even the attacks against North Vietnam have resulted in overcoming the divisions in the bosom of the socialist family.
“And who can doubt that this division is encouraging the imperialists? Who can doubt that a united front against the imperialist enemy would have made them hesitate–would have made them think a little more carefully before launching their adventurist attacks and their increasingly more brazen intervention in that part of the world?”[2]
For his part, Rodriguez claimed in his autobiography that upon capture, Che “was bitter over the Cuban dictator’s lack of support for the Bolivian incursion.” But only a fool would believe the words of Che’s enemy and murderer (who, incidentally, wears his watch to this day like a trophy). More reliable sources suggest that Che considered Rodriguez a traitor and refused to speak to him. But that hasn’t stopped the capitalist press from keeping the claim alive.
As Fidel put it in a June 1987 television interview with Italian journalist Gianni Mina:
“What could we have done? Sent a battalion, a company, a regular army? The laws of guerrilla warfare are different; everything depends on what the guerrilla unit itself does.”[3]
Che’s plan to wage guerrilla war in Bolivia to initiate a socialist revolution to overthrow the dictatorship was fully supported by Cuba. Cuba provided training grounds, fighters, weapons, passports and more to the effort.
We need not pretend Che and Fidel agreed on every single question to know that there was no major disagreement that lead to abandonment or a suicidal departure.
According to the survivors of the guerrilla force he led and the pages of his personal diary, which has since been published, Che never once suggested that he felt betrayed or abandoned by Cuba or Fidel. In his farewell letter Che wrote to Fidel, “I am also proud of having followed you without hesitation, of having identified with your way of thinking and of seeing and appraising dangers and principles.”
1. Guevara, Ernesto, Che. “Message to the Tricontinental.”
2. Castro, Fidel. “Live speech from the steps of Havana University on the occasion of the anniversary of the attack on the Presidential Palace (13 March 1965).”
3. Mini, Gianni. “An Encounter With Fidel.”
Is Fidel Castro one of the richest men in the world?
In 2005, American business and financial magazine Forbes listed Castro among the world’s richest people, with an estimated net worth of $550 million. The estimates claimed that the Cuban leader’s personal wealth was nearly double that of Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II, despite evidence from diplomats and businessmen that the Cuban leader’s personal life was notably austere. Forbes later increased the estimates to $900 million, adding rumors of large cash stashes in Switzerland. The magazine offered no proof at all of this information.
Of course it was all entirely bogus – the bunk methodology they used was based on the lie that Fidel Castro owns everything in the entire country of Cuba. Even in their article they admitted their “estimate” was “more art than science” — or in other words, bullshit.
Fidel’s response?
“PRESIDENT Fidel Castro has challenged and called on Bush, the CIA, the 33 U.S. intelligence agencies, the thousands of banks in the world and the ‘servants’ of Forbes magazine, which claims that Fidel has a fortune of $900 million, to prove that he has even one dollar in an overseas account.
“In exchange for just one shred of evidence, he said that he would offer them everything that they have tried and failed to do over almost half a century, during which time they have tried to destroy the Revolution and assassinate him via hundreds of conspiracies. ‘I’m giving you everything you’ve tried,’ he said, ‘and don’t come with your foolishness and wayside stories. Show me an account, of just one dollar,’ he emphasized.
“If they can prove that I have one single dollar, I will resign from all my responsibilities and the duties I am carrying out; they won’t need any more plans or transitions, if they can prove that I have one single dollar,” the revolutionary leader said emphatically.” – Granma newspaper
Later:
“Bush has not uttered a word and neither have the State Department, Congress or the CIA. Only the Nuevo Herald, a Miami newspaper, has tried to defend [the Forbes article] at the request of the Cuban-American mafia [the handful of rich white Cubans who left the country after the revolution because they didn’t want to be equal with the rest of the people]. This silence by the US Administration demonstrates the extent of its weakness.” – Radio Habana
Even the Miami Herald, a rightwing newspaper with ties to the Cuban-American mafia that is historically hostile to the Cuban Revolution admits that Fidel Castro lives in about the same conditions as everyone else in Cuba. The newspaper has previously printed articles in which it acknowledges that “The houses of Fidel and Raúl are large but simply appointed…. The living room of [Fidel’s] house is described by visitors as furnished with simple wood and leather sofas and chairs and Cuban handicrafts…. The only luxury visible to visitors is a big-screen television….”
Cuban revolutionary Juan Almeida has died
Juan Almeida Bosque, a leader of the Cuban Revolution that toppled the bloody, U.S.-backed dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista, has died at age 82.
Almeida, who was born in a poor neighborhood of Havana, Cuba, left school at age 11 to begin work in construction.
In 1952, he joined Fidel Castro and a group of young Cubans in an attack on the Moncada Military Barracks in Santiago de Cuba which was aimed at securing arms for a popular uprising against the Batista dictatorship. Many of the participants in the failed incursion were tortured and murdered. Almeida, along with Fidel Castro, Raul Castro and others, were able to escape temporarily before being apprehended.
![Juan Almeida with Fidel and Raul Juan Almedia with Fidel and Raul Castro during the revolutionary war.](http://web.archive.org./web/20100315171723im_/http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKalmeida3.jpg)
Juan Almedia with Fidel and Raul Castro during the revolutionary war.
Almeida and the other captured rebels were imprisoned on the Isle of Pines. They were freed after nearly two years in prison as a result of popular pressure.
The rebels soon after went to Mexico where they formed a guerrilla nucleus and began training for a war to overthrow Batista.
In 1956, 82 rebels set out for Cuba on a rickety yacht. Their landing, delayed and disrupted, was a disaster. Not long after touching ground, all but 16 of the guerrillas had been killed by government forces.
![Juan Almeida with Ernesto Che Guevara Juan Almeida with Ernesto Che Guevara](http://web.archive.org./web/20100315171723im_/http://www.elhabanero.cubasi.cu/2006/diciembre/nro1780_dic06/cheyalmeida.jpg)
Juan Almeida with Ernesto 'Che' Guevara
Almeida led a small group that included Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara, the Argentine-born revolutionary who joined the Cuban revolutionaries, out into the jungle during that bleak early period.
The guerrillas were eventually able to regroup. They begun to win battles, recruit new members and supporters, establish new ties and advance.
Almeida, a crack shot, quickly became a comandante, the highest rank in the rebel army. He led one of the few guerrilla fronts during the revolutionary war.
On January 1, 1959, “Batista the Butcher” fled Cuba, realizing his overthrow was imminent. Immediately afterward, the victory of the Cuban Revolution was secured by an island-wide general strike.
The Revolution opened the doorway to equality for Almeida and other Black Cubans who previously suffered under conditions of degradation and discrimination.
Almeida held a number of positions in the revolutionary government. He was a General in the Revolutionary Armed Forces, a member of the Central Committee of the Cuban Communist Party, president of the Association of Combatants of the Revolution and Vice-President of the Cuban Council of State.
![Juan Almeida Juan Almeida.](http://web.archive.org./web/20100315171723im_/http://beta.thehindu.com/multimedia/dynamic/00004/IN12_ALMEIDA_BOSQUE_4135e.jpg)
Juan Almeida.
At the time of his death, Almeida was one of only three living Cubans holding the title Commander of the Revolution.
Almeida was also an artist and writer, having written more than 300 songs and several books on Cuban History.
Thousands of Cubans showed up at memorials across the country to bid farewell to Almeida. According to his wishes, his body is being interred at the Mausoleum of the Mario Muñoz Monroy Third Eastern Front, which he led.
The Baader-Meinhof Complex: A deficient portrait of the RAF
The Baader Meinhof Complex, a German film directed by Uli Edel, attempts to tell the story of the RAF (Red Army Faction or Red Army Fraction depending on the translation), a group describing itself as an “urban guerrilla” that operated in Germany.
The title of the film alone betrays its approach to the subject. The group depicted called itself the RAF. It was the German press that labeled the group the “Baader-Meinhof Gang” in an attempt to portray it as a non-political criminal outfit.
The founders of the RAF saw themselves as a section of an international movement actively fighting against imperialism. They didn’t expect to take power or have a strategy for doing so. They viewed their actions as attacks which would draw some of the attention of the imperialists away from the forces fighting against their domination in places like Indochina and Latin America.
There is much to be criticized in the RAF’s politics and actions, but The Baader-Meinhof Complex doesn’t give a complete enough picture of them to serve as the basis for any real discussion.
While a few references are lightly interspersed throughout the film, no real focus is given to the brutal imperialist war lead by the U.S. in Viet Nam, the occupation of key positions in the German government by former Nazis, the export of guns to bloody African dictatorships by the German imperialists, the repressive actions of the west German state against dissidents or the outright lies meted out by the capitalist media – all of which served as the background for the formation of the RAF.
The RAF arose in a “democratic” west Germany governed by a “Grand Coalition” of the Social Democratic Party and Christian Democratic Union with a former Nazi at its helm, in which the Communist Party was outlawed, radicals were gunned down in the streets and individuals with “unacceptable politics” were blacklisted from jobs. This is not brought out in the film.
The closest thing to an explanation of the RAF’s motives and politics The Baader Meinhof Complex offers are snippets of political statements written by Ulrike Meinhof, a left wing journalist and original member of the group, and a few pieces of dialogue from a police commissioner who states that terrorism can only be prevented by the elimination of poverty in the Third World.
While important facts and events are ignored, too much attention is given to episodes of violence and infighting.
Large segments of the two-and-a-half-hour film are dedicated to the RAF’s bombing campaigns and dramatic gun battles between the group’s members and police in pursuit. Predictably, the police stories that the RAF members always shot first, and without provocation are presented as unchallenged fact.
Little is done to show how the group was able to continually draw members into its ranks and gain the sympathy of a large number of Germans. Instead, excessive focus is given to arguments and break downs among the group and its members. Bitter disputes are shown in full detail.
In the latter part of the film, RAF members Ulrike Meinhof, Andreas Baader, Gudrun Ensslin and Jan-Carl Raspe are shown having killed themselves while in prison. In reality, the circumstances of their deaths are still very much in question.
Ulrike Meinhof is shown having committed suicide after becoming ostracized by the rest of the RAF prisoners. But this tale of her separation from the others is simply a theory cooked up without any concrete proof. Indeed, many continue to believe she was killed by the German state, and for good reason.
The films also shows defense attorneys smuggling weapons into the prison for Baader, Ensslin and Raspe to use on themselves if they so chose. When the three prisoners were found dead in their cells, this “premeditated suicide” explanation is what was provided by German officials. But later tests showed that it would have been impossible for Baader to have shot himself at the angle that would have produced the fatal wound at the base of his neck. On top of this, the left-handed Baader had powder burns on his right hand while Raspe had no powder burns at all. In spite of all this, and more, the official story is never questioned.
A film that purports to depict historical events must be held to a high standard. At the very least, it should stick to the known facts. Instead, The Baader Meinhof Complex presents a flawed picture in a quest to represent the RAF as nothing more than a band of hopeless romantics with guns completely isolated from reality.
The acting in The Baader Meinhof Complex is superb, but it’s not enough to rescue the film from its own inadequacies. The same can be said of the film’s fine cinematography.
In their attempt to create a historical “action film” acceptable in modern capitalist society, the creators of The Baader Meinhof Complex produced a film that falls flat.
자본가들은 모든 노동자들을 비정규직이기를 바란다
(The English version of this entry can be found here).
전국경제인연합회(The Federation of Korean Industries)는 다른 자본가들과 힘을 합쳤고 한국에 있는 모든 노동자들이 비정규직으로 되기를 요구하고 있다.
연합회는 노동자들이 세계경제위기로 인해 가장 큰 고통을 받고 있음에도 불구하고 그들을 비난한다. 연합회는 “요즘 문제들은 노동자들이 유연하게 대처하지 못하기 때문이라고 주장합니다.
평균적으로, 비정규직 노동자들은 남한에서 일하는 보통 노동자들의 60% 임금밖에 받지 못한다.
남한의 총 노동인구 33% 정도인 약 5,400,000명의 노동자들은 현재 “비정규직” 노동자이다.그 중 절반이 한 시간에 4,000원 정도의 최저 임금을 받는다.
세계 경제 위기가 지속되면서 자본가는 노동 계층에게 압박을 주고 있다. 이러한 압박으로부터 우리를 보호하기 위해서 우리는 조직화하여 싸워야 한다. 효과적으로 이 싸움을 해나가기 위해 힘을 모아야 한다. 우리는 이러한 문제들을 만들어내는 자본주의 시스템을 폐지할 때까지 공격을 계속해 나가야 한다.
노동자(쌍용 자동차) 중 일부는 이미 싸움을 시작했다. 그들은 파업을 하고 있고 그들의 일터를 장악하고 있다 . 이제 우리가 함께 해야 한다. 우리는 함께해 이길 것이다.
Everlasting Moments: A film in the service of the status quo
Rather than capturing the essence of the tumultuous times which it portrays, Everlasting Moments, a Swedish film directed by Jan Troell, is dull, dry and drawn out.
Based in early 20th century Sweden, the film follows the working class Larsson family through its ups and downs.
Maria Heiskanen plays Maria Larsson, a housekeeper and mother of seven broken down by her work, her abusive, lying, alcoholic husband Sigge (Mikael Persbrandt) and the banality of domestic servitude.
The Larsson family is plagued with contradiction. Sigge is a loving and carefree one minute and violent and demanding the next. He’s saddened immensely by his addiction to alcohol, but yet still unable to shake it. Religion and social pressures keep Maria trapped in this seemingly endless cycle, even when she wants to escape.
Impoverished and concerned with the well being of her family, Maria tries to sell a camera she won in a lottery to a Danish photographer (Jesper Christensen). But when the photographer sees the one picture Maria has taken, he urges Maria to keep the camera and shoot more, even giving her the materials she needs.
Maria has an on and off attraction with the camera and the photographer (although she never gives in to the temptation to act on it). At one point, she sets up a makeshift studio in her undersized apartment and becomes a popular photographer, drawing the contempt of Sigge, whose ego is bruised by her independence.
In some of the best scenes of the film, Maria uses her camera to help one mother accept the death of a daughter and another to see the beauty within her Down’s syndrome stricken child.
For his part, Sigge becomes swept up in the emerging labor movement. A hard working dockhand, he becomes convinced of the need for socialist revolution through a combination of life experiences and conversations with fellow workers. But it is not his only focus. When Sigge gets involved in a militant strike on the docks and is falsely accused of carrying out an explosive attack in support of it, he is forced to reveal that he was having sex with a barmaid to prove his innocence.
Not enough attention is given to the rising tide of working class militancy of the period. Such a long film could have easily spent more than the few moments it did on the suicide of Sigge’s best friend, an active anarchist who hung himself out of despair. And what’s worse, after that event we don’t hear any mention of the proletarian struggle at all.
Eventually, the Larssons move to an old house in the country and Sigge opens his own transportation business that quickly grows. Maria is shown taking the first and last picture of herself. She died soon after, we’re told, content of the life she’d lived.
Everlasting Moments does a good enough job of depicting the life of the Larsson family, and the acting is strong and believable. But in the end, the film serves the status quo with its moral that everything will eventually work out if you just hang in and bear whatever misery you are faced with.
Because of that, the film looses whatever worth it may have otherwise had. After all, the point is not simply to observe the world as it is, but to change it
The Goods fails to deliver
The involvement of a plethora of well known comedians isn’t enough to save The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard, a comedy directed by Neal Brennan.
The Goods revolves around a failing used car lot in California owned by an aging salesman played by James Brolin. The lot is staffed by a group of unsuccessful salespeople played by Tony Hale, Charles Napier, Ken Jeong and Jonathan Sadowski.
While Jeremy Piven seems like the perfect choice to portray Don Ready, the fast-talking traveling car salesman called in to turn things around, he comes up very short on laughs.
His cohorts, played by David Koechner, Kathryn Hahn and Ving Rhames, don’t fare any better.
It’s not that Piven and company don’t try. The film is littered from beginning to end with punch lines and gags. The problem is that they just aren’t funny.
Most of the “jokes” come at the expense of workers, women and homosexuals.
In what has to be the most difficult to watch scene, the staff of the car lot is provoked by a nationalist “inspirational speech” and anti-Japanese slurs to carry out a mob attack against an Asian-American salesman. After the attack comes to an end, the perpetrators admit to committing a hate crime but plan to defend themselves with the false claim that the Asian-American came at them with a samurai sword. For his part, the victim of the attack (Jeong) agrees to dismiss the whole thing, saying, “Actually, I’m Korean.”
A cameo appearance by Will Farrell and a boy band spoof by Ed Helms add little.
Similarly, the obligatory love interest that arises between Ready and the daughter of the car lot’s owner (played by Jordana Spiro) fails to rescue the film in any way.
Watching The Goods, one gets the feeling that the writers may have intended the film’s more over-the-top aspects to serve as some form of social commentary. If that is indeed the case, they definitely missed the mark.
But even if, on the other hand, their goal was simply to illicit a few cheap laughs, they still fell short.
The Goods could have been something much more. There was no lack of comedic talent and the used car business, marked as it is by fierce competition, predation and deception, is ripe for parody. Unfortunately, The Goods simply doesn’t deliver.
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