[NYTr] Che Still Inspires, 4 Decades after Death

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

AFP via Google - Oct 4, 2007
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5jcDDF8NJ8eoau2ZlMLwhvs1J0Vlg

Che Guevara still inspires, four decades after death

HAVANA (AFP) — Forty years after the death of Ernesto "Che" Guevara,
the turbulent life of Cuba's revolutionary hero continues to inspire
films and books, while his stoic image and self-sacrifice have become
iconic for leftists worldwide.

His legacy remains as vivid today in communist-ruled Cuba as it was,
with schoolchildren still instructed to pledge each morning that:
"Pioneers for communism, we will be like Che."

A 1960 Alberto Korda photograph of a defiant-looking Guevara, his long,
dark hair flying from beneath a beret, is considered one of the best
known photos in the world and a classic image of the 20th century.

On October 8, 1967, the Bolivian army and two Cuban-American CIA agents
captured Che in the village of La Higuera, Bolivia, where he had been
leading a clutch of rebels who survived clashes, hunger and illness.

Che was taken to an abandoned school and the following afternoon he was
summarily executed by Bolivian sergeant Mario Teran. He was 39.

The Argentine-born Cuban hero will be given anniversary honors in the
small city of Santa Clara, Cuba where he led a key battle of the Cuban
Revolution and where a mausoleum has held his remains since 1997.

In Cuba, ailing leader Fidel Castro, 81, was not expected to be seen at
the commemorations of Che's death. Interim president Raul Castro,
leading Cuba since his brother's intestinal surgery over a year ago,
and who was said not to be as close to Che, could fill in for Fidel.

In Bolivia, a ceremony is also planned with marchers expected to trudge
through the night and light a tribute flame for Che in La Higuera on
October 7. In neighboring Villagrande, where his remains were found in
1997, a political-themed ceremony is set for October 8.

Evo Morales, the Andean nation's first ethnic indigenous president and
a close ally of Fidel Castro, is effusive in his praise for the
Argentine-born doctor by training, free spirit and socialist
inspiration.

In President Hugo Chavez's Venezuela and Daniel Ortega's Nicaragua,
Che's image is also somewhat of an unofficial icon.

After years of waning attention, Che's revolutionary mythology was
aggressively revived in 1997 with the discovery of his remains amid
some controversy, and then their dispatch to Cuba -- in the midst of
severe economic hardship -- by Fidel Castro's government.

The remains were paraded amid great fanfare through Havana streets
before being interred in Santa Clara with Fidel Castro looking on.

Some critical analysts said Cuba used the events to distract from
economic problems at home. Other more sympathetic observers noted that
whatever the motivating factors or timing, the communist government
often spotlights Che's symbolic legacy as self-sacrificing to appeal to
Cubans to endure hardship.

The far left in 1960s Europe led the world in latching onto Che
internationally. Now that famous Korda image adorns countless T-shirts
and backpacks worn by young people and sports stars.

Gandhi he was not -- Guevara was a declared supporter of political
violence.

After studying medicine in his home country, Che hooked up with Fidel
and Raul Castro in Mexico before joining the bearded guerrillas who
toppled US-backed leader Fulgencio Batista and took power in Havana in
January 1959.

For six months, Che supervised the repression of
counter-revolutionaries, and went on to head the Cuban Central Bank and
the Industry Ministry before opting to head overseas again to spread
the fight, first in Congo in 1965 (now the Democratic Republic of
Congo), and then in Bolivia.

Guevara helped steer revolutionary Cuba into Moscow's orbit but he
later broke with the Soviet notion of peaceful coexistence with the
West in favor of seeking power militarily, closer to Maoism.

Che Guevara had a daughter with a Peruvian revolutionary, both of whom
are dead. He had four children with his Cuban wife Aleida March:
Aleida, Camilo, Celia and Ernesto, all of whom are still alive. 

© 2007 AFP. All rights reserved