Anonymous Comrade submits:

"The Fight for Che's Legacy"

Boris Kagarlitsky, Moscow Times, Tuesday, Jun. 17, 2003

On June 14, Ernesto "Che" Guevara would have turned 75. Much loved during his lifetime, "El Comandante" was even more revered after his tragic death in 1967. Che's execution at the age of 39 gave rise to a cult following in Western Europe and the Americas. The new left was sorely in need of a hero. The rebellious youth movement of the 1960s rejected traditional leadership icons, but its need for a heroic ideal was profound.Following the exposure of Stalin's crimes at the 20th Party Congress in 1956, the dictator's image lost its power to inspire. Many Parisian radicals took to sporting pins bearing portraits of Chairman Mao, but the totalitarian aspect of Chinese communism undermined appeals for a "grassroots initiative." By the 1960s, Mao the young revolutionary was long forgotten -- he had become little more than a brutal bureaucrat.

Che was something else entirely. Countless leaders had sacrificed the lives of others, but Che sacrificed his own. During the Cuban revolution he could be cruel, but was also noble. He was fascinated with the achievements of the Soviet Union at a time when the Soviet Union had something to be proud of -- during the period of relative liberalization and reform known as the "Thaw." But Che wasn't cut out for the life of a party official. Following the triumph of the Cuban revolution, Che tried his best to devote his energies to running the country. The results were less than brilliant, and El Comandante sensed this.

A radical American economist who traveled to Cuba after the revolution once told me how he had tried to convince Che of the need to build warehouses at the island's ports. When the U.S. blockade began, small shipments of goods from Florida came to a halt. Enormous freighters from places like Eastern Europe and Egypt began to arrive, and the Cubans had no large-scale storage facilities. Che heard the economist out, but before making a decision he called in an "expert in Marxism-Leninism," who told him that warehouses were unnecessary because they would produce no added value. A debate ensued between the advisers, and in the end Che found the arguments of the Marxist-Leninist more convincing. Warehouses at Cuban ports were finally built several years later on orders from Soviet specialists.

To Che's credit, he turned his back on power to remain a "revolutionary soldier of fortune," as he called himself. A hero, idealist and adventurer, he declined a role in ruling Cuba, choosing instead to continue the fight, be it in Africa or in Latin America. He met his end fighting in the jungles of Bolivia. His theory of guerrilla warfare found adherents around the world, and it has been put to the test in battles from Nicaragua to Chechnya. His conception of revolution, in which the decisive role is played not by a vanguard, but by the will of the fighters, remains controversial to this day, but has inspired many young people to make the ultimate sacrifice. Yet in the case of Che Guevara, theory always took a back seat to life, which he devoted to testing his theory.

Che was a rare breed: a 20th-century intellectual who was also a man of action. His life was one long battle against almost impossible odds in which he was either defeated or he triumphed to everyone's amazement. In this he was akin to the heroes of ancient Greek tragedies. In Catholic Latin America, the image of the dead partisan has become closely associated with Jesus Christ.

The height of Che mania coincided with the rise of the new left. When this movement subsided in the mid-1970s, the cult began to fade. And yet today we see the face of the heroic partisan on every street corner. He stares out at us from the covers of bestselling books. He appears in ads for the Sonet cellular telephone company, exhorting us to exercise our "freedom of speech for just $70." His portrait is emblazoned on innumerable T-shirts.

The current fashion for Che was born of the resurgence of the radical youth movement in the West. Today he is a symbol of a return to the values and idealism of the 1960s -- a rejection of the bourgeois pragmatism of the generation that gave us neo-liberal "reform." But bourgeois pragmatism has also found a use for Che -- advertisers have turned him into a successful brand.

The Che Guevara on billboards today stands in opposition to El Comandante of revolutionary myth. Which will get the upper hand, marketing strategy or romantic idealism? Pragmatism is invincible in an era when boredom and vulgarity reign. However, Che's resurgence in itself is proof that bourgeois values have not conclusively triumphed.

Boris Kagarlitsky is director of the Institute of Globalization Studies.