Fidel Castro: In Tribute to Che
e Régis Debray’s Farewell to Che e The Area Where Che Fell °’Orders Came Down...To Execute Che’ ® Fourth [nternational Joins in Mourning
October 21 Antiwar Actions: A Worldwide Success
Pierre Frank: Fiftieth Anniversary of October Revolution
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Fidel Castro: In Tribute to Che
e Régis Debray’s Farewell to Che e The Area Where Che Fell ©'‘Orders Came Down...To Execute Che’ ® Fourth International Joins in Mourning October 21 Antiwar Actions: A Worldwide Success
Pierre Frank: Fiftieth Anniversary of October Revolution
New York, N. Y. 10010. HP
IN TRIBUTE TO CHE
By Fidel Castro
{Full text of speech made by Major Fidel Castro Ruz, first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist party of Cuba and prime minister of the revolutionary government, in memory of Major Ernesto Che Guevara, at the Plaza de la Revoluci6én, on October 18, 1967, Year of Heroic Vietnam. (Translation of the official transcript of the department of stenographic transcripts of the revolutionary government. )]
x * *
Revolutionary Comrades:
I first met Che one day in July or August, 1955. And in one night -- as he recalls in his writings -- he became one of the future expeditionaries of the Granma, although at that time that expedition possessed neither ship, nor arms nor troops.
. And that was how, together with Raul, Che became one of the first two on the Granma list. And twelve years have passed since then -~- they have been twelve years filled with struggle and historical Significance. During this time death has cut down many brave and invaluable men, but, at the same time, throughout those years of our revolution, extraordinary persons have arisen, forged from among men of the revolution, and between those men and the people, bonds of affection and of friendship have emerged which surpass all description.
Tonight we are meeting to try to express, in some degree, our feelings toward him who was one of the closest, the most beloved and, without doubt, the most extraordinary of our revolutionary conmrades -— to express our feelings for him and for the heroes who have fought with him and fallen with him, his internationalist army that has been writing a glorious and never to be effaced historical epic. Che was one of those people who is liked immediately, for his simplicity, his character, his naturalness, his conmradely attitude, his personality, his originality, even when one had not yet learned of his other characteristic and unique virtues.
In those first days he was our troop doctor. And so the bonds of friendship and warm feelings for him were ever increasing.
He was filled with a profound spirit of hatred and loathing for imperialism, not only because his political awareness was already considerably developed, but also because shortly before, he had had the opportunity of witnessing the criminal imperialist intervention in Guatemala through the mercenaries who aborted the revolution in that country.
A man like Che did not require elaborate arguments. It was sufficient for him to know that there were men determined to struggle against that situation, arms in hand -- it was sufficient for him to know that those men were inspired by genuinely revolutionary and patriotic ideals. That was more than enough.
One day, at the end of November, 1956, he set out on the expedition toward Cuba with us. I recall that that trip was very hard for him, since, because of the circumstances under which it was necessary to organize the departure, he could not even provide himself with the medicine he needed and, throughout the trip he suffered from a severe attack of asthma, with nothing to alleviate it, but also without ever complaining.
We arrived, set out on our first march, suffered our first setback and, at the end of some weeks, as you all know, a group of those who had survived from the expedition of the Granma was able to reunite. Che continued to be the doctor of our group.
We came through the first battle, victorious, and Che was already a soldier of our troop and, at the same time, still our doctor. We came through the second victorious battle and Che was not only a soldier, but the most outstanding soldier in that battle, carrying out for the first time one of those singular feats that characterized him in all military action. Our forces continued to develop and we faced another battle of extraordinary inportance at that moment.
The situation was difficult. The information we had was erroneous in many respects. We were going to attack, in full daylight -- at dawn -- a strongly defended, well-armed position at the edge of the sea. Enemy troops were at our rear, not very distant, and in that confused situation it was necessary to ask the men to make a supreme effort.
Comrade Juan Almeida had taken on one of the most difficult missions, but one of our flanks remained completely without forces -- one of the flanks was left without an attacking force, placing the operation in danger. And at that moment, Che, who was still functioning as our doctor, asked for two or three men, among
them one with a machine gun, and in a matter of seconds rapidly set off to assume the mission of attack from that direction.
On that occasion, he was not only an outstanding combatant but, also, an outstanding doctor, attending the wounded comrades and, at the same time, attending the wounded enemy soldiers.
After all the weapons had been captured and it became necessary to abandon that position, undertaking a long return march under the harassment of diverse enemy forces, it was necessary for someone to stay behind with the wounded, and Che stayed with the wounded. Aided by a small group of our soldiers, he took care of them, saved their lives and later rejoined the column with then.
From that time forward, he stood out as a capable and valiant leader, of that type of men who, when a difficult mission is pending, do not wait to be asked to carry it out.
Thus it was at the battle of El Uvero, but he had acted in a similar way on a not previously mentioned occasion in the first days when, following a betrayal, our little troop was attacked by surprise by a number of airplanes and we were forced to retreat under the bombardment. We had already walked some distance when we remembered some rifles of some farmersoldiers who had been with us in the first actions and had then asked permission to visit their families at a time when there was still not much discipline in our enbryonic army. And right then it was thought that possibly the rifles were lost.
I recall that the problem was not brought up again and, during the bombardment, Che volunteered, and having done so, quickly went out to recuperate those rifles.
This wag one of his principal characteristics: his willingness to instantly volunteer for the most dangerous mission. And naturally this aroused admiration, and twice the usual admiration, for a fellow combatant, fighting alongside us, who had not been born here, a man of profound ideas, a man in whose mind stirred the dream of struggle in other parts of the continent and who was, nonetheless, so altruistic, so disinterested, so willing to always do the most difficult things, to constantly risk his life.
And that was how he won the rank of major and leader of the second column, organized in the Sierra Maestra. Thus his prestige began to increase; he began to gain fame as a magnificent combatant who was to reach the highest posts in the course of the war.
Che was an incomparable soldier.
Che was an incomparable leader. Che was,
from a military point of view, an extra-
ordinarily capable man, extraordinarily
courageous, extraordinarily aggressive.
If, as a guerrilla, he had his Achilles'
heel it was this excessively aggressive
quality, his absolute contempt for danger.
The enemy believes it can draw cer-
tain conclusions from his death. Che was a
master of warfare. He was a virtuoso in
the art of guerrilla struggle. And he
showed that an infinite number of times.
But he showed it especially in two extra-
ordinary deeds. One of these was in the
invasion, in which he led a column, a
column pursued by thousands of enemy sol-
diers over flat and absolutely unknown
terrain, carrying out -- together with
Camilo -- an extraordinary military ac-
complishment. He also showed it in his
lightning campaign in Las Villas Province,
especially in the audacious attack on the
city of Santa Clara, entering, with a
column of barely 300 men, a city defended
by tanks, artillery and several thousand
infantry soldiers.
Those two heroic deeds stamped him
as an extraordinarily capable leader, as
a master, as a virtuoso in the art of rev-
olutionary war.
However, now after his heroic and
glorious death, some attempt to deny the
truth or value of his concepts, his guer-
rilla theories.
The master may die -- especially
when he is a virtuoso in an art as danger-
ous as revolutionary struggle -- but what
will surely never die is the art to which
he dedicated his life, the art to which he
dedicated his intelligence.
What is so strange about the fact
that this master died in combat? What is
stranger is that he did not die in combat
on one of the innumerable occasions when
he risked his life during our revolution-
ary struggle. And many times it was neces-
sary to take steps to keep him from losing
his life in actions of minor significance.
And so it was in a combat -- in one
of the many battles he fought -- that he
lost his life. We do not have sufficient
evidence to enable us to make deductions
about what circumstances preceded that
combat, to imagine how far he may have
acted in an excessively aggressive way,
but -- we repeat -- if as a guerrilla he
had an Achilles' heel that Achilles' heel
was his excessive daring, his complete
contempt for danger.
And this is where we can hardly
agree with him, since we consider that his
life, his experience, his capacity as a
seasoned leader, his prestige and every-
thing his life signified, were more valuable, incomparably more valuable than he himself, perhaps, believed.
His conduct may have been profoundly influenced by the idea that men have a relative value in history, the idea that causes are not defeated when men fall, that the powerful march of history cannot and will not be halted when leaders fall.
And that is true, there is no doubt about it. It shows his faith in men, his faith in ideas, his faith in examples. However -- as I said a few days ago -with all our heart we would have liked to see him as a forger of victories, to see victories forged under his leadership, since men of his experience, men of his caliber, of his really unique capacity, are not common.
We have a full understanding of the value of his example. We are absolutely convinced that many men will strive to live up to his example, that men like him will emerge from the heart of the peoples.
It is not easy to find a person with all the virtues that were combined in him. It is not easy for a person, spontaneously, to develop a personality like his. I would say that he is one of those men who are difficult to match and virtually impossible to surpass. But I would say that the example of men like him contributes to the appearance of men of the same caliber.
In Che, we not only admire the fighter, the man capable of performing great feats. And what he did, what he was doing, the very fact of his rising, with a handful of men, against the army of the ruling class, trained by Yankee advisers sent in by Yankee imperialism, backed by the oligarchies of all neighboring countries -- in itself constitutes an extraordinary feat.
And if we search the pages of history, it is likely that we will find no other case in which a leader, with such a limited number of men, has set about a task of such import; a case in which a leader, with such a limited number of men, has set out to fight against such large forces. Such proof of confidence in hinm~ self, such proof of confidence in the peoples, such proof of faith in men's capacity to fight, can be looked for in the pages of history -- but the like of it will never be found.
And he fell.
The enemy believes it has defeated his ideas, his guerrilla concepts, his point of view on revolutionary armed struggle. And what they accomplished, by a stroke of luck, was to eliminate him physically -- what they accomplished was
to gain an accidental advantage that an
enemy may gain in war.
And we do not know to what degree
that stroke of luck, that stroke of for-
tune, was helped along, in a battle like
many others, by that characteristic of
which we spoke before -- his excessive ag-
gressiveness, his absolute disdain for
danger.
This also happened in our war of
independence. In a battle at Dos Rios they
killed the apostle of our independence. In
a battle at Punta Brava, they killed
Antonio Maceo, a veteran of hundreds of
battles. Countless leaders, countless
patriots of our war of independence were
killed in similar battles. And, neverthe-
less, that did not spell defeat for the
Cuban cause.
The death of Che -- as we said a
few days ago -- is a hard blow for the
revolutionary movement, in that it de-
prives it, without a doubt, of its most
experienced and able leader.
But those who are boasting of vic-
tory are mistaken. They are mistaken when
they think that his death is the end of
his ideas, the end of his tactics, the end
of his guerrilla concepts, the end of his
thesis. For the man who fell, as a mortal
man, as a man who faced bullets time and
again, as a soldier, as a leader, was a
thousand times more able than those who
killed him by a stroke of luck.
However, how must revolutionaries
face this serious setback? How must they
face this loss? If Che had to express an
opinion on this point, what would it be?
He gave his opinion, he expressed that
opinion quite clearly when he wrote in
his message to the Latin-American Confer-
ence of Solidarity that if death sur-
prised him anywhere, it would be welcome
as long as‘his battle cry had reached a
receptive ear and another hand was
stretched out to take up his rifle.
And his battle cry will reach not
just one receptive ear, but millions of
receptive ears. And not one hand but mil-
lions of hands will be stretched out to
take up arms.
New leaders will emerge. And the
men -- of the receptive ears and the out-
stretched hands -- will need leaders who
emerge from the ranks of the people, just
as leaders have emerged in all revolutions.
Those hands will not have available
a leader of Che's extraordinary experience
and enormous ability. Those leaders will
be formed in the process of struggle --
those leaders will emerge from among the
millions of receptive ears, from the mil-
lions of hands that will sooner or later
be stretched out to take up arms.
It isn't that we feel that his death will necessarily have immediate repercussions in the practical sphere of revolutionary struggle, that his death will necessarily have immediate repercussions in the practical sphere of development of this struggle. The fact is that when Che took up arms again he was not thinking of an immediate victory -- he was not thinking of a speedy victory against the forces of the oligarchies and of imperialism. As an experienced fighter, he was prepared for a prolonged struggle of five, ten, fifteen or twenty years, if necessary. He was ready to fight five, ten, fifteen, twenty years, or all his life if need be!
And within this time perspective, his death -- or rather his example -- will have tremendous repercussions. The force of that example will be invincible.
Those who cling to the idea of luck try in vain to deny his experience and his capacity as a leader. Che was an extraordinarily able military leader. But when we remember Che, when we think of Che, we do not think fundamentally of his military virtues. No! Warfare is a means and not an end -- warfare is a tool of revolutionaries. The important thing is the revolution -- the important thing is the revolutionary cause, revolutionary ideas, revolutionary objectives, revolutionary sentiments, revolutionary virtues!
And it is in that field, in the field of ideas, in the field of sentiments, in the field of revolutionary virtues, in the field of intelligence, that -~ apart from his military virtues -- we feel the tremendous loss that his death means to the revolutionary movement.
Because Che's extraordinary personality was made up of virtues which are rarely found together. He stood out as an unsurpassed man of action, but Che was not only an unsurpassed man of action -he was a man of visionary intelligence and broad culture, a profound thinker. That is, in his person the man of ideas and the man of action were combined.
But it is not only that Che possessed the double characteristic of the man of ideas -- of profound ideas -- and the man of action, but that Che as a revolutionary united in himself the virtues which can be defined as the fullest expression of the virtues of a revolutionary: A man of total integrity, a man of supreme sense of honor, of absolute sincerity -- a man of stoic and Spartan living habits, a man in whose conduct not one stain can be found. He constituted, through his virtues, what can be called a truly model revolutionary.
When men die it is usual to make speeches, to emphasize their virtues, but rarely as on this occasion can one say of aman, with greater justice, with greater accuracy, what we say of Che: that he was a pure example of revolutionary virtues.
But he possessed another quality, not a quality of the intellect nor of the will, not a quality derived from experience, from struggle, but a quality of the heart: he was an extraordinarily human man, extraordinarily sensitive.
That is why we say, when we think of his life, that he constituted the singular case of a most extraordinary man, able to unite in his personality not only the characteristics of the man of action, but also of the man of thought, of the man of immaculate revolutionary virtues and of extraordinary human sensibility, joined with an iron character, a will of steel, indomitable tenacity.
And because of this, he has left to the future generations not only his experience, his knowledge as an outstanding soldier, but also, at the same time, the fruits of the intelligence. He wrote with the virtuosity of a master of our language. His narratives of the war are incomparable. The depth of his thinking is impressive. He never wrote about anything with less than extraordinary seriousness, with less than extraordinary profundity -~ and we have no doubt that some of his writings will pass on to posterity as classic documents of revolutionary thought.
And thus, as fruits of that vigorous and profound intelligence, he left us an infinity of memories, an infinity of narratives that, without his work, without his efforts, might have been lost forever.
An indefatigable worker, during the years that he served our country he did not know a single day of rest. Many were the responsibilities assigned to him: as president of the National Bank, as director of the National Planning Board, as Minister of Industries, as commander of military regions, as the head of political or economic or fraternal delegations.
His versatile intelligence was able to undertake with maximum assurance any task of any kind. And thus he brilliantly represented our country in numerous international conferences, just as he brilliantly led soldiers in combat, just as he was a model worker in charge of any of the institutions that he was assigned to and for him there were no days of rest, for him there were no hours of rest!
And if we looked through the windows of his offices, he had the lights on until all hours of the night, studying, or rather, working or studying. For he was a student of all problems, he was a tireless reader. His thirst for learning was practically insatiable, and the hours he stole
from sleep he devoted to study.
He devoted his scheduled days off to voluntary work. He was the inspiration and provided the greatest incentive for that work which is today carried out by hundreds of thousands of persons throughout the country, he stimulated that activity in which our people are making greater and greater efforts.
And as a revolutionary, as a communist revolutionary, a true communist, he had a boundless faith in moral values. He had a boundless faith in moral values, he had a boundless faith in the conscience of man. And we should say that he saw, with absolute clarity, the moral resources as the fundamental lever in the construction of communism in human society.
He thought, worked out and wrote many things. And it is fitting to bring out, on a day like today, that Che's writings, Che's political and revolutionary thinking, will be of permanent value in the Cuban revolutionary process and in the Latin-American revolutionary process. And we do not doubt that his ideas, as a man of action, as a man of thought, as a man of untarnished moral virtues, as a man of unexcelled human sensitivity, as a man of spotless conduct, have and will continue to have universal value.
The imperialists boast of their triumph at having killed this guerrilla fighter in action -- the imperialists boast of a triumphant stroke of luck that led to the elimination of such a splendid man of action. But perhaps the imperialists do not know or pretend not to know that the man of action was only one of the many facets of the personality of that combatant. And if we speak of sorrow, we are saddened not only at having lost a man of action, we are saddened at having lost a morally superior man, we are saddened at having lost a man of exquisite human sensitivity, we are saddened at having lost such a mind. We are saddened to think that he was only thirtynine years old at the time of his death.
We are saddened at missing the additional fruits that we would have received from that intelligence and that ever richer experience.
We have an idea of the dimension of the loss for the revolutionary movement. But, nevertheless, here is the weak side of the imperialist enemy: they think that by eliminating a man physically they have eliminated his thinking -- that by eliminating him physically they have eliminated his ideaz, eliminated his virtues, eliminated hi: example.
And so shamele *s are they in this belief that they have .:0 hesitation in publishing, as the most natural thing in the world, the by now almost universally accepted circumstances in which they murdered him after he had been seriously wounded in action. They do not even séem aware of the repulsiveness of the procedure, they do not even seem aware of the shamelessness of the admission. They have published it as if thugs, oligarchs and mercenaries had the right to shoot a seriously wounded revolutionary combatant.
And even worse they explain why they did it. They assert that Che's trial would have been quite an earthshaker, that it would have been impossible to place this revolutionary in the dock.
And not only that, but neither have they hesitated to spirit away his remains. And be it true or false, they certainly announced they had cremated his body, thus beginning to show their fear, beginning to show that they are not so sure that by physically eliminating the combatant they can liquidate his ideas, liquidate his example.
Che fell defending the interests, defending the cause of the exploited and the oppressed peoples of this continent -- Che fell defending the cause of the poor and disfranchised of this earth. And the exemplary manner and the selflessness with which he defended that cause cannot be disputed by even his most bitter enemies.
And before history, men who act as he did, men who do and give all for the cause of the oppressed, grow in stature with each passing day, and find a deeper place in the heart of the peoples with each passing day. The imperialist enemies are beginning to see this, and it will not be long before it will be proved that his death will, in the long run, be like a germ which will give rise to many men determined to imitate him, many men determined to follow his example.
And we are absolutely convinced that the revolutionary cause on this continent will recover from the blow, that the revolutionary movement on this continent will not be crushed by this blow.
From the revolutionary point of view of our people, how must we view Che's example? Do we feel we have lost him? It is true that we will not see new writings of his, true that we will never again hear his voice. But Che has left a heritage to the world, a great heritage, and we who knew him so well, can become in great degree his beneficiaries.
He left us his revolutionary thinking, his revolutionary virtues -- he left us his character, his will, his tenacity, his spirit of work. In a word, he left us his example! And Che's example will be a
model for our people -- Che's example will be the ideal model for our people!
If we wish to express what we expect our revolutionary combatants, our militants, our men to be, we must say, without hesitation: "Let them be like Che!" If we wish to express what we want the men of future generations to be, we must say: "Let them be like Che!" If we wish to say how we want our children to be educated we must say without hesitation: "We want them to be educated in Che's spirit!" If we want the model of a man, the model of a man who does not belong to our time, the model of a man who belongs to the future, I say from the depths of my heart that such a model, without a single stain on his conduct, without a single stain on his actions, is Che! If we wish to express what we want our children to be, we must say from our very hearts as ardent revolutionaries: "We want them to be like Che!"
Che has become a model of what men should be, not only for our people but also for people everywhere in Latin America. Che carried to its highest expression revolutionary stoicism, the revolutionary spirit of sacrifice, revolutionary conbativeness, the revolutionary's spirit of work.
Che brought the ideas of Marxisn- Leninism to their freshest, purest, most revolutionary expression. No other man of our time has carried the spirit of internationalism to its highest possible level as Che did.
And in the future, when an example of a proletarian internationalist is sought, that example, high above any other, will be Che's example! National flags, prejudices, chauvinism and egoism had disappeared from his mind and heart. And he was ready to shed his generous blood spontaneously and immediately, in behalf of any people, for the cause of any people!
And thus, his blood fell on our soil when he was wounded in several battles -- and his blood was shed in Bolivia, for the redemption of the exploited and the oppressed. That blood was shed for the sake of all the exploited and all the oppressed -- that blood was shed for all the peoples of America and for the people of Vietnam, because while fighting there in Bolivia, fighting against the oligarchies and imperialism, he knew that he was offering Vietnam the highest possible expression of his solidarity!
It is for this reason, comrades of the revolution, that we must face the future with optimism. And in Che's example, we will always look for inspiration, inspiration in struggle, inspiration in tenacity, inspiration in intransigence toward the enemy, inspiration in internationalist sentiment!
Therefore, after tonight's impressive ceremony, after this incredible demonstration of multitudinous recognition -incredible for its magnitude, discipline and spirit of devotion -- that demonstrates that our people are a sensitive, grateful people who know how to honor the memory of the brave who die in combat, that our people recognize those who serve them, that demonstrates the people's solidarity with the revolutionary struggle and how this people will raise aloft and maintain ever higher aloft the revolutionary banners and revolutionary principles -- in these moments of remembrance, let us lift our spirits, with optimism in the future, witl absolute optimism in the final victory of the peoples, and say to Che and to the heroes who fought and died with him: Ever onward to victory!
Patria o Muerte! Venceremos!
REGIS