Ernesto Guevara was born on June 14, 1927 in one of the largest cities in Argentina, Rosario. The famous prefix "Che" began to be used much later. With its help, while living in Cuba, the revolutionary emphasized his own Argentinean origin. “Che” is a reference to interjection. In Ernesto's homeland, it is a popular appeal.
Childhood and Interests
Guevara's father was an architect, his mother a girl from a family of planters. The family moved several times. Future Commander Che Guevara graduated from college in Cordoba, and received higher education in Buenos Aires. The young man decided to become a doctor. By profession, he was a surgeon and a dermatologist.
The early biography of Ernesto Che Guevara shows how extraordinary his personality was. The young man was interested not only in medicine, but also in the numerous humanities. His reading circle consisted of the works of the most famous writers: Verne, Hugo, Dumas, Cervantes, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy. The socialist views of the revolutionary were formed by the works of Marx, Engels, Bakunin, Lenin and other left-wing theorists.
A little-known fact that distinguished the biography of Ernesto Che Guevara - he knew French very well. In addition, he loved poetry, knew by heart the works of Verlaine, Baudelaire, Lorca. In Bolivia, where the revolutionary died, he carried a notebook with his favorite poems in a hiking backpack.
On the roads of America
Guevara’s first independent trip outside Argentina dates back to 1950, when he moonlighted on a cargo ship and visited British Guiana and Trinidad. The Argentine loved bikes and mopeds. The next trip covered Chile, Peru, Colombia and Venezuela. In the future, the partisan biography of Ernesto Che Guevara will be full of many such expeditions. In his early youth, he traveled to neighboring countries to get to know the world better and gain fresh impressions.
Guevara's partner in one of his travels was a doctor of biochemistry Alberto Granado. Together with him, an Argentine doctor visited the leper colony of Latin American countries. The couple also visited the ruins of several ancient Indian cities (the revolutionary was always keenly interested in the history of the indigenous population of the New World). When Ernesto traveled to Colombia, a civil war broke out there. He even visited Florida at random. A few years later, Che, as a symbol of the “export of revolutions”, will become one of the main opponents of the White House administration.
In Guatemala
In 1953, the future leader of the Cuban Revolution, Ernesto Che Guevara, during a break between two major trips to Latin America, defended his thesis on the study of allergies. Having become a surgeon, the young man decided to move to Venezuela and work there in a leper colony. However, on the road to Caracas, one of his fellow travelers convinced Guevara to go to Guatemala.
The traveler was in the Central American Republic on the eve of the invasion of the army of Nicaragua, organized by the CIA. The cities of Guatemala were bombed, and the socialist president, Jacobo Arbenz, gave up power. The new head of state, Castillo Armas, was pro-American and began repressing against left-wingers who lived in the country.
In Guatemala, the biography of Ernesto Che Guevara for the first time was directly related to the war. The Argentinean helped the defenders of the ousted regime transport weapons, participated in putting out fires during air raids. When the socialists suffered a final defeat, the name of Guevara was on the list of people who were waiting for repression. Ernesto managed to take refuge in the embassy of his native Argentina, where he was under diplomatic protection. From there he moved to Mexico City in September 1954.
Introducing Cuban Revolutionaries
In the capital of Mexico, Guevara tried to get a job as a journalist. He wrote a trial article about the Guatemalan events, but the matter did not go further. For several months, the Argentine worked as a photographer. Then he was a watchman in the building of a book publishing house. In the summer of 1955, Ernesto Che Guevara, whose personal life was lit up by a joyful event, married. In Mexico City, the bride Ilda Gadea came to him from his homeland. Random earnings barely helped the emigrant make ends meet. Finally, Ernesto entered the city hospital by competition, where he began to work in the allergy department.
In June 1955, two young men came to see Guevara's doctor. These were Cuban revolutionaries who were trying to overthrow the dictator Batista in their native island. Two years before, opponents of the old regime attacked the barracks of Moncada, after which they were tried and imprisoned. An amnesty was declared the day before, and the revolutionaries began to flock to Mexico City. During his ordeal in Latin America, Ernesto met many Cuban socialists. One of his old friends and came to see him, offering to participate in the upcoming military expedition to the Caribbean island.
A few days later, the Argentinean first met with Raul Castro. Even then, the doctor firmly decided to give his consent to participate in the raid. In July 1955, Raul's older brother arrived in Mexico from the United States. Fidel Castro and Ernesto Che Guevara became the protagonists of the impending revolution. Their first meeting took place at one of the safe houses of the Cubans. The next day, Guevara became a member of the expedition as a doctor. Recalling that period, Fidel Castro later admitted that Che was much better than Cuban comrades versed in the theoretical and ideological issues of the revolution.
Guerrilla warfare
In preparing for their departure for Cuba, members of the July 26 Movement (the so-called organization led by Fidel Castro) faced many difficulties. A provocateur penetrated the ranks of the revolutionaries, who informed the authorities about the suspicious activities of foreigners. In the summer of 1956, Mexican police raided, after which conspirators, including Fidel Castro and Ernesto Che Guevara, were arrested. For opponents of the Batista regime, prominent public and cultural figures began to intervene. As a result, the revolutionaries were released. Guevara spent more than the rest of his comrades under arrest (57 days), since he was charged with illegal border crossing.
Finally, the expeditionary force left Mexico and went to Cuba by ship. Departure took place on November 25, 1956. Ahead was a months-long guerrilla war. The arrival of Castro's supporters on the island was marred by a shipwreck. The detachment, consisting of 82 men, was in the mangroves. He was attacked by government aircraft. Half of the expedition died under shelling, another two dozen people were captured. Finally, the revolutionaries took refuge in the mountains of the Sierra Maestra. Provincial peasants supported the partisans, gave them shelter and food. Other safe shelters are caves and impassable passes.
At the beginning of the new 1957, Batista's opponents won their first victory, killing five government soldiers. Soon, some members of the squad fell ill with malaria. Among them was Ernesto Che Guevara. Guerrilla warfare forced to get used to mortal danger. Every day, fighters faced another fatal threat. Che struggled with an insidious disease, resting in the huts of peasants. Comrades often saw him sitting with a notebook or another book. Guevara's diary later formed the basis of his own recollections of guerrilla warfare, published after the victory of the revolution.
By the end of 1957, the rebels already controlled the Sierra Maestra Mountains. New volunteers from among the local residents, dissatisfied with the Batista regime, joined the detachment. Then Fidel made Ernesto major (commandant). Che Guevara began to command a separate column, consisting of 75 people. Underground members enjoyed support abroad. American journalists penetrated the mountains, reporting on the July 26 Movement in the United States.
Comandante not only led the fighting, but also conducted propaganda activities. Ernesto Che Guevara became the editor-in-chief of the newspaper “Free Cuba”. Its first numbers were written by hand, then the rebels managed to get a hectograph.
Victory over Batista
In the spring of 1958, a new stage in the partisan war began. Supporters of Castro began to leave the mountains and act in the valleys. In the summer, a stable connection was established with the Cuban Communists in the cities where strikes began to arise. The Che Guevara squad was responsible for the offensive in the province of Las Villas. Having traveled a length of 600 kilometers, in October this army reached the Escambray massif and opened a new front. For Batista, the situation was getting worse - the US authorities refused to supply him with weapons.
In Las Villas, where the rebel power was finally established, a law was published on the implementation of agrarian reform - the liquidation of the estates of the landlords. The policy of scrapping old patriarchal customs in the countryside attracted more and more peasants to the ranks of revolutionaries. The initiator of the popular reform was Ernesto Che Guevara. He spent years of his life working on the theoretical works of the socialists, and now he has been honing his oratory, convincing ordinary citizens of Cuba of the correctness of the path suggested by the members of the July 26 Movement.
The last and decisive battles was the battle for Santa Clara. It began on December 28 and ended with the victory of the rebels on January 1, 1959. A few hours after the surrender of the garrison, Batista left Cuba and spent the rest of his life in forced emigration. The battles for Santa Clara were led directly by Che Guevara. On January 2, his troops entered Havana, where the revolutionaries awaited a triumphant population.
New life
After Batista’s defeat, newspapers around the world asked who Che Guevara was, what this rebel leader was famous for, and what was his political future. In February 1959, the government of Fidel Castro proclaimed him a citizen of Cuba. Then Guevara began to use the famous prefix "Che" in his signatures, with which he went down in history.
Under the new government, yesterday's rebel served as president of the National Bank (1959 - 1961) and Minister of Industry (1961 - 1965). In the first summer after the victory of the revolution, he conducted an entire world tour as an official, during which he visited Egypt, Sudan, India, Pakistan, Ceylon, Indonesia, Burma, Japan, Morocco, Spain and Yugoslavia. In the same June 1959, the commandant married for the second time. Aleida March, a member of the July 26 Movement, became his wife. Ernesto Che Guevara’s children (Aleida, Camilo, Celia, Ernesto) were born in marriage with this woman (except the eldest daughter of Ilda).
State activity
In the spring of 1961, the American leadership, which had finally quarreled with Castro, began an operation in the Bay of Pigs. Enemy landing landed on Liberty Island. Until the end of the operation, Che Guevara led troops in one of the provinces of Cuba. The American plan failed, and socialist power in Havana remained.
In the fall, Che Guevara visited the GDR, Czechoslovakia and the USSR. In the Soviet Union, his delegation signed an agreement on the supply of Cuban sugar. Moscow also promised Liberty Island financial and technical assistance. Ernesto Che Guevara, interesting facts about which could make a separate book, participated in a festive parade dedicated to the next anniversary of the October Revolution. A Cuban guest stood on the podium of the mausoleum next to Nikita Khrushchev and other members of the Politburo. In the future, Guevara was several times in the Soviet Union.
As a minister, Che seriously revised his attitude to the governments of the socialist countries. He was dissatisfied with the fact that large communist states (primarily the USSR and China) established their stringent terms of trade with subsidized small partners, such as Cuba.
In 1965, during a visit to Algeria, Guevara made a famous speech in which he criticized Moscow and Beijing for the enslaving attitude to fraternal countries. This episode once again showed who Che Guevara was, what he became famous for and what kind of reputation this revolutionary had. He did not sacrifice his own principles, even if he had to go into conflict with the allies. Another reason for the commander’s discontent was the reluctance of the socialist camp to actively intervene in the new regional revolutions.
Expedition to Africa
In the spring of 1965, Che Guevara found himself in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. This Central African country was undergoing a political crisis, and partisans were working in its jungle, advocating the establishment of socialism in the homeland. Comandante arrived in Congo along with a hundred more Cubans. He helped organize the underground, shared with them his own experience gained during the war with Batista.
Although Che Guevara put all his strength into a new adventure, new failures awaited him at every turn. The rebels suffered several defeats, and Cuban relations with the leader of the African comrades Kabila did not work out from the very beginning. After several months of bloodshed, the Congo authorities, who were opposed by the socialists, made some compromises and resolved the conflict. Another blow to the rebels was Tanzania's refusal to provide them with rear bases. In November 1965, Che Guevara left the Congo, never reaching the goals set for the revolution.
Future plans
A stay in Africa cost Che another malaria disease. In addition, asthma attacks were aggravated, from which he suffered from early childhood. The first half of 1966, the commandant spent secretly in Czechoslovakia, where he was treated in one of the sanatoriums of Czechoslovakia. Resting from war, the Latin American continued to work on planning new revolutions around the world. His statement about the need to create a “multitude of Vietnam,” where at that time there was a conflict between the two main world political systems, gained wide popularity.
In the summer of 1966, the commande returned to Cuba and led preparations for the partisan campaign in Bolivia. As it turned out, this war was the last for him. In March 1967, Bolivian President Barrientos was horrified to learn about the action in his country of partisans abandoned in the jungle from socialist Cuba.
To get rid of the "red threat", the politician turned to Washington for help. In the White House, it was decided to engage special units of the CIA against the Che detachment. Soon, leaflets scattered from the air began to appear over provincial villages in the vicinity of which guerrillas operated, reporting large rewards for the killing of the Cuban revolutionary.
Death
In total, Che Guevara spent 11 months in Bolivia. All this time he kept notes, which after his death were published in a separate book. Gradually, the Bolivian authorities began to crowd out the rebels. Two detachments were destroyed, after which the commandant remained almost completely isolated. On October 8, 1967, he, along with several comrades, was surrounded. Two rebels were killed. Many were injured, including Ernesto Che Guevara. How the revolutionary died, it became known thanks to the recollections of several eyewitnesses.
Guevara, along with his comrades, was escorted to the village of La Iguera, where prisoners found a place in a small adobe building, which was a local school. Podpolshchikov was captured by a Bolivian detachment, which on the eve had completed training organized by military advisers sent by the CIA. Che refused to answer officers' questions, talked only with the soldiers, and from time to time asked for a smoke.
On the morning of October 9, an order came to the village from the Bolivian capital to execute the Cuban revolutionary. On the same day he was shot. The body was transported to a nearby town, where the body of Guevara was put on display by local residents and journalists. Hands were amputated in order to officially confirm the death of the rebel using fingerprints. The remains were buried in a secret mass grave.
The burial was discovered in 1997 thanks to the efforts of American journalists. Then the remains of Che and several of his comrades were transferred to Cuba. There they were buried with honors. The mausoleum where Ernesto Che Guevara is buried is located in Santa Clara, the city in which the commandant won his main victory in 1959.