BIGpedia - Che Guevara - Encyclopedia and Dictionary Online

Ernesto Rafael Guevara de la Serna (May 14, 1928—October 9, 1967) Argentine-born Marxist revolutionary and Cuban guerrilla leader; usually referred to as "Che" Guevara.

Table of contents

1 Sourced

2 Attributed

2.1 Imperialism
2.2 Other
2.3 Needs Translation

3 See also

Sourced

In a revolution, one triumphs or dies.

Source: farewell letter to Fidel Castro; dated April 1, 1965 [1]

...

"The great lesson of the guerrillas' invincibility is taking hold among the masses of the dispossessed. The galvanization of the national spirit; the preparation for more difficult tasks, for resistance to more violent repression. Hate as a factor in the struggle, intransigent hatred for the enemy that takes one beyond the natural limitations of a human being and converts one into an effective, violent, selective, cold, killing machine. Our soldiers must be like that; a people without hate cannot triumph over a brutal enemy."

Source: message to the Tricontinental ; 1967 [2]

Attributed

Imperialism

We must bear in mind that imperialism is a world system, the last stage of capitalism-and it must be defeated in a world confrontation. The strategic end of this struggle should be the destruction of imperialism. Our share, the responsibility of the exploited and underdeveloped of the world, is to eliminate the foundations of imperialism: our oppressed nations, from where they extract capital, raw materials, technicians, and cheap labor, and to which they export new capital-instruments of domination-arms and all kinds of articles, thus submerging us in an absolute dependence.

While envisaging the destruction of imperialism, it is necessary to identify its head, which is no other than the United States of America.

Our every action is a battle cry against imperialism, and a battle hymn for the people's unity against the great enemy of mankind: the United States of America. Wherever death may surprise us, let it be welcome, provided that this, our battle cry, may have reached some receptive ear, that another hand may be extended to wield our weapons, and that other men be ready to intone our funeral dirge with the staccato singing of the machine guns and new battle cries of war and victory.

As long as imperialism exists, it will, by definition, exert its domination over other countries. Today that domination is called neocolonialism.

We should like to see this Assembly (UN) shake itself out of complacency and move forward. We should like to see the committees begin their work and not stop at the first confrontation. Imperialism wishes to convert this meeting into a pointless oratorical tournament, instead of solving the grave problems of the world. We must prevent their doing so. This Assembly should not be remembered in the future only by the number 19, which identifies it. Our efforts are directed to prevent that.

Imperialism has been defeated in many partial battles. But it remains a considerable force in the world, and we cannot expect its final defeat save through effort and sacrifice on the part of all of us.

There are no boundaries in this struggle to the death. We cannot be indifferent to what happens anywhere in the world, for a victory by any country over imperialism is our victory; just as any country's defeat is a defeat for all of us.

Other

"Hatred as an element of struggle; unbending hatred for the enemy, which pushes a human being beyond his natural limitations, making him into an effective, violent, selective, and cold-blooded killing machine. This is what our soldiers must become …"

"I know you've come to kill me. Shoot, coward, you're only going to kill a man." [Just before he was shot], see: Famous last words

Regarding the IMF : "If it is an element of liberation for Latin America, I believe that it should have demonstrated that. Until now, I have not been aware of any such demonstration. The IMF performs an enitrely different function: precisely that of ensuring that capital based outside of Latin America controls all of Latin America." -- November 3, 1959 -- Interview for Radio Rivadavia of Argentina

Regarding the IMF : "The interests of the IMF respresent the big international interests that today seem to be established and concentrated in Wall Street." -- November 3, 1959 -- Interview for Radio Rivadavia of Argentina

If you tremble indignation at every injustice, then you are a comrade of mine.

Many will call me an adventurer -- and that I am, only one of a different sort: one of those who risks his skin to prove his platitudes.

Silence is argument carried out by other means.

The revolution is not an apple that falls when it is ripe. You have to make it fall.

Whenever death may surprise us, let it be welcome if our battle cry has reached even one receptive ear and another hand reaches out to take up our arms.

We cannot be sure of having something to live for unless we are willing to die for it.

Hasta la victoria siempre! (Until victory always -- Struggle until victory forever!)

Words that do not match deeds are unimportant.

Cruel leaders are replaced only to have new leaders turn cruel!

At the risk of seeming ridiculous, let me say that the true revolutionary is guided by a great feeling of love. It is impossible to think of a genuine revolutionary lacking this quality.

We must carry the war into every corner the enemy happens to carry it: to his home, to his centers of entertainment; a total war. It is necessary to prevent him from having a moment of peace, a quiet moment outside his barracks or even inside; we must attack him wherever he may be, make him feel like a cornered beast wherever he may move. - Ernesto "Che" Guevara Why does the guerrilla fighter fight? We must come to the inevitable conclusion that the guerrilla fighter is a social reformer, that he takes up arms responding to the angry protest of the people against their oppressors, and that he fights in order to change the social system that keeps all his unarmed brothers in ignominy and misery.

The guerrilla fighter needs full help from the people of the area. This is an indispensable condition.

I am not interested in dry economic socialism. We are fighting against misery, but we are also fighting against alienation. One of the fundamental objectives of Marxism is to remove interest, the factor of individual interest, and gain, from people's psychological motivations. Marx was preoccupied both with economic factors and with their repercussions on the spirit. If communism isn't interested in this too, it may be a method of distributing goods, but it will never be a revolutionary way of life.

The amount of poverty and suffering required for the emergence of a Rockefeller, and the amount of depravity that the accumulation of a fortune of such magnitude entails, are left out of the picture, and it is not always possible to make the people in general see this.

The monopoly capitalists - even while employing purely empirical methods - weave around art a complicated web which converts it into a willing tool. The superstructure of society ordains the type of art in which the artist has to be educated. Rebels are subdued by its machinery and only rare talents may create their own work. The rest become shameless hacks or are crushed.

I am not a liberator. Liberators do not exist. The people liberate themselves.

Where a government has come into power through some form of popular vote, fraudulent or not, and maintains at least an appearance of constitutional legality, the guerrilla outbreak cannot be promoted, since the possibilities of peaceful struggle have not yet been exhausted.

We are doing everything possible to give labor this new status of social duty and to link it on the one side with the development of a technology which will create the conditions for greater freedom, and on the other side with voluntary work based on a Marxist appreciation of the fact that man truly reaches a full human condition when he produces without being driven by the physical need to sell his labor as a commodity. Man still needs to undergo a complete spiritual rebirth in his attitude towards his work, freed from the direct pressure of his social environment, though linked to it by his new habits. That will be communism.

There is no other definition of socialism valid for us than that of the abolition of the exploitation of man by man.

To die under the flag of Vietnam, of Venezuela, of Guatemala, of Laos, of Guinea, of Colombia, of Bolivia, of Brazil-to name only a few scenes of today's armed struggle-would be equally glorious and desirable for an American, an Asian, an African, even a European.

Each spilt drop of blood, in any country under whose flag one has not been born, is an experience passed on to those who survive, to be added later to the liberation struggle of his own country. And each nation liberated is a phase won in the battle for the liberation of one's own country.

Each time a country is freed, we say, it is a defeat for the world imperialist system, but we must agree that real liberation or breaking away from the imperialist system is not achieved by the mere act of proclaiming independence or winning an armed victory in a revolution. Freedom is achieved when imperialist economic domination over a people is brought to an end.

The socialist countries have the moral duty of liquidating their tacit complicity with the exploiting countries of the West.

Arms cannot be regarded as merchandise in our world. They should be delivered to the peoples asking for them for use against the common enemy without any charge at all, and in quantities determined by the need and their availability.

Under the discredited flag of the United Nations, dozens of countries under the military leadership of the United States participated in this war with the massive intervention of U.S. soldiers and the use, as cannon fodder, of the South Korean population that was enrolled.

The slogan "We will not allow another Cuba" hides the possibility of perpetrating aggressions without fear of reprisal, such as the one carried out against the Dominican Republic or before that the massacre in Panama-and the clear warning stating that Yankee troops are ready to intervene anywhere in America where the ruling regime may be altered, thus endangering their interests.

To send men to the firing squad, judicial proof is unnecessary...These procedures are an archaic bourgeois detail. This is a revolution! And a revolutionary must become a cold killing machine motivated by pure hate.

Needs Translation

"Hay que endurecerse sin perder jamás la ternura."

Translation: "One has to become tough without becoming unkind."

"La revolución no se lleva en los labios para vivir de ella, se lleva en el corazón para morir por ella."

Translation: "The revolution should not be carried on the lips in order to live for it, but instead should be carried in the heart in order to die for it."

"No se vive celebrando victorias, sino superando derrotas."

Translation: "Do not live celebrating victories, but overcoming defeats."

"Prefiero morir de pie que vivir siempre arrodillado." this quote actually originates from Emiliano Zapata

Translation: "I prefer to die standing, rather than live on my knees."

"Triste cosa es no tener amigos, pero más triste ha de ser no tener enemigos porque quién no tenga enemigos señal es de que no tiene talento que haga sombra, ni carácter que impresione, ni valor temido, ni honra de la que se murmure, ni bienes que se le codicien, ni cosa alguna que se le envidie." Este es un pensamiento de José Martí

Translation: "Sad thing is not having friends, but sadder still must be not having any enemies; because it is a sign that he who doesn't lacks any talent that makes for himself a shadow, nor character that inspires, nor honor to be rumored, nor goods to be coveted, nor anything to be envied."

"El conocimiento nos hace responsables."

Translation: "Knowledge makes us accountable."

"Essa onda ira cresiendo cada dia que passe, essa onda ja no parara mas."

Translation: "This wave (of revolution) will grow with everyday that passes, this wave will never stop."