Talk:Che Guevara/Archive 4

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Clarification needed

The section Criticism of Che opens with the following sentences:

The U.S. claim that the Che Guevara was "personally responsible" for the torture and execution of hundreds of people in Cuban prisons,and the murder of many more peasants in the regions controlled or visited by his guerrilla forces. They also believe that Guevara was a blundering tactician, not a revolutionary genius, who has not one recorded combat victory. Some critics also believe that Che failed medical school in Argentina and that there is no evidence he actually ever earned a medical degree. [2] ,[3], [4], [5], [6],[7],[8]

To whom exactly does "The U.S." refer here? Also, why is "The U.S.", which is apparently intended as a collective noun, followed in the next sentence by "They also believe ..." ? And, finally, who specifically are "They"?

Polaris999 00:32, 27 January 2006 (UTC)


That was added by someone trying to discredit the criticisms of Che by linking it or associating such critisms with the United States (As if they have some secret agenda in making him look bad). I removed it because it is not only improper to say the United States held this view but its just moronic. The section however should stay. (Gibby 06:20, 27 January 2006 (UTC))

The referenced claims are all made by US (predominantly right-wing) newspapers and associated journalists and therefore calling them U.S. claims is quite apt I would think. It is not the best possible wording and the issue of use of words such as "They" is addressed in the Wikipedia style help section on how to avoiding weasel words.
However it is quite proper in my opinion that due note be made of the fact that the critisims listed are predominantly from newpaper and magazine sources with a strong political bias against the individual and therefor should be treated as such and not stated as if they are in any way accepted facts. Canderra 17:04, 27 January 2006 (UTC)


why arent any of you socialists complaining about the moronic reverts by that communist propagandist from ip 83... who keeps making OR claims about sociopaths and love and dubiousness and other bs...watch this guy...he thinks the communist party of Cuba rules by "moral authority" he is a NUT JOB!!!! (Gibby 16:31, 29 January 2006 (UTC))

A note about anti-Che t-shirts may be notable in a section on CG in popular culture, but they hardly constitute serious criticism. Should we link to every company that uses his image on a t-shirt? No. Mattley (Chattley) 18:06, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

Casualties at Bay of Pigs/Playa Girón

The figure of 2,000 deaths which someone inserted into the section "Cuba" is one which I have never seen elsewhere and I therefore support 83.108.6.54's request for sourcing (which s/he placed on the article's "History" page.)

In a document entitled "COMPENSATION CLAIM AGAINST THE UNITED STATES", the Cuban government writes:

"THE mercenary Bay of Pigs invasion, in April 1961, left a count of 176 deaths, more than 300 wounded and 50 maimed for life, for which reason it constitutes Point Four of the Cuban people’s claim against the government of the United States."

Please refer to COMPENSATION CLAIM AGAINST THE UNITED STATES for more details ...

Polaris999 22:27, 27 January 2006 (UTC)


Polaris those figures are far lower than serious most references on the subject report Triay (2001) p. 110 mentions 4,000 casualities; Lynch p. 148 50X or about 5,000 (statistics only comparible to Soviet loss ratios at the beginning of WWII). "Over 2,200 casualties [1]. In one air attack alone Castro forces suffered 1800 casualities caught on an open causeway in civilian buses and hit by napalm (and thus mostly horribly dead) [2][3] [4]. It is not wise to trust "I am not a communist!"-Castro's numbers El Jigüe 1-27-06


Thank you for providing these sources. It is perplexing that so long after the event there is still such a wide range of casualty figures given. I notice that in the wiki article on the Bay of Pigs, on which I believe you are one of the collaborators, the figure of "2,200; estimated casualties" is given. For the sake of consistency, shouldn't this be the figure used in this article also? Furthermore, wouldn't it be more appropriate to present the discussion of Fidel Castro's military tactics in either the "Fidel Castro" or "Cuba" articles, or one about the Cuban military, rather than here in the Che article? Moreover, it is unclear what is meant by your statement: " ... Lynch (p. 148 50X or about 5,000) ." To what does this "50X" refer?
A very specific problem that I have with the changes you have made in this section is the fact that you modified the last sentence in the paragraph from what it had been, i.e. "The victorious Castro government declared Guevara "a Cuban citizen by birth"; he divorced his Peruvian wife, Hilda Gadea, and married a member of Castro's army, Aleida March."
to read:
"Despite the fact that he was not involved in the fighting at the Bay of Pigs, the victorious government declared Guevara "a Cuban citizen by birth"; he divorced his Peruvian wife, Hilda Gadea, and married a member of the 26th of July movement, Aleida March." (You made this change at 10:22, 28 January 2006 , as can be seen on the History page.)
This non sequitur is so absurd that I can only wonder if you meant it as a joke? Surely everyone who has any familiarity at all with the subject at hand knows that the official decree making Che a Cuban citizen "by birth" was published in La Gaceta Oficial on 8 February 1959, i.e. more than two years before the Bay of Pigs invasion! And, he married Aleida March on 2 June 1959. I am therefore going to revert this sentence to its previous, correct version.
Finally, although the following comment refers to an error you have inserted into the section enntitled "Guatemala", I will include it here rather than setting up a separate topic to address it. To wit, at 11:56, 27 January 2006, you wrote:
"His economic survival was precarious and he pawned some of Hilda's jewelry. Then a shipment of weapons from Communist Czechoslovakia for the Arevalo Government arrived and he left Guatemala for El Salvador and then returned to Guatemala. As the invasion by Carlos Castillo Armas faltered and then began to gain ground. He joined an armed militia organized by the Communist Youth for several days but then returned to medical duties, tried to resist the new government of Castillo Armas, but when Hilda was arrested he fled to the refuge of the Argentine Embassy."
The statement that the shipment of weapons from Czechoslovakia was for the Arevalo Government (which I asked you to clarify previously) is certainly erroneous. I assume that you meant that the shipment was for the Arbenz Government? I will make this correction also, and hope that you will let it stand. Polaris999 01:49, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

Good shot Polaris You are correct that mention of Arevalo instead of Arbenz was one of my "brain farts." 50x merely means 50 fold a standard notation in some fields. El Jigüe 1-31-06

Thank you for your reply, El Jigüe. Re the "50X", I was actually trying to find out what the base number for the 50X was, i.e. 50 times what? It would not seem to mean that Castro's casualties were 50X those of the invading forces which are generally estimated to be about 1,300 (see Bay of Pigs Invasion) since in order to have lost 50X that number, Castro would have had to suffer approximately 65,000 casualties which certainly didn't happen. Furthermore you write "50X or about 5,000" which suggests the base number you are using is about 100, but, if this is indeed the case, to what exactly does that 100 refer?
After much consideration, I have removed the following sentences (delimited by parentheses below) from the Che article. While quite interesting, most of this information does not pertain to Guevara or battles in which he participated (in the case of Angola, he had, as you know, been dead for many years when that intervention occurred) and it therefore will be better placed elsewhere. I hope that you will expand this section and insert it into another Wikipedia article, perhaps Military of Cuba or Fidel Castro.

(While some consider Camilo Cienfuegos-Guevara's march on Santa Clara in late 1958 as the final blow that forced Batista to flee the country; there are others who consider Fidel Castro's own far bloodier far harder fought victory at Guisa [1], November 20 to 30, 1958 [2], the so called "Gate of Victory" [3] and the rest of the subsequent Cauto Basin campaign far more decisive (see Castro 1972 pp. 439-449)[4]At Guisa the still fighting Batista army lost perhaps 200 men, while in the armored train (shades of Trotsky) that Guevara attacked the demoralized Batista army only offered token resistance. Later wars when Castro changed to regular USSR style military tactics caused his forces to have far higher losses. During the Bay of Pigs Invasion Castro's losses were very high, Triay (2001 p. 110) mentions 4,000 casualities; Lynch (p. 148 50X or about 5,000) (as statistics only comparible to Soviet loss ratios at the beginning of WWII). Other sources indicate over 2,200 casualties [5]. In one air attack alone Castro forces suffered 1800 casualities caught on an open causeway in civilian buses and hit by napalm (and thus mostly horribly dead) [6][7] [8]. Thus over 2,000 militia died defending Castro at the Bay of Pigs; and perhaps ten fold that again Cubans were lost in the War in Angola. These statistics are comparable to Soviet loss ratios at the beginning of WWII, and reflect the Eastern Block training these militia were receiving.)

Polaris999 23:29, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

Confusion with le Coubre explosion

It seems that some one has confused the statistics of the Bay of Pigs *(April 1961) with that of the explosion of the ammunition ship Le Coubre (La Coubre) (March 196))in which according to Castro Government information:

"Bombs planted at the point of departure and set to explode when the ship was unloaded. Whoever set the bombs did it quite carefully: a second bomb had been set to detonate soon after the first trapping and killing those who had come to help. More than 100 people died that day, among them six French sailors. Hundreds more were hurt.

Alberto Solís Sotolongo, the son of one of the longshoremen killed on the dock while unloading La Coubre, was 14 at the time of the explosion." [9].

The suggestion that this is the source of the confusion is that Che Guevara was around during Le Coubre disaster [10] this reference only has initial figures of 75 killed, in another reference a more complete figure of 136 killed is mentioned by Alberto Korda [11]. Others who place the Che and Korda there mention "hundreds" killed [12]. It is said that Guevara was perhaps responsible for sending people in after the first explosion to be caught in the second explosion. The Castro government had allowed the unloading of the ship at a dockside instead the regulation requiring unloading on to a lighter in the harbor. Guevara was not around the action at the Bay of Pigs, he was chasing a fake invasion (in Pinar del Rio I think). For further details read my coming book El Jigüe 1-27-06

Che in popular culture

This section has recently been created, in part because of a comment I made above (though I wasn't suggesting that we should have such a section). At the moment it consists mainly of links to commercial retailers of CG related merchandise, which is not really appropriate for a wikipedia. The rest is covered elsewhere in the article. Thoughts on removing it? Mattley (Chattley) 18:06, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

You've got to be kidding

Che Guevara has been listed as a good article; it adheres to certain quality standards, and may become a featured article. Please continue improving this article!

If by "good" we mean "biased", and if by "quality standards" we mean "adheres to an angenda", then I have to agree. Haizum 12:55, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for your helpful remarks, which we all find witty, erudite and incisive. Or perhaps not. Mattley (Chattley) 13:31, 6 February 2006 (UTC)
(Chortle) It's funny that such a blatant patron of Thesaurus.com would use the word "erudite." Haizum 17:08, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Bolivian Communist Party

Whilst the statement

Guevara had expected assistance and cooperation from the local dissidents. He did not receive it; and Bolivia's Communist Party, oriented towards Moscow rather than Havana, did not aid him.

may be true, it should be noted that some members of the Bolivian Communist Party did join/support him, such as Rodolfo Saldana, Serapio Aquino Tudela, and Antonio Jimenez Tardio. PJB 15:11, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

I'm not aspecailist on that question was the Bolivian Communist Party legal or clandestine at that time ? Ericd 18:13, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

I think it was legal- which may explain it's leaderships wishs to dissasociate themselves from the guerrillas. PJB 18:16, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

Merchandising of his image a criticism of his policies and ideals? No!

How is

Some critics have used his popular image with t-shirts, caps, etc. to demonstrate exaclty how the spirit of Che has been defeated by capitalism through the merchandising of his image. Some of these critics have taken the criticism a step further by making merchandise critical of Che and his modern supporters.

a criticism of Che, his ideas or his policies? I think it should be removed from the section as it is not really a criticism of Guevara, but an example of how capitalism has perverted his image. I mean, its not like Che would have endorsed this, or would have seen it as a failing on his part. PJB 15:28, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

http://www.che-mart.com/

thats why, enough said. (Gibby 17:50, 8 February 2006 (UTC))

Errr.. I dont see your point. Why is his image's use on products (Like in that website) a problem with Guevara's politics? PJB 18:08, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

If you don't see any difference between the use of Guevara picture in Wikipedia and it's use by some commercial brand of Vodka you have a problem with your understanding of Guevara's views... Ericd 18:21, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

Im saying that the Wikipedia article is about Che. Therefore criticisms about him in the article should be about his policies, views and actions. The use of his image by commercial businesses on T-shirts cannot be a criticism of Guevara as it was up to those comapnies (like the vodka company you mentioned)to use it. How then can the use of his face as a brand by comapnies way after his death for there own purposes be a criticism of Che Guevara? PJB 18:26, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

Missing the point...Che-mart is critical of che...they think he was a murderous commie bastard, they hate him. They also get to poke fun of Che lovers for their ignorance of che's murderous ways and how he sells alot of great products (for profit) to alot of middle class American kids...

i'm sad but not surprised you dont see the point. (Gibby 07:23, 9 February 2006 (UTC))

Some critics have used his popular image with t-shirts, caps, etc. to demonstrate exactly how the spirit of Che has been defeated by capitalism through the merchandising of his image.

Thats the bit I have a problem with. Isn't it just saying that businesses are just cashing in on the image of Che? If it is then how is it a criticism of him? It's saying that capitalists are using the image of a well known figure to make some money-shouldn't it make it clearer that the act of slapping his face over merchandise is to poke fun at Guevara?

I'll admit that I now see how Che-Mart is a criticism, as its selling products that criticise him, but the above sentence dosn't fit. I mean the spirit of Che has been defeated by capitalism through the merchandising of his image is not an example of someone make a criticism of him. The merchandising of his image is to make moolah, not a point...after all thats all the sellers of the products are after right...a few quick dollars off the back of a hero?. PJB 10:58, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Agreed, the lines you quote are very badly written and seem out of context with the section. I have removed them as they don't contain any actual criticism of Che Guevera which is obviously the prerequisite for any information belonging in a section titled "Criticism of Che". Canderra 16:19, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Thank god (Not that god exists or helps me or is worthy of praise)! Someone who agrees with my criticism! I knew it didnt fit in and, as you said, its poorly written. PJB 16:13, 9 February 2006 (UTC)


The Che-Mart group is the group that not only criticized Che but criticizes Che and his supporters by pointing out in their t-shirts that Che is the "greatest T-shirt salesman" its a slap in the face against him and his supporters to note that capitalism is what keeps his image afloat in places like the United States. The wording of the sentence that you dislike is the result of compromise with a communist who refused to allow any mentioning of Che-Mart in the article (even after he demanded a source). (Gibby 16:52, 9 February 2006 (UTC))

Well it sounded bad and was confusingly written. I would accept that companies would ridicule/criticise Che via their products, but that didnt come across clearly. PJB 16:56, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Sounds better now. Now it dosnt sound like its saying that because companies use his image he (Che) must be wrong. PJB 17:03, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Needs a mention?

Should it not also be mentioned that in the Bolivian campaign Che Guevara and his guerillas did not execute, torture or abuse any captured Bolivian troops?

In the Bolivian Diary Guervara's men capture several enemy soldiers (For example a Major on 10th April 1967), and not once do they beat them or kill them (unlike what happens to Che and his men at La Higuera under CIA direction).

I feel this is an important point to mention in order to give a balanced view of his actions. It also shows him not to be the blood thirsty maniac with no compassion. Maybe it should be put in the Hero? section? PJB 12:55, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

It might also be appropriate to mention that Che gave medical attention to all of the wounded Bolivian soldiers whom the guerrillas took prisoner, before releasing them. Even after his last battle at the Quebrada del Yuro, in which he had been wounded, when he was taken to a temporary holding location and saw there a number of Bolivian soldiers who had also been wounded in the battle, he offered to give them medical care. (His offer was turned down by the Bolivian officer in charge.) Source: Paco Taibo Ignacio II.
PJB, perhaps you would like to made this addition to the article? Personally, I believe it would best be placed in the "Insurgent" or "Capture and execution" section since this is a matter of fact, not perception. Polaris999 14:48, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

O.k. PJB 16:10, 9 February 2006 (UTC)


Added

The torture and subsequent execution of Guevara and his men by the Bolivian army, under CIA supervision, at La Higuera is in marked contrast to Che's treatment of Bolivian prisoners. In the Bolivian Diary Guervara's men captured several enemy government soldiers (For example a Major on 10th April 1967), and not once did they beat them or kill them.

to the section on his death. Its not biased or a POV. PJB 17:50, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

It IS POV. You are trying to place a hagiographic slant on Che.

Aggreed, its not only pov it is original research. Many critics of Che note that he was violent and often tortured his prisoners...no use saying just the opposite especially with no citations.(Gibby 06:15, 11 February 2006 (UTC))

During the Bolivian campaign Guevara didn't torture any of his prisoners. He did not conduct summary executions of prisinors. Read the Bolivian Diary..all of the prisoners he takes are released.

Compare to the Bolivians. They kill him on the spot (There was no death penalty in Bolivia at the time!!), they kill his comrades on the spot, with evidence of torture.

The Bolivian Diary gives info on his treatment of PoWs. He didnt lie in the diary as it was personnal and for his eyes only. PJB 15:59, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

I want to add

Despite the violent nature of the conflict it might also be appropriate to mention that Che gave medical attention to all of the wounded Bolivian soldiers whom the guerrillas took prisoner, before releasing them. Even after his last battle at the Quebrada del Yuro, in which he had been wounded, when he was taken to a temporary holding location and saw there a number of Bolivian soldiers who had also been wounded in the battle, he offered to give them medical care (His offer was turned down by the Bolivian officer in charge.). Source: Paco Taibo Ignacio II.

to the section on the insurgency. It shows a side to Guevara not apparent elsewhere in the article. Might need cleaning up a little, but I will include it in one form or another. PJB 18:03, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

I've added the above paragraph. PJB 18:33, 9 February 2006 (UTC)


I've added

although some members of the Bolivian Communist Party did join/support him, such as Rodolfo Saldana, Serapio Aquino Tudela, and Antonio Jimenez Tardio against the party leadership's wishes.

to the Insurgent section's reference to his lack of support from the Bolivian Communist Party. PJB 19:49, 9 February 2006 (UTC)


There is already a section on the Bolivian Diary. I also suggest you try and read something else. Che is hardly the man you romanticize him to be. (Gibby 17:46, 11 February 2006 (UTC))

Minor issue

The statement

On 7 February 1959, the victorious government proclaimed Guevara "a Cuban citizen by birth". He immediately proceeded to divorce his Peruvian wife, Hilda Gadea, and on 2 June 1959 married Aleida March[›], a Cuban-born member of the 26th of July movement with whom he had been living since mid-1958.

makes it sound like Guevara divorced his Peruvian wife either because he had just become a Cuban (did she object, forcing a breakup?) or because he wanted to celebrate victory by marry his female comrade. Which, if either, is it? It needs to be clearer why he divorced her, as at the moment it sounds like it was due to his becoming a Cuban citizen. PJB 19:05, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

I wrote the above and appreciate your pointing out that it needs clarification since it is often hard for the author to catch such flaws in his/her own work. The facts are these: Che had decided to separate from Hilda before he left Mexico on the Granma. The best information I have indicates that he was never "in love" with her, but they lived together in Mexico and when she became pregnant he decided to marry her for the sake of the child. Before sailing on the Granma, he reiterated all of this to Hilda, but she chose not to accept the fact that he intended for the marriage to end. Shortly after the "26th of July movement" triumphed (on 21 January 1959 to be exact) she took their three-year-old daughter ("Hildita") and flew to Havana, in her mind for the purpose of being reunited with Che and resuming their marriage. He immediately informed her that as far as he was concerned their marriage was over and that he would be initiating divorce proceedings immediately. This was before he had been proclaimed "a Cuban citizen by birth", and I feel quite certain that it had nothing whatsoever to do with the citizenship issue. During the years that he was fighting in the Sierra, Che had been involved with several women, but had "settled down" with Aleida March in the summer of 1958. He told Hilda that he intended to marry Aleida as soon as their divorce became final, and this is what he did. (As to his motives for marrying Aleida, I have no definitive information and prefer not to speculate ... )
I hope that you will re-word the relevant section of the Che article to improve its clarity.
Polaris999 01:57, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Polaris999...I didnt want to be picky but I thought it sounded a bit off. Ill rewrite that part. PJB 11:59, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

Unless I am missing something, I can't see where/when he marries Hilda Gadea: the article just jumps to the divorce, which is a bit confusing. Needs adding? --Slp 00:57, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for pointing this out, Slp! It definitely should be included -- I will try to find a place to insert it. Polaris999 01:59, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
I included the information about Hilda in the first paragraph of the "Cuba" section. Thanks again for bringing this omission to my attention! Polaris999 23:36, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

Needs a mention (2) ?

Shouldn't his nickname (Che) be explained in the first paragraph/intro? It means "friend/mate" in Spanish, and Argentines are stereotyped as saying it often. PJB 12:07, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

Added it.

PJB 14:24, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

The nickname is discussed at length in the "Guatemala" section where it probably belongs since that is where it was given to him.
Polaris999 19:51, 10 February 2006 (UTC)


Also, in Critics of Che section, should something be mentioned of Cuban Exile critics in Miami? There must be members of that community who criticise him for helping to overthrow their beloved dictator Batista?

Re your statement "There must be members of that community who ... " : Definitely true -- and several of them are using the Che article here on wikipedia to express their point of view.
Polaris999 19:51, 10 February 2006 (UTC)


And another thing in the Critics of Che section...shouldnt it be flatly stated that his aim to overthrow the Bolivian government by force and violence rather than through politics (After all the Bolivian Communist Party was active, but banned I think after his actions) is a source of criticism? PJB 12:13, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

Mario Monje and the rest of the leadership of the Bolivian Communist Party (PCB) initially pledged their support for the operation, but Monje alleges that this was because they had been misled by Fidel Castro into thinking that the Cubans' intention was to use Bolivia merely as a transit point to infiltrate guerrillas into other South American countries. The Ñancahuazú farm was purchased by Coco Peredo, a member of the Communist Youth branch of the PCB who became a leader of the guerrillas, using money given to the PCB by Cuba for that purpose. The location chosen was, shall we say, unfortunate, and far from the area where Che had expressly directed that the land should be purchased -- he had selected the Alto Beni region. Exactly what was said among Fidel Castro, Manuel Piñeiro and Mario Monje remains murky and it seems probable that the exact truth will never be known. Che and Monje did not personally discuss plans for the guerrilla operation until after Che had arrived at the Ñancahuazú farm. This meeting took place on 31 December 1966 and it immediately became apparent that their expectations were very different and by the time it ended it was clear that the PCB would not be collaborating with Che's group. Monje asked Che's permission to inform those members of the PCB Communist Youth who were members of the guerrilla troop about the fact that the PCB would not be supporting the movement and to give them the option to withdraw from it. Che assented and Monje addressed them, laying out his objections to Che's plans and asking them to leave the guerrilla and return with him to La Paz. They unanimously chose to stay with Che and Monje returned to La Paz the next day.
Polaris999 19:51, 10 February 2006 (UTC)


Also that could mean that the Bolivian Communist Party would criticise him...there might be an example out there somewhere. After all Che's actions got them banned (I think---please verify), which would have driven them ape-shit (especially if they were involved in elections etc. to win power peacefully). PJB 12:43, 10 February 2006 (UTC)


A parcel of jungle land in the Ñancahuazú region had been purchased by native Bolivian Communists and turned over to him for use as a training area.

Was the land purchased before he decided to go to Bolivia by the Communists or was it bought specifically for a training area for the guerillas? The answer could shed light on local support for Che.

If it was bought before hand, were the Communists (Were they members of the BCP, Bolvians who held communist views or some of the communists who had gone against the BCP's leaderships wishes?) supporting him secretly and supported his aims? PJB 12:51, 10 February 2006 (UTC)


Please refer to my answer to this in the above paragraph. Probably there should be a separate article about Monje in which all of these issues could be explored in greater detail ... (Yes, the PCB was outlawed after the guerrilla operation was discovered.)
Polaris999 19:51, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

I know Monje had his three goals of:

  • Resigning from the Bolivian Communist Party, after ensuring its neutrality
  • Take control of the political and military leadership of the revolution
  • Try to get other groups on side

Che's refusal of point 2 (Military control of the revolution) seems to have angered Monje, who then went back, as you say, to La Paz, where he seemed to turn the Bolivian Communist Party against Che (Kicking out guerrillas from the Youth Movement, refusing support etc).

I agree that a seperate area/article or something should be made to further explore this.

PJB 12:32, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Also a few other things that I would like to discuss for inclusion:

  • Lucia Alvarez De Toledo (Who translated my copy of the Bolivian Diary) writes in her introduction of an old Cuban peasant who has a 'Santeria' shrine in his house, which has a picture of Guevara amongst the other idols. The old Cuban peasant swore that Che was black and Cuban born! She also mentions a women in La Higuera, who was 19 when Guevara was in Bolivia, who tells her "Look at us. Nothing has changed since then (The Bolivian Revolution). El Commandante came too soon. We were ignorant of him and did not understand him. We abandoned him and he died because of us, when he had come to save us so that we could have a better life, and here we are, just as we were before he came or maybe even worse". Could these we used to write a couple of paragraphs in the Hero section on popular support and as an example of his legacy respectivly?
  • The land reforms of the government, inadequete and limited as they were, did give peasants a stake in the status quo. Lucia Alvarez De Toledo believes this will explain the lack of peasant support (as well as the fear of the conflict).

Whats your thoughts?

PJB 12:49, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Another interesting thing I've just read is the events on 24th March 1967. Che records that an officer whom he had captured 'gave the names of two other officers who were willing to co-operate.' Was the Barrientos regime popular, and could this be mentioned in the Bolivian Campaign section? If so, how?

PJB 13:09, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Attention requested

Che Guevara's involvement in the Cuban Revolution, especiallly the Psychological profile section reads increasingly like an unencyclopedic attack piece. I can only guess that someone is taking advantage of that having been split out from the main article to write things that would never be tolerated in this more-watched article, and that are basically off-topic for an article about his involvement in the Cuban Revolution. I don't have time to wade into this now, but I urge those who are working on this article to read and watchlist that one as well. - Jmabel | Talk 04:49, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Definitely agree.--Dakota 18:47, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Guevara’s effectiveness in combat

Guevara’s effectiveness in combat is doubted by some. At el Hombrito the Che fired a BAR (Browning Automatic Rifle) at short range and missed (James, 2001, p. 97); the one dead enemy was probably killed by Francisco Tamayo Rodriguez (El Mejicano) with a single shot .22. At Úbero, assigned to an intermediate position, the Che did not participate directly in the assault (James, 2001, p 92 -93) unlike Camilo Cienfuegos, Efiginio Almeijeras, and Jorge Sotus.

In the Che’s final combat (April 1958), near Santa Rosa, Buey Arriba, with his feared enemy Sánchez Mosquera, Guevara left his men to ambush Mosquera’s troops at very close range from beneath the cover of a grass covered bank of the upper Buey River. Guevara supporters claim that he taken this position to sniping at Mosquera (really does not bear up because Guevara usually carried shorter range weapons, at this time a Beretta submachine gun) and admits running away [13], [14]. However, Guevara’s men held firm, and came out of hiding, firing at the standing Batista’s who were firing at the Che running away, and managed to cause causalities including the wounding of Mosquera.

During the Batista’s army assault on Sierra Maestra, Guevara did not support Rene Ramos Latour and as a result Ramos was wounded and bled to death as "Benigno" watched (Alarcón Ramírez, 1997). The Che’s greatest victory the assault on the armored train is reputed bought [15]. The numerous overseas adventures which he participated in/ and or planned were all failures.

—This unsigned comment was added by 216.152.242.200 (talk • contribs) 15 February 2006.

Criticism Section being defaced

Some of the additions to this section (in particular from User:KDRGibby) are such blatant POV that the entire section is being put into disrepute. It seems everyday new extraordinary claims (e.g. "[Che Guevera has] no recorded combat victories", "Che was a major failure at managing the Cuban economy", etc) which are only backed-up by references to columns, blogs and rants on extreme right-wing websites (which normally do not provide references or only provide equally unreliable and biased references).

Looking at this user's contributions page, it is clear that this person has been trawling Wikipedia adding large criticism sections (albeit with very bad spelling) to anything which disagrees with his exact point of view.

While most people would probably agree that there are many issues to criticise Che Guevera on and the majority of these have already been listed. The article was after all peer-reviewed and specified as a 'Good article' with "excellent NPOV" in 2004). Now however the criticism section is in danger of becoming a "this guy was a communist satan incarnate" rant. Can people please take extra care to ensure this section is kept as neutrally orientated as possible and not further vandalised by users such as KDRGibby (who's user page advocates the use of multiple aliases to achieve POV orientated defacement). Canderra 19:06, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Canderra, it is ok to have a pov so long as the pov is cited with sources and presented npov style. For example one must say, Critics believe XYZ. CITE You are placing your own pov by deleting cited material on bogus grounds. The sources are not blogs. I doubt you've read them. You technically confirm this because, I looked at KDRGibby's page, and it appears as if he is addressing leftist behavior not condoning it. You do not actually read the material.
Please read what is cited. Please look up the definition for words such as blogs. And please refer yourself to wiki rules regarding vandalism, pov, and npov.
Oh and btw, you have already violated the 3rr rule on this page with 4 reverts in a 24 hour period.
You wouldn't happen to be KDRGibby would you? (It appears User:KDRGibby has been blocked for making personel attacks although blockings don't stop people using anon. ip's). Funny how you have only reverted his portions and duplicated his dubious "sources". I have read the "sources" and I think most people would agree that a rant by someone who claims to have lived in Cuba yet cites no sources and provides no evidence of this or his claims does not count as a source (anyone could write such a page and use it to cite anything).
For your information, I have not performed 4 reverts in the last 24 hours, only 3. As the Vandalism page states "(Vandalism is any addition, deletion, or change to content made in a deliberate attempt to reduce the quality of the encyclopedia.)" - trying to flood numerous wikipedia articles with extreme right-wing properganda is obviously vandalism. You can start your own extreme right-wing version of Wikipedia if you wish but Wikipedia.org is a NPOV website Canderra 21:32, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

From 1956 on Feburary 15 till 1916 on Feb 16 you made 4 reverts. You should be blocked. You should also be blocked for deleting sourced material on made up grounds. They are not blogs. I do not tthink you have bothered to read them. The quality of the article is reduced by making up rules as you go along, as you have done.

You are making claims of "right wing propoganda" that you cannot back up. Please stop abusing the rules and throwing baseless accusations around.

"This is the story of failure"

  • This is the story of failure

This is the first line from the preface of “The African Dream”, and was not written by a critic of Guevara, but by his daughter Aleida Guevara (correct me if I am wrong but it is either her, Gott, or Che). Guevara’s status as a “tactician” or successful “guerilla soldier” is, as the critics cite, wholly without merit and should be reflected in the article. Guevara is portrayed by those who idolize him as the David to America’s imperialistic goliath, but realistically this is more of a construct than any accurate reflection of history. Outside of a few engagements in Cuba, Guevara had no success anywhere else he tried to export the revolution to. In fact on the few occasions he tangled with US forces directly, he had was defeated. In the Congo, his forces were decimated by the local Congolese led by a 6 man Green Beret A-team, and in Bolivia, well we know that story. Interestingly enough, the purpose of the A-Team in the Congo was not to kill Guevara, but to grind him down and humiliate him, as they had numerous opportunities to kill him. There is a reason that the US Army’s special warfare school makes its students read Giap, but not Guevara.

So the question remains, how do we fix this in the article? Ten Dead Chickens 20:38, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Here are a couple of suggestions:
For starters, if you are going to pretend to use a direct verbatim quote, why not get the quote right? What you have written above is not the first line from Aleida Guevara March's foreword to The African Dream. Check it out ...
Next, why not sign your comments on this Talk/Discussion page with your user name since that is the Wiki rule?
Polaris999 20:22, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
Preface, intro, its all good. But what about the specifics? Ten Dead Chickens 20:38, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

changes to criticism section

A new IP editor suddenly burst onto this page [16], who looks suspiciously like User:KDRGibby, who is currently blocked for a week. [17] Anyone want to comment? Elle vécut heureuse à jamais (Be eudaimonic!) 23:24, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

After reviewing the History page of the Che article and the "contribs" pages of User:KDRGibby and 129.15.107.84, I would conclude that KDRGibby and 129.15.107.84 are one and the same. Significantly, the last posting by KDRGibby was made at 14:06, 16 February 2006 and the first posting by 129.15.107.84 at 15:37, 16 February 2006; KDRGibby had been blocked, and the block vprotected, by Jpgordon at 14:14, 16 February 2006.
This same user now seems to be appearing as 129.15.107.72 . This IP is based at the University of Oklahoma.
I requested semi-protection for this page a few weeks ago because of similar problems, but the admin who reviewed the request said that s/he didn't think semi-protection was necessary at that time. Perhaps some admin will agree that it is necessary at this time?
Polaris999 00:03, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Hang loose for a bit. If KDRGibby continues using socks to evade blocks, the results of his arbitration will likely make this easier to take care of. --jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 00:22, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
Thank you, Jpgordon, for providing that link to the arbitration page of KDRGibby which is very interesting to read. BTW, another situation that we have developing here is that a certain user who refuses to register and who has many warnings and blocks has begun using a TOR router to slip in here pretending to be someone else. Do you happen to know if there is a Wiki policy re the use of TOR routers for this purpose? Polaris999 02:15, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
Sure. See Wikipedia:No open proxies. --jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 03:52, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
Many thanks, Jpgordon! I thought that Wikipedia had such a policy, but could not bring up information about it via any of the keywords I tried in the search engine. Polaris999 05:37, 17 February 2006 (UTC)


Would y'all mind NOT steam rolling my edits in this merry go round? Ten Dead Chickens 01:39, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
Might help if you signed your comment so we would know who you are ... Polaris999 01:33, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Speaking of which, why all the fuss about who KDRGibby may or may not be? What about the point, namely that the entire criticism section is being remove, when clearly its cited, and reflects the source. Perhaps it could be worded a bit better, but I plan on doing some serious re-working of this article and hate to see my contributions rolled over. Ten Dead Chickens 01:45, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

TDC, if you can figure out how to do this without being constantly "wiped out" as an unintended side effect of reverts that are done to correct vandalism, I will be eager to learn your method. All I can suggest is that you work on one section at a time as that makes it easier to recover your contributions if they do happen to get rolled over. I personally try to never revert the entire article but rather restore particular sentences if they get deleted, mangled, or vandalized. Sometimes, however, when a vandalism attack affects the entire article, there is no option except to rv it ... Anyway, I have always tried to respect your edits in the past and will certainly continue to do so in the future. Polaris999 02:08, 17 February 2006 (UTC)



DELETE / MOVE / CORRECT ARTICLE AND / OR SIMPLY BE FAIR

==Delete==

________________________________________________________________________________

or put it anywhere else

this article is on a revolutionary politician, NOT a PHOTOGRAPHER

if the picture of Che is of importance, please mention the author / photographer of the picture by name and directly at the picture. Please regard the international guidelines in behaviour of pictures and photographers. If you do not so, please leave wikipedia alone, because this tryes to be a seriously platform and scitifically encyclopedia, but no kid's play ground.

For the record, the above unsigned comment was created and edited by 217.7.165.169 aka User:Photomania between 03:27 and 03:47, 17 February 2006.
Polaris999 07:34, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

A Blog Or Not a Blog, that is the question

Editor Canderra argues that the sources below are blogs and has deleted the material. The material is still not present in the article but no other editor has bothered to confirm or deny these assertions (For whatever reason). Please take your time now to review the section and check the sources for yourself, lets see if they really are blogs.


New York Sun writer, Williams Myers, labels Che as a "sociopathic thug".[18] Other US newspaper critics have made similar remarks. They point out that Che Guevara was responsible for the torture and execution of hundreds of people in Cuban prisons, and the murder of many more peasants in the regions controlled or visited by his guerrilla forces. Contrary to Che supporters, these critics also argue that Che was a blundering tactician with no recorded combat victories. They claim that Che failed medical school in Argentina and that there is no evidence that he earned a medical degree.[19] [20] They note that Che murdered individuals on dubious grounds and took their property, seized private manors for himself, and distributed property among communist bureaucrats rather than the peasants. The also state that he not only oversaw the prison, over which he ordered the execution of hundreds if not thousands of Cubans, but also helped institute forced labor camps when volunteerism failed. Finally, these critics believe that Che was a major failure at managing the Cuban economy as he "oversaw the near-collapse of sugar production, the failure of industrialization, and the introduction of rationing—all this in what had been one of Latin America’s four most economically successful countries since before the Batista dictatorship."[21],[22],[23]
Some critics, such as Che-Mart, have merchandised their dislike of Che Guevara by marketing t-shirts poking fun at both Che Guevara and his supporters, for example, pointing out what they percieve as an irony: Che Guevara as one of capitalisms hotest selling images.[24]


  • They are not blogs. Put the material back in. (Gibby 20:03, 18 February 2006 (UTC))


I think that User:KDRGibby has raised an important issue here and hope that other editors will comment on it. The sources cited in the first paragraph s/he references above are not blogs, but most of them are of an extremely POV nature and dubious quality -- they hardly seem to meet the Wikipedia requirement set forth in Wikipedia:Verifiability that only "reliable and reputable sources" be used. But, then again, how is one to categorize a source as "reliable and reputable" or not? Perhaps the following section of Wikipedia:Verifiabilty can serve as a guide:

Self-published sources
Anyone can create a website or pay to have a book published, and then claim to be an expert in a certain field. For that reason, self-published books, personal websites, and blogs are largely not acceptable as sources. Exceptions may be when a well-known, professional researcher in a relevant field, or a well-known professional journalist, has produced self-published material. In some cases, these may be acceptable as sources, so long as their work has been previously published by credible, third-party publications. However, exercise caution: if the information on the professional researcher's blog is really worth reporting, someone else will have done so.

Polaris999 01:42, 19 February 2006 (UTC)


I actually only stated that a couple of specific websites User:KDRGibby 'cited' were blogs not all of them. It should however be noted that all the sources KDRGibby lists above are either commentaries by right-wing journalists (half from less than reputable and politically biased websites) or unreferenced rants by supposed Cuban exiles. Also, references for most of the material in these sources are few and far between. As Polaris999 notes, they definatly fall below the reliability required by the Wikiepdia policy on Wikipedia:Verifiability.
Of the content KDRGibby contests must be included, there are numerous factual flaws, as a sample:
  1. The quote "no recorded combat victories" is categorically false as most biographical sources list at least several combat victories e.g. the winning of the battle of the city of Santa Clara by the column he led was probably the most decisive victory of the Cuban revolution!
  2. The sentence which starts "Che was a major failure at managing the Cuban economy" contains several misleading statements and besides which when exactly did Che Guevara manage the Cuban economy? His only economically related role was minister of Industries for just 3 years, hardly long enough to "over[see] the near-collapse of sugar production, the failure of industrialization". Also, to imply Cuba was a economically succsessful country under the previous Batista dictatorship is extremely dubious.
  3. As far as I can see, the claim that he failed his medical degree comes from a single unreliable researcher several decades after Che's death and is based pretty solely on the fact that his documentation could not be located by the researcher and ignores all testimonies of his graduation. Besides, try and find the documentation of any other of his 1948 University of Buenos Aires medical degree classmates, not easily done. Sure the claim has been made none-the-less, but it is a controversial one (as is currently noted in the article).
Obviously a biographical article on someone like Che Guevara (who played a major part in the formation of a new political system) deserves a criticism section, in particular, to draw attention to the evidence of his involvement in the widespread execution of political adversaries after the revolution. But to add some of KDRGibby's more extreme claims, which are backed up only by the most unreliable and doubtful “sources”, only degrades the quality of the article and is out of keeping with the intended objective nature of biographical articles on Wikipedia. Canderra 02:54, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Polaris, Wiki does not prohibit the use of POV sources, that is afterall how we get all our info anyway. What wiki wants is to present pov material in npov fashion which means citing the source and informing readers that this is the opinion or belief of the source. These sources have a different pov than most of the editors adding to the Che page, the pov of these people is that Che was a good man. If we delete opposition to this we do in fact promote a pov without actually saying so.

Canderra, if you read the sources, one of them mentions that there is dispute over the battle of Santa Clara stating that it may not actually have been a battle at all but a pre-arranged surrender. Nevertheless these are reputable sources and they are NOT blogs, nor are they self published. IRI, HNN, and FPM are not blogs, they are not self publications, they hire people to research and write and or pay scholars and journalists for their material.

In regards to Cuban economics there are multiple sources that mention the pre revolution economy and the post economy...if Milton Friedm et. al. are correct it doesnt take long to ruin an economy with communism. Lennin managed to nearly ruin Russia in 18 months. AT anyrate, if the claims are dubious the burdon of proof is now on you to say otherwise. You can't just delete the information if you yourself have no cited counterpoints and no good reasons other than protecting your own POV.

As far as dubious sources, this page has most of its sources coming from various Che biographies written by friends and appologists for them...this gives a pov. If you leave out my section, then almost everything else from the page should be deleted as well. Furthermore, if my sources are "dubious at best" what kind of dubious pov is giong to be provided when quoting the thoughts and words of Che directly? Do you really think Che would criticize himself? If supporting Che and being Che are the only qualifications for being a proper source for this article (And that seems to be what is being said here) then we have violated the Wiki NPOV rules...quite blatantly. (Gibby 06:13, 19 February 2006 (UTC))


I'm sorry but this is getting ridiculous, one cannot just introduce whatever claims that can be found from all corners of the internet regardless of the source website's material not even being properly cited and then state it is up to other editors to prove the claims are false. A quick search on Google yields this website [[25]], of equal validity to many of the sources you quote above, claiming that hundreds of people think that Napoleon is god. Obviously this website does not mean however that the Napoleon article should now be updated with a section stating that he may be god with a link to the quoted website somehow validating the claim.
This is an encyclopedia we are trying to create here so primary and secondary sources are always preferable over other tertiary sources. You are mistaken if you think I believe Che was a "Good man", I (like most Wikipedia editors) just want an accurate npov biographical article on him and all other similarly notable persons. This is why (as noted by Polaris999), the [guideline on partisan websites] as well as the [publication guideline] clearly states that the material from websites such as frontpagemag.com and independant.org are not acceptable as a secondary or tertiary source. A quick glance at the general content of these websites should reassure any editor of this (frontpagemag.com even sells 'bumper stickers' which say "right-wing extremist"!).
I do not wish to continue this discussion further as it appears to be going around in circles. Myself and other editors have stated several times why some specific contributions you have made to this article are not valid and have shown the relevant Wikipedia guidelines which state exactly why. It would be a loss to the article to have an editor such as yourself not contribute so please start assisting us in constructing and maintaining a good, factual article, not one full of wild accusations. Canderra 23:16, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
That said, the majority of KDRGibby's sources are mainstream news and opinon outlets. Why are these bieng thrown out with the other more contentious sources? Ten Dead Chickens 23:26, 19 February 2006 (UTC)


The sources are valid, they are respectable, they are published. And the material is presented as a information regarding these critics views of Che Guevara. It should not be deleted. Canderra is treating views he does not agree with poorly. Wikipedia does not prevent the disimination of published points of views. The section is npov because it demonstrates these are the views of particular critics.

If we throw out something like frontpagemag (especially IRE which is nonpartisan (for godssake) then we HAVE to throw out autobiographical material and or other material written by LEFTWINGERS! Ultimatly we will be left with very little on the page.

What is going on here is the systematic elimination of any material contrary to the views of certain editors who like Che. The deletion of this material is unfair and not logically consistant with what is present on the page in other sections.(Gibby 23:41, 19 February 2006 (UTC))

And forgive me if I don't believe you Canderra but your main criticism on the section said, repeatidly, that the citations were blogs, which they clearly were not. You are attempting to delete the material by whatever means are necessary and I do not think it is to keep a good factual article...otherwise your complaints would have been...say good and factual themselves. (Gibby 23:51, 19 February 2006 (UTC))

I have no problem with deleting the reference to FPM, as long as its author is not a widely published individual. Wikipedia suffers from too much sourcing from non notable individuals with big megaphones (i.e. Kevin Drum). With that said, I think that there is some debate as to the notability of Fontova, and a case could be made either way as to the inclusion of his opinion and notes. But I do agree that KDRGibby contributions are cited with mainstream sources, NOT WEBLOGS AS IS CONSTANTLY CLAIMED, and removing it is indefensible for the reasons given above. Ten Dead Chickens 16:34, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
Hello, TDC. I notice that you have removed the NPOV tags placed on both sub-sections of the Legacy section with the comment on the History page, "(since both sections appear to be adequately sourced, this should be removed)". I am glad that you have removed the NPOV tags because I do not think that POV was the main issue with these two sub-sections; in my opinion, the problem continues to be the matter of sourcing. In the case of "Support", I do not consider it to be adequately sourced. The only source given refers to the Korda photo. I think that more references are definitely needed here, including one for the Sartre remark: although it may be "common knowledge" for many that he said that, this doesn't eliminate the need for it to have a proper citation.
As for the "Criticism" sub-section, I think that it reads like a rant. And I continue to maintain that most of the sources cited therein do not meet Wikipedia's verifiability and reliability standards. How can we have confidence in the accuracy of Fontova's reporting when he wasn't even able to find out how to correctly spell "Dzerzhinsky"? If a "Legacy" section is supposed to contain diatribes such as these, I suppose that someone will have to re-write the "Legacy" section of the article on Franklin Roosevelt to include the opinions of him expressed by Adolf Hitler, Mussolini and Hirohito ...
Polaris999 20:08, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
If you question the sourcing of the support section, then fix it. If you have a problem with the content of the “legacy” section, than I suggest a name change, as I don’t feel it is appropriate. It deals very little with Guevara’s legacy, and is more of a “why we hate him” vs “why we love him” argument. If the criticism section reads like a “rant” to you, then change the language, don’t remove it. All the sources, except for Fontova, are linked to mainstream sources, and passes the WP:Cite criteria. As for Fontova, spelling variations on names are common, and if this is the best straw man you can provide to exclude his comments, you are setting the bar awfully low. Ten Dead Chickens 20:30, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
I had no part in writing either of those sub-sections and therefore do not plan to add citations or alter their content in any way. I did just now change the name of the section from "Legacy" to "Aftermath"; perhaps another editor will come up with a better name for it. BTW Fontova also gets Guevara's own name wrong, but I guess that wouldn't bother you. As for the statements he makes quoting unknown or little-known persons, I could hardly track down these individuals to find out whether they did or did not make such statements, and, in the case they had, whether there was any evidence to support them. It is interesting to note, however, that on his own blog/webpage[26], Fontova describes himself as "America's bestselling, incorrigibly incorrect, Cuban-Cajun author and columnist".
Polaris999 00:33, 23 February 2006 (UTC)
Update: Because the Che Guevara article was promoted to FAC status earlier today and no one else has undertaken to clean-up the Support and Criticism sub-sections, I have reluctantly decided to undertake this task since in their present "unkempt" state they detract from the rest of the article. Polaris999 05:14, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

The Battle of Santa Clara

When the Che reached Las Villas Province that area was already occupied by very diverse anti-Batista forces which included Eloy Gutiérrez Menoyo and William Alexander Morgan who are usually deleted from Cuban government photographs [27]. The Che soon ran into trouble with the other rebels to the point that he was disarmed and sent out of a certain area by rebel comandante Jesús Carreras [28].

The Che’s greatest “victory” the assault on the armored train is also reputed bought [29]. In this “action” only “El Vaquerito is reported killed, losses of the Batista soldiers are apparently zero [30]; however, it seems that 37 Batista soldier prisoners were executed immediately afterwards [31], [32]. Finding himself without the kind of support he had from other rebels and auxiliaries, the numerous unsupported overseas adventures which El Che participated in/ and or planned were all failures. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.240.227.15 (talk • contribs)

In the article by Humberto Fontova that you cite above -- giving two separate footnotes for the same article located at different URL's -- I have noticed that the number he actually mentions is 27, not 37. He writes as follows:
"Yet immediately after the Santa Clara bribe and skirmish, Che ordered 27 Batista soldiers executed as 'war criminals.' "
Polaris999 08:44, 24 February 2006 (UTC)


Polaris you are correct, it should have read 27 not 37. As to the Mexican you will find him scattered through out the references either as El Mejicano, the Mexican or Francisco Rodriguez Tamayo for instance he is cited on page 264 of John Anderson's book. He also probably killed the only Batista fatality with a one shot .22 at El Hombrito, which Che takes credit for even though he missed at close range with his BAR (see James). Why the heck Che was using that very heavy and cumbersome weapon I do not know. The Mexican was also close to Universo Sanchez who used him as an executioner and bodyguard. It is said that the Mexican was involved in crime in Miami, and his name appears in various John Kennedy's shooting conspiracy theory site; frankly I think he too was "company" and that all this crime stuff is mere "cover"....

Thank you for the clarification, El Jigüe. BTW I do not mean to argue that the "Battle of Santa Clara" was on the scale of, shall we say,
the Battle of Kursk ;-) . By all measures, it seems to have been a minor engagement -- but, since it is generally referred to by the name "Battle of Santa Clara", I think that we need to continue using that terminology unless someone wants to write a separate article on the event explaining why it should be called something else ... Polaris999 20:52, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Removal of sentence

I reverted to remove a sentence which in part contained "However this is a load of nonsense."--Dakota ~ ° 01:15, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I know the bit you mean -- someone just added that a few minutes ago, maybe as a joke. In any case, it definitely needs to go! Polaris999 01:36, 28 February 2006 (UTC)
This article sees much ip action. Is there or was there a move on to semi protect. Just curious--Dakota ~ ° 18:38, 1 March 2006 (UTC)



Hello, Dakota. In response to your inquiry, I am posting below the request I made for semi-protection on 23 February 2006 and the reply received from User:Voice of All. I found this reply quite enigmatic as I have not been able to figure out how the vandalism could be "Not yet as bad as it looks." Since the abuse has abated somewhat since then, I have not taken any further action. Perhaps you could make a better case than I did ...

It seems to come in spurts with this article. I hope it stays low. It's on my watchlist.--Dakota ~ ° 23:19, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
Thank you for watchlisting it, Dakota. I just had to undo a new kind of vandalistic attack -- this time someone replaced one of the URL's in the References section with a link to a commercial site seeking to exploit Che's image. Polaris999 23:53, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
Just reverted again it again.--Dakota ~ ° 21:41, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Che Guevara (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Please semi-protect against continuing, mostly obscene, vandalism from unregistered users. Polaris999 05:06, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

Not yet as bad as it looks. Keep me informed...this may soon need protection. Lets wait for now.Voice-of-AllT|@|ESP 05:09, 23 February 2006 (UTC)


Polaris999 23:13, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Use of the term Left-wing Milieu

From University of Cambridge Faculty of History http://www.hist.cam.ac.uk/graduate_students/mphil/students.html

"Mr Sebastian Klaus Gehrig

Churchill skg29 Left-Wing Milieu and Civil Society in the Federal Republic of Germany during the 1970s The dissertation deals with the question how the discussion inside the left-wing milieu evolved during the 1970s until the year of the "german state crisis" in 1977. This shall be compared with the view of civil society on the milieu and its fear that the left-wingers could support the actions of the "Rote Armee Fraktion" (RAF) and so mabye challenge the strukture of german democracy"

El Jigue 3/1/06

The relevance of this completely escapes me. Care to explain? - Jmabel | Talk 00:54, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

A reader questioned use of the word "Milieu." My note provides and example of its use. In the general context it was used by me to challenge the idea that Guevara had a sudden conversion to marxist thought by reviewing his upbringing. 4-11-06

Polaris the allegedly Faulty website is from Cuba

The site you believe brought the system down is from Cuba and has a whole series of images of the explosion of "le Coubre." Very interesting, you can probably take any of them since the Cuban government does not believe in copyright (si no le conviene). I just looked it up again and stuck it in here, had done that previously and nothing happened. The site URL, with a V in front of it to deactivate it in case it is really some kind of Trojan is “[Vhttp://www.fotospl.com/Default.aspx?Class=23&Epig=001~01&PA=18]”


Probably there is a place for an entry on the Le Coubre affair. It has a Morgan, an Evans and a Jones involved in it, so the Welsh Mafia should like that.

The Cuban government has trouble with power supply and by repute they are said to use viruses, Trojan horses etc to harm others. If you recall it was the Cuban government that blocked the exile Iranian satellite broadcast [33]. El Jigue 3/1/06

Hello El Jigue a.k.a. user 205.240.227.15 --
The problem with the reference you tried to add -- and which I had to remove -- was not anything to do with the URL (website) in question, but rather a result of the way you had formatted it. Instead of creating a new, completely separate source note (<ref></ref>) for the link you wanted to insert (i.e. the one to the Cuba-based Prensa Latina photos of La Coubre) as would have been the correct procedure, you "dropped" the new URL into the middle of an existing source note, and, not surprisingly, this caused the source note to "bomb".
I am inserting below two "takes" of the sentences in question in order that you can see exactly what you did wrong. The first shows the properly-working source note immediately before you edited it. The second shows the result of your editing, i.e. how you "dropped" the second URL into the existing source note.
BTW when I saw what had happened with this reference/link, my first thought was that I would create a separate source note for the URL that you had attempted to add, but then I saw that we already had a link to the photos of La Coubre on the Prensa Latina website in the first sentence of this paragraph (included below) , so that it would have been redundant to add another.
Revision as of 02:01, 27 February 2006
Alhutch (Talk | contribs)
In 1960 Guevara was involved in the ''[[La Coubre]]'' arms shipment cleanup<ref>[http://www.fotospl.com/Default.aspx?Class=23&Epig=001~01&PA=17 FotosPL images] of ''La Coubre'', accessed [[26 February]] [[2005]]</ref> that went further awry when a second explosion occurred, resulting in well over a hundred dead.<ref>Cuban Information Archives, "La Coubre explodes in Havana 1960". [http://cuban-exile.com/doc_151-175/doc0166.html Online], acessed [[26 February]] [[2006]]</ref> This is the time when "Korda" took the most famous photograph.
================================================================================================
Revision as of 02:55, 27 February 2006
205.240.227.15 (Talk | contribs)
In 1960 Guevara was involved in the ''[[La Coubre]]'' arms shipment cleanup<ref>[http://www.fotospl.com/Default.aspx?Class=23&Epig=001~01&PA=17 FotosPL images] of ''La Coubre'', accessed [[26 February]] [[2005]]</ref> that went further awry when a second explosion occurred, resulting in well over a hundred dead.<ref>Cuban Information Archives, "La Coubre explodes in Havana 1960". [http://cuban-exile.com/doc_151-175/doc0166.html Online][http://www.fotospl.com/Default.aspx?Class=23&Epig=001~01&PA=18], acessed [[26 February]] [[2006]]</ref> This is the time when "Korda" took the most famous photograph
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Polaris999 23:57, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Polaris Thank you, apparently I goofed. I had formatted it the way I do all the rest and they do not bring my system down. The photographs at the site you discarded speak for themselves far more than the other link you left. Why don't you pick one or two and link to them. They speak so very eloquently of Guevara's arrogant incompetence that in no circumstance would I have messed them up deliberately. If you like make a site for Le Coubre explosion and I will fill it in with a carefully annotated account. BTW I was miles away when it happened, so it is no quite like being there but most of who were there died, you will have to rely on witnesses a little further away. El Jigue 3/3/06

Hello El Jigue -- Probably your link would have worked all right if you hadn't accidentally placed it inside a <ref></ref> source note. BTW I did look at the photos of La Coubre on both Prensa Latina sites and it seemed to me that they were identical except for the fact that those accessible by the 2nd URL had a kind of watermark over them which made them hard to see; that is why I chose to keep the 1st URL rather than replace it with the 2nd one. But, moving on from all of that, I think that your idea of creating a separate article for the La Coubre explosion is an excellent one and I just did so. Here it is: La Coubre explosion. I originally set it up without content as I was going to notify you immediately that it was available for you to begin working on, but amazingly enough, even as I was in the process of writing this message to you I received a warning that it was about to be deleted because it was empty! A little too fast, I would say. Anyway, I then had to jump over to that page and write a first paragraph in order to keep the article from being deleted, and also a message to the admin who had marked it for deletion. So, please do write some more in there as quickly as you can, and feel free to remove my first paragraph as I didn't intend it to be permanent. Incidentally, it was always my understanding that it was Raúl Castro who had ordered the La Coubre to be unloaded on the dock, not Che. Do you have other information? Polaris999 02:50, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Topics related to Che Guevara

A list of topics related to Che Guevara so the "See also" section can be improved;

LordViD 15:58, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Political events: 26th of July Movement - Cuban Revolution - La Coubre explosion - Cuban Missile Crisis
People: Fidel Castro - Carlos Fonseca - Luis Carlos Prestes
Legacy: Che Guevara (photo) - Guevarism - Che-Lives - Colegio Cesar Chavez
Other: Guerilla warfare - Socialism - Marxism - Summary execution - Extrajudicial punishment

LordViD 21:48, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Remove the Timeline, it disrupts the article (Gibby 06:11, 6 March 2006 (UTC))

Guevara's plaza in Rosario

I've just uploaded three pictures of the Plaza de la Cooperación in Rosario, where Guevara was born. I think they're much clearer than those that appear at the "Rosario de Santa Fe" website (http://www.heyche.com/4), and the large mural painting should probably be included in the article, but everything's so neatly packed in it that I'm not sure where. So I ask established editors to do as they see fit with commons:Image:Che Guevara Rosario 1.jpg, commons:Image:Che Guevara Rosario 2.jpg, and commons:Image:Che Guevara Rosario 3.jpg. The author of the aforementioned website also comments that it's a modest monument in a small town. I can assure you the plaza is not hidden, though it's neither large nor extremely flamboyant, the mural is quite large, and Rosario is by no means a small town (it has 1 million inhabitants). I'll go get a picture of Guevara's house soon. --Pablo D. Flores (Talk) 19:13, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Info on Ricardo Carpani, author of the paiting (in Spanish):
Polaris999 asked why the severe, stern expression of Guevara in the painting. Seems Carpani simply chose to draw like that all his characters. --Pablo D. Flores (Talk) 21:47, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
Two pictures of Guevara's appartment block in Rosario have been uploaded to Commons (commons:Image:Casa_Che_Guevara_1.jpg, commons:Image:Casa_Che_Guevara_2.jpg). Not really impressive, I guess, though the facade is nice. --Pablo D. Flores (Talk) 01:12, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Che - a humanitarian?

In what way is Che Guevara a humanitarian? Probert 12:52, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Probert Perhaps Swedenman is mistranslating the word "Humanist" which is often code (as used by Castro) for communist e.g. in 1959 "The revolution was humanist, he stressed, not Marxist" [34]. This is sometimes called marxist humanist [35]. The rationale behind this misleading label appears to be that marxist revolutionary actions, although bloody, are expected (although never proven to) result in future human paradise on earth. That is the "the road map to Cuba's New Jerusalem might be found in the covers of Das Kapital." [36] (:>) El Jigue 3-11-06

He is a humanitarian becorse he fought for the right, He fought against the diktator of Cuba and the americans, He fought for goodnees for South America and he become murded for it. Swedenman 21:24, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree Swedenman, Guevara really fought for the "right" since his idiotic guerrilla manual and tactics got a lot of the left killed. Besides every military man in Latin America was not going to let Guevara or his kind execute them if they could get them first. El Jigue 3-11-06

He has NEVER torture and kill people. The fought the dictator of Cuba who, with support of the americans, tortured and kill people of Cuba who fought against him. Swedenman 10:42, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps Fidel Castro torture and kill people but Che has never doing it. Swedenman 12:32, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Y'know: I generally admire Che, but to say he didn't kill people is clearly just plain wrong. He oversaw the executions of numerous prominent Batististas, and he did so proudly. - Jmabel | Talk 00:58, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
Some consideration should probably also be given to the fact that he passionately wished that the USSR leadership had launched the nuclear-tipped missiles installed in Cuba against US cities rather than withdrawing them. He felt so strongly about this that he personally confronted the top Soviet leaders over the matter and chastised them for not having fired the missiles. When they replied that such an action on their part would have doubtlessly resulted in the death of hundreds of millions of people in the USA, USSR, Eastern and Western Europe, and the virtual obliteration of Cuba and its inhabitants, he retorted that this would have been "a necessary sacrifice". His reasoning was apparently that if 500 million people in the "oppressor nations" of the North were to die in a nuclear holocaust, this would mean the liberation of the 2,000+ million people (1960 population figures) in the impoverished countries of the South, and the net effect for humanity would therefore be a positive one. In other words, he considered the value of the life of a human being who happened to be residing in a developed country to be less than zero. He also seemed to have no conception whatsoever of how terrible life in a post-nuclear-war world would have been for the survivors, nor any concern for the catastrophic effects a war of mutually-assured destruction would have had on the Earth's ecosystem ... Polaris999 23:41, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

Hilda Gadea = Hilda Gardea

Polaris you may find additional info under Hilda Gardea [37]as well as Hilda Gadea. Gardea is a name of a place in la Vascongada [38], but Gadea also is a place in Spain [39]. Anyway she might deserve a section; BTW will attend to the Le Coubre (I believe that is the correct name of the ship) explosion when I get a chance El Jigue 1-11-06

Che in Mozambique

I just stumbled across a source which suggested that Che offered assistance to FRELIMO in Mozambique in late 1966 or early 1967, assistance which they turned down because they felt that his strategy of a concentrated military campaign against specific localities would ultimately hurt their chances of success, and that they would be better off pursuing a strategy of inciting nation-wide resistance and rebellion. I've added just a small piece of information in the article to reflect this, and cited the source, but this isn't something I've ever heard before, so if anybody knows otherwise, go ahead and revert it. Thanks! The Disco King 01:35, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

Curiously enough, this is something I have heard before, from a very different source, many years ago. I had always wondered what to make of that report, but your contribution suddenly makes it appear more credible. Polaris999 18:03, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

Dumb deletions

That insert deleted on the photo of the Che with a tank is the reference to the tank it is a Sherman with a 76 mm cannon [40]. As to that tonnage was estimate as 2000 tons, in a 4,800 ton ship [41]. How much do think a freighter can carry. You guys don't have any idea about how heavy weaponry is or how much a cargo ship can carry do you? A light tank can weigh 12 metric tons see above. A 7,000 ton Liberty ship can carry 9,140 tons cargo. Now I bet you guys do not have the scholarly integrity to change these things back. I can just hear the old warriors and sailors laughing at you. Matter of fact I think I will bring the matter up in as many old soldier and sailor sites as I can. Why the heck did you bolix up the old reference method now it is almost impossible to find the old citation Citation is at [42]. Xe xe El Jigue 3-15-06

I regret to say that I do not know to what you are referring when you write:
That insert deleted on the photo of the Che with a tank is the reference to the tank it is a Sherman with a 76 mm cannon [43].
I made no such deletion or any other deletion concerning this photo or the tank in it and wasn't aware that any such deletion had been made; therefore, I am unable to comment on it.
Re the source note and link to the CIA memoranda you mention, they are still there (as note number 9, as I recall). When this article was peer reviewed, it was strongly recommended that all notes should be put into, and maintained in, the <ref></ref> style and this was done by a group of editors working together.
Re the tonnage, I will be glad to re-word it to say that the CIA estimated it to be carrying 2000 tons. I have spent several days trying to find a third source re how much tonnage the Alfhem may have been carrying and can only find the two estimates, namely the one by the CIA of "2000 tons" and that by Jon Lee Anderson of "2 tons" -- I therefore thought that the truth was likely to be somewhere in the middle and a compromise figure of 200 tons seemed reasonable, but perhaps it will be better to cite the two disparate estimates and let readers draw their own conclusions. Polaris999 06:26, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

On the Alfhem cargo

[44] Pro-Arbenz says two tons of small arms and one light artillery piece An artillery piece weighs quite a bit even a light one.

[45] says 2000 tons and starts with “1949 - Jacobo Arbenz Guzman killed his rival Gen. Francisco Javier Arana and sought to become the successor of President Juan Jose Arevalo” this citation uses CIA documents

[46] This pro-Arbenz source says 2000 tons were purchased but they that they were railroad mounted cannon and antitank artillery plus antiquated inoperable small arms. How this author knows this is not specified. Czech weapons even antiquated ones are considered excellent WWI rifles were in good rifles.

[47] A Center for Democracy reports ” after Alfhem berthed, Allen Dulles convened intel advisory committee and laid out argument that Arbenz had arms enough to roll down Central America and grab the Panama Canal (domino theory). Rip Robertson took in a demolition team to blow railroad trestle. Hersh, b. (1992). The old boys 339-348”

In addition this source talks off 50 tons of support for Castillo Armas. Guatemala, 54 after the overthrow of Arbenz gvt the armas regime established the CIA-backed national committee for defense against communism. Nacla (magazine re latin america) 2/83 p4 Guatemala, 54 after Alfhem arrived, secretary of state proclaimed a mutual defense treaty with Honduras and fifty tons of arms sent for distribution to armas insurgents. U.S. submarines and 3 B-36 bombers turned up in region. Eisenhower ordered navy to stop and search all "suspicious foreign-flag vessels." Hersh, b. (1992). The old boys 347”

[48] Reports 2000 tons of Skoda (high quality) small arms, ammunition and light artillery and that the amount far exceeded any legitimate needs of the Guatemalan army.

[49] Mentions many details “Two thousand tons of arms and ammunition, more than all Central America has received in the last 30 years, ...the arms, in 15,000 cases, were loaded on the freighter Alfhem in the Baltic port of Stettin,” “Guatemala's Defense Minister José Angel Sánchez was down from Guatemala City to superintend the unloading, and the dock was cleared of idlers. Day after day, on cars of the U.S.-owned International Railways of Central America, the crates rolled up to the capital, 197 miles away. Armed guards rode each car. One night a stick of dynamite exploded without serious damage under an arms train, presumably set by anti-Communist Guatemalan exiles who had come over the Honduras border, 15 miles away. Tracing the fuse, soldiers wound up in a gunfight. One sergeant and one saboteur were killed.”


[50] “In May 1954, Arbenz turned to Czechoslovakia for military weapons in order to guard against a possible American intervention. Arbenz purchased 2,000 tons of arms which were sent on a Swedish ship Alfhem which evaded several attempts of interception enroute to Guatemala. One CIA official wanted to sink the ship in the Guatemalan port of Puerto Barrios, but that plan was rejected by his superiors. Instead, the CIA approved a plan to dynamite the railroad tracks outside Puerto Barrios, so that the arms shipment would be stalled. But that plan backfired when the rain-soaked detonators failed. CIA operants quickly opened fire on the passing train but failed to stop the shipment of weapons to the Guatemalan military. As it turned out, the weapons were of little use to the Guatemalan military, since they were comprised of cannons which could be used when mounted on railroad cars; anti-tank guns but there were no tanks in the area; and antiquated small arms, most of which were inoperable”

[51] Cites a report that the weapons were to be used by a “Workers militia”


“Holland, Max "Private Sources of U.S. Foreign Policy: William Pawley and the 1954 Coup d'Etat in Guatemala" Journal of Cold War Studies - Volume 7, Number 4, Fall 2005, pp. 36-73 The MIT Press

Abstract

As a wealthy American businessman and former ambassador, William Pawley was a key actor in PBSUCCESS, the covert operation that brought down the government of Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán in Guatemala in 1954. The anti-Arbenz rebels, led by Colonel Carlos Castillo Armas, could not have defeated the Guatemalan army on their own. The key to a successful coup was getting the army to act on their behalf, and in this regard, control of the air was vital. Pawley, owing to his knowledge of Latin America and experience in aviation, played a central role in ensuring that the rebels enjoyed air superiority during their move against the president. At a more abstract level, Pawley exemplified the role non-governmental actors played in the formulation and implementation of U.S. foreign policy during the Cold War. The "state-private network," as it has been dubbed, remains a rich vein for scholarly investigation.” This paper discusses air support of Castillo Armas and also mentions 2000 tons of weaponry.

All this goes on an on… Some say either the weapons were no good others that they were excellent. Some say two tons, some say two tons plus artillery, most say 2000 tons. Two tons can be carried by a large dugout canoe or a heavy truck and the artillery pieces could be towed. Yet all agree the weapons went by rail suggesting a really heavy cargo. It is my opinion that the 2 ton figure with or without artillery is merely an excuse for defeat. What ever, the air support may well have made the difference. Perhaps the Guatemalan military unhappy with Arbenz’s killing of Arana was not reliable, and the “Workers Militia” were simple not ready. As to the quality of the weaponry they were from the Skoda works, the highest quality in the Soviet block. Castro once complained that the Mauser rifles shipped to him by Costa Rican President Figueras were of bad quality, while most experts regard Mauser rifles as excellent. It would seem that the trouble was incompetence because the Mausers used 7mm ammunition that is slightly different from 30.06 Springfield round in Cuba and using 30.06 jammed the Mausers. Besides Anderson has made a number of other mistakes in his excellent book. You will have to read mine when it comes out.

My conclusion is that the weapon shipment was 2000 tons, and it should be place in Wikipedia: Commonly [52], [53], [54], [55], [56], Holand (2005) but not universally, Anderson (1997), [57] believed to be a very significant 2000 tons. El Jigue 3-16-6

Thank you, EJ, for all of this outstanding information! Do you think that we should have an article for the Alfhem similar to the one for La Coubre? Because all of the citations you have included here are of interest and they certainly wouldn't fit into a source note ...
Re Anderson, I too have found a number of errors in his book and have been wondering how to let him know about them without going through all of the formality of writing him a letter. Do you think we should create a JLA article and then have a sub-section where people could list the errors they have noticed so that he can correct them in the next edition?
Re your upcoming book, I do look forward to reading it and keep checking amazon for notice of its publication date but so far have found no mention of it. Do you know when it will be released? Polaris999 20:58, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Polaris thank you for your kind words, sorry I was so abrupt by as I get older it is harder to be polite when I am tired. It will take a least a year before my book is in press, so do not hurry, I think yours will come out before that. Yes, please open sections on to both articles especially on the Alfhem. As to Anderson it is hard for me to be that critical, but perhaps a contribution to a revised edition may be useful. In addition, there are other author's correspond with me on the topic. Still there is much novel material coming to light. Today I saw an item coming out of Cuba stating that the Mexican (Francisco Rodriguez Tamayo) was part of Che Guevara's "suicide squad," he is supposed to be in Miami and must know so much I hope he tells all soon. What is happening now is that many of the old even in Cuba, are rushing to write before they die. But complete freedom to write for those inside Cuba will not occur until the senior leaders pass from power. El Jigue 3-16-06

Hello El Jigue. Thank you for your message -- I know what you mean about getting tired. Right now my eyes are getting so tired from staring at information about Alfhem that I expect to start seeing double at any moment. BTW some unknown person came by and deleted everything you had added in there without giving any explanation. I put it all back, but think it will be good to develop the Churchill reference a bit because apparently not everybody catches the connection. Right now I just stuck a couple of paragraphs that I found in the WC article here on WP to the end of the article and am going to think about where the best place to mention the speech, etc. might be. Re the other information you found about Alfhem (above), it occurs to me that we might set up a separate section in the article entitled "Details of the Alfhem incident" where you could put some or all of that? I did find quite a bit of good data about the ship itself, the only problem being that it is all written in Swedish and I don't know Swedish. (But I definitely know more now than I knew this morning.) When you have a chance, please look at the "Specifications" section I just added and tell me if it needs any correction or modification.
About your book, I am sure that it will be published long before mine because I have not even decided whether I want to write one yet ... Polaris999 04:49, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

El Jigue to be banned again

I just inserted ""After the signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact and the outbreak of World War II in 1939, the PCF (French Communist Party) was declared a proscribed organisation. The PCF pursued an anti-war course during the early part of the Second World War." Maurice Thorez head of PCF "deserted from the French Army and fled to the Soviet Union. " [58] " into Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact thus, I expect to be banned again soon. Will be back after ban ends. El Jigue 3-24-06

Che's heritage is as lively as ever - even in L.A. !

http://i.a.cnn.net/cnn/2006/US/03/25/immigration.rallies.ap/t1.rally.la4.gi.jpg —Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.70.32.136 (talk • contribs) 05:23, 26 March 2006

Thank you for this information -- I have included a link to the photo in the "Legacy" section. Polaris999 23:32, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

For Lokifer: Please look at the HISTORY section to see ...

who removed those sentences about the neo-Nazis. You will find the following entry and explanation:


23:32, 2 April 2006 Nikodemos (one of the sources doesn't seem to exist, the other isn't particularly reliable and makes little more than a passing comment about 3rd positionists (not "neo-Nazis"))

I checked the link that Nikodemos mentions -- which used to go to the ABC article -- and found that it was indeed dead (because ABC seems to have moved that article into an accessible by payment only archive); therefore I did not restore the sentence since it is now unsourced. If you want the sentence in question to remain in the Che article, you will probably need to find another source for it and update the reference; otherwise, it will probably be deleted again. Polaris999 20:17, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Just because a source has been moved to a pay area doesn't make the fact less true. Only using free accessed sites on the internet is asinine. Citing a book or magazine is exactly the same thing as citing an article from an online news organization that has moved material to a pay site. Not everyone can access the information, unless you worked at the Library of Congress and even then you'd be unable to access all sources. Most of the stuff slapped onto wikipedia isn't even cited and you're razzing me because I was able to access the information before it became unaccessible for free.
As for the supposed passing comment without a mention of NeoNazis in the second article, the first freaking line in the article saying "In times when German Neo-nazis are walking around with Che t-shirts at their marches..." Go there and read it, [59] and as far as it being unreliable, the site is Che-Lives, a forum by people who idolize Che...Why would people who idolize Che want to make up stuff about NeoNazis using his image? Lokifer 10:38, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
I don't quite understand why the fact that some of a small group of neo-nazi's have been spotted wearing Che Guevara t-shirts even warrants a mention in the main article anyway. If it were the German communist party then I would understand but Che Guevara and German Neo-Nazi groups aren't generally associated together for obvious reasons (their politics are completely different afterall).
Are we going to start mentioning every group of which some of it's members have been seen wearing such a t-shirt? I think this would be absurd, who's next? most of the bartenders at a local bar near me recently wore Che t-shirts when they hosted a Latin America themed evening, should we therefor include a mention of this bar and it's staff aswell? Canderra 11:21, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
I'm mostly with Canderra here, but the thing about the ABC article mostly just underlines why blind links are lousy references. If the reference is spelled out (I didn't check on this one) or can be spelled out retroactively, great, useful, someone can probably seek the print version, etc. But if it is just a dead link with no title, date, etc.? Pretty useless. - Jmabel | Talk 06:07, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
  1. ^ Fidel Castro, "The 40th Anniversary of the Cuban Revolution", 1 January 1999.Online at The New Humanist, accessed 4 January2006.
  2. ^ CNC TV,"Recuerdan famosa victoria del Ejercito Rebelde en Guisa", 1 December 2005.Online at Google's Cache, retrieved 30 December2005.
  3. ^ Radio Bayamo,"Batalla de Guisa, noviembre de 1958: La puerta de la victoria", 30 November 2004.Online at Google's Cache, retrieved 19 December2006.
  4. ^ Cuban Aviation,"1958: The last operation of the FAEC against the guerrilla".Online at Cuban Aviation, accessed 4 January2006.
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