Harris Richard L. Che Guevara: A Biography

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of the Latin American region. And, again, all the Latin American

countries have been historically handicapped by unfavorable terms

of trade that give unfair advantages to the more advanced industrial

countries that dominate the global economic system. This situation

was criticized by Che Guevara in his writings, speeches, and relations

with government ofﬁ cials and leaders of countries around the world.

After World War II, the increasingly powerful transnational corpo-

rations based in the United States and in some of the other advanced

industrial countries invested heavily in Latin American economies to

take advantage of their abundant supply of natural resources, cheap

labor, lax environmental regulations, and captive consumer markets

(Harris 2008). Over the last several decades, these powerful corpora-

tions and the international ﬁ nancial institutions mentioned above

have promoted what they call the increasing integration of the Latin

American economies into the global economic system, which is domi-

nated by these very same corporations and ﬁ nancial institutions. Con-

sequently, the most proﬁ table sectors of the Latin American economies

generally are dominated by these transnational corporations and foreign

investors. These economies are also excessively dependent on the lim-

ited number of products they export to the advanced industrial coun-

tries, rather than producing products for their domestic markets, and

as a result most of the Latin American countries trade more with the

United States and other advanced industrial economies than with

each other.

Along with these common economic traits these countries have other,

more distressing similarities. In most of these countries, a large percent-

age of the population lives in poverty, there is widespread unemploy-

ment, and a large sector of the population is forced into the so-called

informal economy in which they are precariously employed as street

peddlers, small vendors, domestic workers, and day laborers or engaged

in illegal commercial activity such as prostitution or drug trafﬁ cking

(Harris and Nef 2008). The majority of the workers in the so-called

formal sector of these economies are low-skilled and semiskilled work-

ers, who receive much lower wages and many fewer beneﬁ ts (if any)

than comparable workers in the advanced industrial economies.

Moreover, because a large percentage of the population is either un-

employed, underemployed in temporary and part-time jobs, precari-

xx INTRODUCTION

ously employed in the informal sector, or engaged in subsistence or

semi-subsistence agriculture, these economies are also characterized by

the kind of unequal distribution of income mentioned above. That is

to say, the majority of the population receives a small fraction of the

total income of these societies, while the wealthy elites receive a major

proportion of the total income and own most of the land. This unequal

distribution of income and land is coupled with the increasing concen-

tration of other forms of wealth (personal property, stock ownership,

etc.) in the hands of the relatively small elite, who form the top layer of

the steep pyramidal class structures that exist throughout Latin Amer-

ica. Indeed, there is a growing polarization and income gap between

the extremely wealthy upper classes at the top of these class structures

and the middle and lower classes below them. As a result of this un-

equal distribution of income and wealth, there is extensive poverty,

social exclusion, and political inequality throughout Latin America.

These distressing characteristics of Latin American countries have

been criticized for a long time as immoral and unjust by progressive

thinkers, social activists, and critical intellectuals—particularly from

the middle and working classes. Che Guevara was a progressive thinker

who became personally outraged by the social inequality, political op-

pression, social injustice, class discrimination, political corruption, and

forms of foreign domination he saw in his travels around Latin Amer-

ica. Trained as medical doctor in his native Argentina to heal the sick

and do no harm, Che’s social consciousness and humanitarianism

were challenged by his experiences on the road, where he encountered

widespread poverty, social inequality, exploitation, discrimination, po-

litical repression, and the diseases and ill health caused by these unjust

conditions.

He was greatly inﬂ uenced by these experiences as well as the po-

litical events, leaders, and situations he witnessed ﬁ rsthand in Latin

America and the practical political education he received as a result of

his participation in many of these events and situations. In the follow-

ing pages, Che’s observations and insights, convictions, opinions, and

actions will be examined in relation to the circumstances, events, ideas,

prominent intellectuals, and political leaders he encountered over the

course of his adult life in Latin America and around the world.

INTRODUCTION xxi

TIMELINE: EVENTS IN THE

LIFE OF CHE GUEVARA

May 14, 1928 Ernesto Guevara de la Serna is born in Rosario, Ar-

gentina, but his parents, Ernesto Guevara Lynch and

Celia de la Serna, register his ofﬁ cial date of birth as

June 14, 1928.

1932 Because of young Ernesto’s asthma the Guevara fam-

ily moves to Alta Gracia, Argentina.

1934 His mother begins schooling young Ernesto at home

in Alta Gracia.

1937 Ernesto attends primary school in Alta Gracia at the

Colegío San Martín and later attends the Santiago

de Liniers School and the Victor Mercante School.

1942 Ernesto travels daily by bus to attend secondary

school at the Colegío Nacional Deán Funes in Cór-

doba, Argentina.

1943 Guevara family moves to Córdoba.

1946 Ernesto graduates from secondary school.

April 22, 1947 Ernesto receives his Certiﬁ cado de Bachiller from

the Colegío Nacional Deán Funes in Córdoba.

1947 Guevara family moves to Buenos Aires. Ernesto

begins medical school at the University of Bue-

nos Aires.

1950 Ernesto travels by motorbike throughout northern

Argentina.

1951 Ernesto works for six months at sea as a nurse on

oil tankers.

1952 With his friend Alberto Granado, Ernesto travels

through Latin America (recorded in his famous

Motorcycle Diaries, ﬁ rst published in 1993 and pop-

ularized in a ﬁ lm version in 2004).

1953 Ernesto graduates from medical school at the Uni-

versity of Buenos Aires; travels to Bolivia, Peru, Ec-

uador, Panama, Costa Rica, and Guatemala, where

he decides to stay.

1954 Árbenz government in Guatemala is overthrown

by CIA mercenary force; Ernesto ﬂ ees to Mexico.

1955 Ernesto meets Raúl and Fidel Castro in Mexico

City and joins the Cuban revolutionary 26th of

July Movement.

August 18, 1955 Ernesto marries Hilda Gadea Acosta, whom he met

in Guatemala.

December 1956 Ernesto, now known as “Che,” arrives in Cuba with

Castro brothers to launch revolutionary armed

struggle from the Sierra Maestra mountains against

the Batista dictatorship.

1957 Che becomes outstanding guerrilla ﬁ ghter and

is promoted to top rank of comandante by Fidel

Castro.

1958 Che leads a column of guerrilla ﬁ ghters who capture

the critical provincial capital city of Santa Clara;

sensing the end is near, the dictator Batista ﬂ ees

Cuba.

1959 Che is appointed commander of the La Cabaña

fortress in Havana and president of the Central

Bank of Cuba; also undertakes a two-month diplo-

matic mission to Europe, Africa, and Asia.

xxiv TIMELINE

TIMELINE xxv

June 2, 1959 Che marries Aleida March Torres in Havana after

divorcing his ﬁ rst wife, Hilda Gadea Acosta, who

decides to reside in Havana with their daughter

Hildita.

1960 Che publishes his ﬁ rst book La Guerra de Guerril-

las ( Guerrilla Warfare ); heads several Cuban diplo-

matic missions—to the Soviet Union, Europe, and

Asia.

1961 Che appointed Minister of Industry, heads Cuban

mission to the Soviet Union and other socialist

countries in Europe, China, and North Korea; also

visits Uruguay, Argentina, and Brazil, where he

receives the distinguished National Order of the

Southern Cross from President Janiro Cuadros.

1962 Che heads important Cuban mission to the Soviet

Union that ﬁ nalizes secret negotiations that lead

to placement of Soviet missiles in Cuba; this pro-

vokes the infamous Cuban Missile Crisis and U.S.

naval blockade of Cuba.

1964 Che speaks at United Nations General Assembly

on the international crisis in the Congo, and at the

end of the year undertakes an extended trip to Af-

rica and China.

1965 Che returns to Cuba in March and drops out of

sight; between April and November he heads a se-

cret Cuban military mission that unsuccessfully at-

tempts to establish a training base in the Congo for

revolutionary guerrilla movements in Africa.

1966 Following the failure of his Congo mission and a

short stay in Tanzania, Che returns secretly to Cuba

and prepares for a clandestine mission in Bolivia;

he enters the country disguised as an Uruguayan

economist in early November.

1967 Che attempts to establish in Bolivia a continental

base for revolutionary guerrilla operations in Latin

America.

October 9, 1967 Che is captured and executed.

1979–1989 The Sandinista revolutionary movement overthrows the

Somoza dictatorship in Nicaragua and over the next

10 years the country’s revolutionary leaders honor Che

as one of the major sources of inspiration for their revo-

lution.

1994 The Zapatista revolutionary movement in southern

Mexico begins to gain international attention and its

leaders publicly pay homage to Che; their primary spokes-

person, Subcomandante Marcos, is even described by

the media as the new Che Guevara.

1997 A team of Cuban geologists and Argentine forensic an-

thropologists discover the remains of Che’s body in an

unmarked grave in Vallegrande, Bolivia; in October his

remains are returned to Cuba and placed in a special

mausoleum in Santa Clara.

1999 Che is included as one of the 20th century’s 100 most

inﬂ uential people in a special issue of Time magazine.

2006 Bolivia’s newly elected, socialist president Juan “Evo”

Morales pays homage to Che in his inauguration speech

and prominently displays his photo in his presidential

ofﬁ ce.

2009 Che, a two-part biographical ﬁ lm on Guevara directed

by Steven Soderbergh and starring Benicio del Toro,

is released internationally; by October 2009, this ﬁ lm

grossed over $40 million worldwide.

xxvi TIMELINE

Chapter 1

GUEVARA’S EARLY LIFE

IN ARGENTINA

Che Guevara was born on May 14, 1928 (although his birth certiﬁ cate

indicates he was born a month later, on June 14, 1928), in the Argen-

tine city of Rosario, which is located in northern Argentina on the

famous Paraná River. His parents named him Ernesto (his father’s ﬁ rst

name) and as is the custom throughout most of Latin America, his full

name consisted of both his father’s family name and his mother’s fam-

ily name. Thus, as a boy and young man he was known as Ernesto

Guevara de la Serna—Guevara being his father’s family name and de la

Serna being his mother’s family name. Since he did not assume the ﬁ rst

name of Che until much later in his life, in this chapter and the follow-

ing two chapters, he will be referred to as Ernesto Guevara.

His parents were of upper-class origin. His father, Ernesto Guevara

Lynch, was an entrepreneur and a builder-architect who studied archi-

tecture but never received his degree. During the more entrepreneur-

ial phase of his career, he tried his hand at ranching, yacht building,

and the cultivation of maté (the herbal tea that is the national drink

in Argentina). However, he ended up as a builder-architect. His an-

cestry was both Spanish (Guevara) and Irish (Lynch) and one of his

great-grandfathers was one of the wealthiest men in South America

2 CHE GUEVARA

(Anderson 1997:4), but over the years the Guevara family lost most of

their wealth. Ernesto’s (Che’s) great-grandfather Juan Antonio Guevara

left Argentina for the gold rush in California, where he married a beau-

tiful Mexican woman named Concepción Castro. Their son, Roberto

Guevara Castro, was born in California but returned with his parents

to Argentina, where he married Ana Isabel Lynch, who was also born

in California. She was the daughter of an Argentine family of Irish an-

cestry that like the Guevaras went to California during the gold rush

but returned later to Argentina. Their son, Ernesto Guevara Lynch,

was Ernesto’s (Che’s) father. During Ernesto’s (Che’s) childhood, he

loved listening to his grandmother Ana Isabel’s tales of frontier life in

California.

His mother, Celia de la Serna y Llosa, came from a wealthy landown-

ing family of Spanish ancestry. Her parents died when she was quite

young, and as a result she received a sizable inheritance at the age of 21,

which was the same year Ernesto was born. She graduated from an ex-

clusive Catholic girls’ school in Buenos Aires. She was an intelligent,

quite literate, unconventional, and generous person who remained de-

voted to Ernesto, her ﬁ rstborn, until her death just a few years before

his own.

Soon after Ernesto’s birth, his parents moved to San Isidro, Argen-

tina, where Ernesto’s father was a partner in a yacht-building business.

It was while they were living in this city along the banks of the La

Plata River that his parents discovered the young Ernesto had asthma

(which he suffered from the rest of his life). His mother was an avid

swimmer and used to take him with her to the yacht club in San Isidro

when she went swimming. On one particularly chilly day, by the time

she was ready to leave the club she discovered he was very ill. She and

her husband took him immediately to a local doctor, who informed

them that their son had a severe asthmatic condition. For the next two

years, Che’s parents tried every possible cure, but in the end they were

advised that they would have to move to a much drier climate if they

wanted their son’s health to improve. As a result, they moved to the

little town of Alta Gracia on the gentle western slopes of the Sierra

Chica in the central Argentine province of Córdoba.

Ernesto grew up in Alta Gracia and later in the provincial capital

city of Córdoba, along with his two brothers and two sisters, who were

GUEVARA’S EARLY LIFE IN ARGENTINA 3

born there. The dry climate of the region greatly beneﬁ ted his health,

although he continued to suffer periodic asthma attacks, which at

times forced him to stay in bed for days. Nevertheless, as he grew older,

Ernesto spent as much time outdoors as possible. His childhood friends

recall that he was always organizing hikes to the hills and playing games

requiring physical skill and endurance (Caligiuri and Piccon 2007).

He learned to swim at an early age, and this sport became one of his

passions. His parents, especially his mother, encouraged him to swim,

since they believed this sport would improve his health and particu-

larly his breathing problems. As he grew older, he also became an avid

golfer and loved to ride horses.

His friends remember him as a decisive and bold youth who was very

sure of himself (Caligiuri and Piccon 2007). He had several nicknames

during his childhood. His family members often called him “Tete,”

while his friends called him “Ernestito,” “Fuser,” and “Chancho.” His

childhood and school friends remember him for his enthusiasm, mis-

chievous and courageous nature, and adventurousness. Evidently, he

was a real daredevil, willing to do almost anything, perhaps to prove to

himself that in spite of his chronic illness he was just as good or better

at doing things as his friends. Enrique Martin, one of his childhood

friends, remembers him as a “real friend when somebody needed him”

and as “a charismatic person” who “never got angry more than two min-

utes.” According to Martin: “We all respected and admired him for his

kindness” (Caligiuri and Piccon 2007:52).

The family rented various houses in Alta Gracia, but the house where

they spent the most time was Villa Nydia, which is today the Museo

Casa del Che Guevara (Museum of Che Guevara’s House). The family

lived in Villa Nydia from 1935 to 1937 and again from 1939 to 1943

(Caligiuri and Piccon 2007:41). It is the house that was most thought of

by the Guevara family as their home in Alta Gracia.

Ernesto’s family life was relatively happy, although his parents sepa-

rated when he was a young adult. His father gave him considerable free-

dom and moral support. His mother gave him a great deal of love and

attention; they had a special bond between them. Ernesto always con-

ﬁ ded in her, even years later when he became an important leader in

the Cuban Revolution. Because of his asthma, he was unable to attend

school during the ﬁ rst years of his primary education (Caligiuri and