The Awakening of Latin America

by Ernesto Che Guevara

  Published in Verde Olivo magazine, May 22, 1960.

  Cacareco, the Argentine Vote and Other Rhinoceroses

  By Sharpshooter

  The mighty brains of representative, electoral democracy have spoken. Their circumspect desires for Cuba’s constitutionalization have fallen gently and insidiously. This is the first step toward getting our country declared another dictatorship. They don’t want leaders like Fidel Castro who are supported by the people and their votes.

  They want Cacareco, the rhinoceros in the São Paulo zoo, elected in a demonstration of complete rejection of politicians. Or, as happened in Argentina in a close election, they want the blank votes to win. What do those blank votes mean, kind champions of constitutionality, if not the only way the people have of saying that they aren’t satisfied and are trying by all possible means to show their rebellious spirit?

  There is a reason why Fidel Castro—this Fidel Castro that the champions of representative democracy don’t want—is cheered in Ydígoras’s Guatemala, which has broken off relations with us, and why his influence is felt among the Venezuelan people, whose top leader got so peeved he left the May Day parade.

  And, speaking of elections, what would happen if Fidel Castro were to insist that an electoral contest—complete with democratic, institutional pieces of paper—be held between Mr. Ydígoras, for example, and himself, Fidel, as president of Guatemala and that other elections be held between himself, Fidel, and the presidents of many other republics that I won’t list here? Ah, but there, the method of little pieces of paper in a wooden box is subordinated to a careful system that always allows certain national oligarchies linked to the most powerful international oligarchies to mock what the people want.

  Voting means that the segregationists in South Africa can be in power to shoot the blacks and that, until the people’s wrath topples him, Syngman Rhee can execute (murder is a more accurate word for it) his political opponents. The magic of the little bits of paper in the wooden box is that they allow Ydígoras, Somoza, Duvalier and Stroessner to be the constitutional representatives of their institutional republics and a 12-year nonaggression pact of mutual friendship to be signed between two political parties somewhere in Latin America.

  We prefer our direct, aggressive, challenging manner of voting, based on fighting for what we want—for the man who has united the enormous masses of people who participated in our May Day march. We’re afraid that the other system might give us A RHINOCEROS.

  Published in Verde Olivo magazine, May 8, 1960.

  Ydígoras, Somoza and Other Proofs of Friendship

  By Sharpshooter

  It is a curious thing. This Cuban revolution, which was unanimously applauded on January 1, has begun to lose a series of friends among the Latin American governments. I repeat: among the governments, because it is continuing to gain friends among the people. And it is losing friends among those governments because they say it is a dictatorship that is closing down newspapers, curtailing freedom of speech, not holding elections, taking over public finance and doing away with private enterprise—in short, they present a wide range of reasons.

  Naturally, we know that Ydígoras, Somoza and Trujillo hold exemplary elections; we also know, for example, that the Dominican Republic’s economy is in private hands, because, when all is said and done, Trujillo owns the whole island. Okay, but he owns it as an individual, not as the head of state; he is not even president. The same holds true of the Somozas; Somoza owns everything as an individual, not as president. The fact that there haven’t been any opposition newspapers in those countries for many years and that an international news agency has been thrown out of Guatemala—well, that is not important.

  In other words, we are reviled for having done something that they do, too, but in the other direction, and for other things that they do but we don’t. Shooting a war criminal is not the same as murdering a student.

  But we are called mountebanks. Who is Mr. Ydígoras? Mr. Ydígoras is a military man, who has participated in a whole lot of battles for Latin America’s liberation. He was against Árbenz; signed a “gentleman’s agreement” with Castillo Armas; and one fine day, among wholesale rope jumping, hysterical shouts and other clowning, with the votes of the people—who didn’t see all the evil in him—and a little electoral fraud, climbed to power. Naturally, he is a loyal ally of his old friend Castillo Armas. His political line has not covered up anything at all; he has maintained a firm friendship with the United States and with the rest of the “free world.”

  He hates only the communists, the Fidel-following communists, and all others who are fighting for their countries’ freedom. Because of this, one fine day, perhaps waking up under the influence of the rum he had drunk the night before, a little under the weather in his green palace in Guatemala, he decided once and for all to follow the advice of his friend the US ambassador and break off relations with Cuba. And he broke them off. The workers protested on May Day, but he still broke off relations.

  A little farther south in Central America, there is an individual named Luis Somoza, who seems to be an exact copy of a painting 30 years old—all you have to do is change the first name from Anastasio. More or less 30 years ago, President Roosevelt said, with his US pragmatism, “He may be a son of a bitch, but he’s ours,” and he was right (on both counts). That gentleman, who murdered Sandino, freedom and everything else that was decent in Nicaragua, was the United States’ man, and he remained that all his life. They called the martyr who executed him a murderer, and US doctors employed all the latest advances of US science in a US hospital in the Canal Zone (that was stolen from Panama) to try to save the life of the perforated puppet.

  He died, but his dynasty didn’t end; there is the picture of his son, Luis Somoza, who inherited the dynasty and who has the same characteristics as his beloved progenitor—a friend of the United States to the end. And this friend of the United States has expelled the members of our Cuban mission in Nicaragua—also after listening to the wise advice of his friend, the US ambassador in Managua.

  In reality, the budget of our Ministry of Foreign Affairs will be more than ample after so many cutbacks, because there is a gentle murmur in the air of a plan that has been given the name of another Latin American democrat, by means of which Trujillo’s downfall would be the means to screwing Cuba. First isolate Trujillo and then Cuba—present them as identical: both bloody, both dictatorial, both arbitrary, both bad guys. Thus the “good guys,” the closest friends of the friends of the United States, have begun the long process for isolating Cuba. First Ydígoras, then Somoza, then… I know who, but I’m not going to give his name here.

  I only know that it will be the best of the friends who are left, only a little less close a friend than Ydígoras and Somoza.

  And we will be alone in this hemisphere—alone, disconsolately alone. It seems that they are threatening to leave us without the support of 20 rulers and their ministers, chambers of deputies, newspapers and business people. We will be so alone that the only ones who will remain with us will be the 150 million who constitute the weakest, needy and scorned of Latin America—the people, who are struggling and suffering alongside the Cuban revolution and who will emerge victorious with it.

  Published in Verde Olivo magazine, June 12, 1960.

  The Marshall Plan, the Eisenhower Plan and Other Plans

  By Sharpshooter

  Marshall was a US general. He did what all US generals do in US politics: he defended the interests of US monopolies against all the peoples of the world, including the people of the United States.

  It was in the years just after the last world war, when all the European countries that had just been liberated from Nazism were tragically poor. Millions of US dollars were spread among the hungry people, to return to the coffers of the big monopolies sooner or later and to enslave the peoples to the United States.

  The years went by, and another general became very important in US politics: Eisenhower. They say t
hat he’s a good bridge player and also plays golf, and he, too, has a plan. His plan—which either he or somebody else thought up—is not a plan about golf courses or the rules of bridge; it’s a plan about the Middle East and is aimed at guaranteeing the oil fields, now owned by a few monopolies whose influence we all know about in Cuba: the oil monopolies.

  Those are the general’s’ plans. Now, however, there is a brand new plan in Latin America, so new that the name of its author is only whispered unofficially by cliques of know-it-alls in international politics, and it is rumored that it is already being applied.

  The gyrfalcon of the monopolies’ plan consists simply of convincing everybody that Trujillo and Fidel Castro are alike—the Dominican Republic and Cuba. Once they are equated, the OAS—giving weight to the proceedings and setting precedents—will first isolate, strangle and perhaps destroy Trujillo and then unleash the fury of all the other countries against poor Cuba. This is the situation we face; the plan is being carried out simultaneously.

  In response to pressure by the peoples, relations are being broken with the dictator Trujillo. Wonderful. So, Trujillo carried out a revolution? Let’s break with Trujillo. Trujillo is bad; Trujillo is a murderer! And who is responsible for what the evil Trujillo does? What obscure imperial force gives orders to the generals who, seemingly in the name of Trujillo, are invading a friendly oil-exporting country? Better not investigate, because it might be unhealthy. Let’s break with Trujillo says the voice of the peoples and of the governments, but some governments are also breaking with Cuba. Trujillo–Castro; Cuba–the Dominican Republic. The extremes meet and become interchangeable.

  That is the plan being implemented, the plan that the gossips say was thought up by a great democrat—whose name I can’t mention—who suffers from irreconcilable Fidel Castritis, which is exacerbated when he has to meet with presidents; it weakens him so much he has to take to his bed. That is what the gossips say. But let’s not think about which democratic president’s name should be given to the plan; it’s very probably a lie, and the plan does not deserve his name—or perhaps it should have a long and complicated name that combines the last names of many rulers who see their sinecures endangered.

  What matters is that this plan is aimed at turning Fidel, in the eyes of the Latin American people, into a Trujillo, who must be destroyed; at using the governments’ forces of international solidarity to destroy Trujillo; and at using those forces (or those of someone who says they represent those forces) to destroy Cuba. This is the hard part: all the other parts of the plan are simple and easy to carry out, but it’s hard to confuse the people and to destroy Cuba by armed force. No matter who tries.

  Published in Verde Olivo magazine, June 17, 1960.

  Nixon, Eisenhower, Hagerty and Other Warnings

  By Sharpshooter

  All Latin Americans remember the tour Vice-President Nixon made more than a year ago; it was an uninterrupted series of defeats that wound up with an enraged crowd attacking his car in Caracas with insults, spit and even bricks.

  It was an entire region’s unanimous rejection of a policy—the crude policy of an empire. After that, President Eisenhower went to South America to talk with a series of Latin American rulers and to try to tip the scales against Cuba.

  Once again, the rejection was unanimous. In Brazil, enormous posters expressed feelings against the United States and for Cuba. In Argentina, he had to be rescued by a helicopter that took him to the embassy. In Chile, he had pitched battles with the Central Organization of Workers (CUT); and, in Uruguay, the tear gas that was used against the angry crowd made President Eisenhower cry. Even in poor, disheartened Puerto Rico, so sunk in its pain and oppression, there were protests. Later, after the signing of a much-touted security pact between the United States and Japan and a lot of publicity for a forthcoming visit to Japan by President Eisenhower, several protests took place, culminating in the terrible beating that was given to Mr. Hagerty, the president’s secretary, and President Eisenhower was officially invited to postpone his trip.

  It is time for the US rulers to realize that these expressions of violence by the people, these tumultuous demonstrations in which many enthusiastic young people are beaten up or lose their lives, are in response to something. The US rulers have to understand, once and for all, that the people’s opinion must be respected; that nobody can stop them from expressing what they think; and that, when their views are so obviously hostile, as in Japan and Caracas, some conclusions should be drawn. The world in which President Eisenhower can go around showing off his majestic figure as a hero of democracy without any problems is growing smaller. Our country is a part of this world, and, if President Eisenhower were to visit us with the honest intention of improving our relations—not that of exhibiting his “rights” as consul or to impose some new proconsuls—it might be the safest one of all.

  In any case, all those demonstrations have been a very harsh warning for the United States—which, in this long struggle against the liberation of the world—is in an ever more precarious position. It can’t get the puppet governments to subjugate their people any longer, and the people are rising up and expressing their opposition. It can’t manacle or gag other nations any longer. In spite of the deaf ear it has turned, it should heed this final warning: it has to take the people into account.

  Published in Verde Olivo magazine, June 15, 1960.

  Accusations at the OAS and United Nations and Other Stabs

  By Sharpshooter

  They say that clever birds in the countryside lay their eggs in one place and make a noise in another, to keep their enemies from endangering their offspring; this also happens with the birds of prey called monopolies. They have already decided to attack Cuba. Now, they may be considering what means to use or they may already have made this decision—perhaps a shady action by Allen Dulles in cahoots with the State Department or intervention by the whole Pentagon, with its stiff five-star generals calculating it all on the basis of mathematical formulas.

  The only thing for sure is that they’re doing the same thing as the birds in the countryside. They’re going to the OAS and making a fuss there, and everybody is going to the OAS to defend that “bastion of freedom in the Americas.” There, they are talking, shouting and turning purple in the face, while their eggs are being hatched near Cuba.

  The US law book-thumpers in the House of Representatives and the OAS are engaged in discussions, but the Pentagon is working silently, drawing up formulas, and will one day look for its chicks, those that already think they’re big enough to return to the warm and welcoming soil of Cuba. They will come preceded by the Pentagon’s multi-motor planes, its bombs weighing many tons, its multiple troop divisions and the guns of its battleships sailing in line with its formulas.

  They will come systematically to take their places with clockwork precision. What a shame, what a great shame, that, after so much painstaking work, so many calculations carried to the tenth decimal point and so much determination to defy the wrath of world public opinion, they will find that all of their formulas have failed, and they will totter and collapse. Because, in their formulas for Cuba, they have left out one tiny, worthless, insignificant factor, which will bring the empire’s dreams crashing down: THE PEOPLE.

  Published in Verde Olivo magazine, July 10, 1960.

  The “Court of Miracles” and Other Devices Used by the OAS

  By Sharpshooter

  The Court of Miracles is a legendary name and also the symbol of something where everything is transformed—that is, where concepts are confused. The extraordinary mess called the OAS is precisely a Court of Miracles. This Court of Miracles gets Chapitas or Tachito recognized along with the leaders of democratic countries, and it gives much greater worth to traitors to their peoples than to those who defend their countries’ freedom.

  One of the characteristics of the Court of Miracles is that it keeps turning good people into bad ones and bad people into good. For it, the vote of a tiny is
land is worth just as much as that of a country with 60 million inhabitants. Don’t misunderstand: this is not democracy. They’re worth the same to the Court because everything is controlled by that “generous” spiritual father who is lord and master of the Americas: the United States. Uncle Sam moves his agile fingers, and, below, the puppets Frondizi and Beltrán move gracefully with very pretty, harmonious movements that make you think they have walked and talked by themselves. Therefore, the OAS is also called “the big theater.”

  But sometimes the main artist, Mr. Monopoly, gets mad. Then the puppets become uncoordinated and seem to tremble, and you can see that they’re nothing more than puppets.

  For example, they can’t break off relations with Cuba with the same arrogance and poise as they can with the Dominican Republic. But those illustrious citizens, representatives of the illustrious quasi-nations of Latin America, meet solicitously and vote 20-odd to zero every time the sheep herder claps his hands, and all the sheep follow him. This is why our institution is also called “the big flock.”

  But, naturally, when they meet to rule on the lives and estates of a handful of men which they have turned into a free people by their sovereign will, the members of this innocent flock sometimes become arrogant and absurd, and sometimes become deeply worried about Soviet penetration.

  They defend the Monroe Doctrine. What did Monroe say?

  Well, Monroe said that the Americas should be for the Americans—that is, our beautiful, virgin, Indian America should be for the giant of the North. He also said that the United States would not intervene in Europe and said that the United States would not allow any extra-continental power to intervene in the Americas. What has remained of Mr. Monroe’s verbal bluster? His doctrine of nonintervention is frequently invoked, but those who invoke it have never asked themselves where the US bases now in Britain, Greece, Italy, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, France and Spain will be relocated—on Mars? What has become of the promise that the United States would not intervene in Europe? It has been forgotten. The pretty puppets, who dance to the tune of the puppet master, know what has been swept under the rug but are delighted to lend themselves to this scheme that has been drawn up against our democracy, forgetting true bonds of solidarity.