Che on the Silver Screen  
By Humberto Fontova
FrontPageMagazine.com | Wednesday, May 28, 2008

Oscar-winning director Steven Soderbergh unveiled his four-and-a-half-hour Che Guevara Biopic at the Cannes Film Festival last Thursday. One reviewer described the movie as “maniacally anticipated”  - and Variety hailed it as Cannes' “most-anticipated” film.

But based on reviews thus far, it looks like Soderbergh blew it. After suffering what some critics described as the film's “butt-numbing” duration, Variety's Todd McCarthy branded the movie “defiantly nondramatic” and “a commercial impossibility.”

New York Magazine calls it, “something of a fiasco.” Everyone seemed bored if not actually catatonic while viewing the film. Time's Richard Corliss described Benicio Del Toro in the starring role as “seemingly sedated.” Bloomberg News wrote of the “viewers' bleary eyes.”

These reviewers, as usual, miss the point and bash the director unfairly. Director Stephen Soderbergh said flat out that the purpose of his movie was “to give you a sense of what it was like to hang out with [Che Guevara].”

Well? What did the reviewers expect? As usual, they know very little about the film's subject. In fact, Soderbergh has accomplished his goal with bells on. As exhibit one, I submit a sample of Che Guevara's sparkling conversation:

   "The past makes itself felt not only in the individual consciousness – in which the residue of an education systematically oriented toward isolating the individual still weighs heavily – but also through the very character of this transition period in which commodity relations still persist, although this is still a subjective aspiration, not yet systematized."

Splash some cold water on your face and stick with me for just a little more:

   "It is still necessary to deepen his conscious participation, individual and collective, in all the mechanisms of management and production, and to link this to the idea of the need for technical and ideological education, so that we see how closely interdependent these processes are and how their advancement is parallel.”

These passages come straight from the Che diaries that form the basis of the film's script. "I have no home, no woman, no parents, no brothers and no friends," wrote Guevara. "My friends are friends only so long as they think as I do politically."

To everyone familiar with the real Che Guevara it's abundantly clear that Soderbergh directed masterfully. He was not giving us Jerry Lee Lewis or John Belushi. No honest and educated reviewer can deny him massive kudus for so expertly transmitting this insufferable personality and presence to a soon snoring audience.

Soderbergh and Benicio Del Toro, who stars as Che and shares production credits, actually had an intriguing and immensely amusing theme if only they'd known how to plumb it. Soderbergh hails Guevara as "one of the most fascinating lives in the last century." Almost all who actually interacted with Ernesto Guevara (and are now free to express their views without fear of firing squads or torture chambers) know that the The Big Question regarding Ernesto, the most genuinely fascinating aspect of his life, is: how did such a dreadful bore, sadist and and epic idiot attain such iconic status?

The answer is that this psychotic and thoroughly unimposing vagrant named Ernesto Guevara had the magnificent fortune of linking up with modern history's top press agent, Fidel Castro, who for going on half a century now, has had the mainstream media anxiously scurrying to his every beck and call.

Had Ernesto Guevara De La Serna y Lynch not linked up with Raul and Fidel Castro in Mexico city that fateful summer of 1955--had he not linked up with a Cuban exile named Nico Lopez in Guatemala the year before who later introduced him to Raul and Fidel Castro in Mexico city-- everything points to Ernesto continuing his life of a traveling hobo, panhandling, mooching off women, staying in flophouses and scribbling unreadable poetry.

While making their film, Soderbergh and Del Toro repeatedly visited Havana to coo and peck away as anxiously as Herbert Matthews, Dan Rather or Barbara Walters while the regime tossed out its crumbs. Though rarely meeting with the Maximum Leader himself, the filmmakers, on top of relying on Che's diaries (edited by Fidel Castro) for the script, also obtained recollections from Che's widow and many of his former underling executioners. These all currently serve as ministers in a totalitarian regime. “We wanted to show the real character” boasts Soderbergh.

"I met him (Fidel Castro) for about five minutes," Del Toro said. "He knew about the project and he said to me that he was very happy that we had spent so much time researching the subject.”

“I'm here in Cuba's hills thirsting for blood,” Che wrote his abandoned wife in 1957. “Dear Papa, today I discovered I really like killing,” he wrote shortly afterwards. Alas, this killing very rarely involved combat, it come from the close-range murder of bound and blindfolded men and boys.

“When you saw the beaming look on Che's face as the victims were tied to the stake and blasted apart,” said a former political prisoner to this writer, “you knew there was something seriously, seriously wrong with Che Guevara.” In fact the one genuine accomplishment in Che Guevara's life was the mass-murder of defenseless men and boys. Under his own gun dozens died. Under his orders thousands crumpled. At everything else Che Guevara failed abysmally, even comically. Yet Soderbergh and Del Toro skip over these fascinating quotes and Che's one genuine accomplishment as a revolutionary.

He's lauded as the century's most celebrated guerrilla fighter but he never fought in a querrilla war. “The Guerrilla war in Cuba was notable for the marked lack of military skills or offensive spirit in the soldiers of either side," writes military historian Arthur Campbell, in his authoritative, Guerrillas: A History and Analysis. "The Fidelistas were completely lacking in the basic military arts or in any experience of fighting.”

"In all essentials Castro's battle for Cuba was a public relations campaign, fought in New York and Washington," writes British historian Hugh Thomas.

Yet Soderbergh and Del Toro, obsessively wary of lapsing into the slightest historical inaccuracy, relied on the Castro regime as primary source -- and came up with a shoot-'em up war movie! -- albeit an apparently boring one.

He's lauded as a rebel and free-spirit yet he denounced the very "spirit of rebellion" as "reprehensible!" -- and he boasted that under his watch "individualism must disappear!" This was no idle boast either. Che Guevara co-founded a regime that jailed more of its subjects than Stalin's and murdered more people in its first three years than Hitler's in its first six. In 1959, with the help of KGB agents, the man celebrated by the beautiful people at Cannes helped found, train and indoctrinate Cuba's secret police. "Always interrogate your prisoners at night," Che ordered his goons. "A man's resistance is always lower at night." Today the world's largest Che mural adorns Cuba's Ministry of the Interior, the headquarters for Cuba's STASI and KGB trained secret police.

Too bad Soderbergh and Del Toro didn't interview the former CIA officers who revealed to this writer how Fidel Castro himself, via the Bolivian Communist party, constantly fed the CIA info on Che's whereabouts in Bolivia. Including Fidel Castro's directive to the Bolivian Communists regarding Che and his merry band might have also added drama. “Not even an aspirin,” instructed Cuba's Maximum Leader to his Bolivian comrades, meaning that Bolivia's Communists were not to assist Che in any way—“not even with an aspirin,” if Che complained of a headache.

Alas, utterly starstruck by their subject and slavishly compliant to Fidel Castro's script and casting calls, all these fascinating plots and subplots flew right over Soderbergh and Del Toro's heads.

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Really wtf did they expect?

If it flopped at Cannes - shown to an audience of fawning left-tards - you just KNOW it's got to be a turd!

Now I know why I saved this picture:

i guess even glimpses of the truth were too much for the Cannes crowd..

What truth?A biopic of an elusive subject killed by CIA trained goons that probably wasn't too close to being accurate.  Have any of you read "The Motorcycle Diaries", or any his diaries from Bolivia (The Guerrilla Campaign) or "Guerilla Warfare"?  Che was a passionate, writer, "doctor", figther and philosopher who took it upon himself to travel his continent and ultimately see the hardships of the working class and poor and tried to help out wherever he could to lift the oppressed.  

Is his commericalized and idolized by ignorant and naive douche-bags who don't understand what half his deal was (I am still learning)?  Sure.  And then you have your right wing types who only see him as a Marxist tryin to spread the Red disease thru Central and South America.  

Did he kill people? Of course, and so did Patton, Sherman, and other commanders of armed forces in combat.  Big deal.  Fidel wasn't nearly as intelligent, well-spoken or admired as Che and seemed to forget the original ideals they were fighting for and against...But shit, it's not like the Cold War and those advancing both idealogies was as black and white as you would like to think.

Read a couple of his books, then criticize.  And if you have done so, explain to me specifics why you hate the guy, not just the morons that buy his image.

"Our lives count for nothing before the fact of the revolution."- EGdlS  (Under my graduating yearbook picture in 97)

Quoted: What truth?A biopic of an elusive subject killed by CIA trained goons that probably wasn't too close to being accurate.  Have any of you read "The Motorcycle Diaries", or any his diaries from Bolivia (The Guerrilla Campaign) or "Guerilla Warfare"?  Che was a passionate, writer, "doctor", figther and philosopher who took it upon himself to travel his continent and ultimately see the hardships of the working class and poor and tried to help out wherever he could to lift the oppressed.   Is his commericalized and idolized by ignorant and naive douche-bags who don't understand what half his deal was (I am still learning)?  Sure.  And then you have your right wing types who only see him as a Marxist tryin to spread the Red disease thru Central and South America.   Did he kill people? Of course, and so did Patton, Sherman, and other commanders of armed forces in combat.  Big deal.  Fidel wasn't nearly as intelligent, well-spoken or admired as Che and seemed to forget the original ideals they were fighting for and against...But shit, it's not like the Cold War and those advancing both idealogies was as black and white as you would like to think. Read a couple of his books, then criticize.  And if you have done so, explain to me specifics why you hate the guy, not just the morons that buy his image. "Our lives count for nothing before the fact of the revolution."- EGdlS  (Under my graduating yearbook picture in 97)

I've got the popcorn.  This will be good.  

Quoted: Quoted: What truth?A biopic of an elusive subject killed by CIA trained goons that probably wasn't too close to being accurate.  Have any of you read "The Motorcycle Diaries", or any his diaries from Bolivia (The Guerrilla Campaign) or "Guerilla Warfare"?  Che was a passionate, writer, "doctor", figther and philosopher who took it upon himself to travel his continent and ultimately see the hardships of the working class and poor and tried to help out wherever he could to lift the oppressed.   Is his commericalized and idolized by ignorant and naive douche-bags who don't understand what half his deal was (I am still learning)?  Sure.  And then you have your right wing types who only see him as a Marxist tryin to spread the Red disease thru Central and South America.   Did he kill people? Of course, and so did Patton, Sherman, and other commanders of armed forces in combat.  Big deal.  Fidel wasn't nearly as intelligent, well-spoken or admired as Che and seemed to forget the original ideals they were fighting for and against...But shit, it's not like the Cold War and those advancing both idealogies was as black and white as you would like to think. Read a couple of his books, then criticize.  And if you have done so, explain to me specifics why you hate the guy, not just the morons that buy his image. "Our lives count for nothing before the fact of the revolution."- EGdlS  (Under my graduating yearbook picture in 97) I've got the popcorn.  This will be good.

Methinks he's a revenuer.

Quoted: What truth?A biopic of an elusive subject killed by CIA trained goons that probably wasn't too close to being accurate.

Here we see classic leftist denial: The problem is never with the concept, but merely with the implementation. Failed movies, political movements and regimes - Honestly, they would have succeeded if only they had been done differently!

Did he kill people? Of course, and so did Patton, Sherman, and other commanders of armed forces in combat.  Big deal.

Only in a libtard's mind could commanding soldiers in combat be equated with personally executing hundreds of handcuffed prisoners...

They could've tarted it up a bit by including the steamy love scene between Che and Eva Peron

Quoted: What truth?A biopic of an elusive subject killed by CIA trained goons that probably wasn't too close to being accurate.  Have any of you read "The Motorcycle Diaries", or any his diaries from Bolivia (The Guerrilla Campaign) or "Guerilla Warfare"?  Che was a passionate, writer, "doctor", figther and philosopher who took it upon himself to travel his continent and ultimately see the hardships of the working class and poor and tried to help out wherever he could to lift the oppressed.   Is his commericalized and idolized by ignorant and naive douche-bags who don't understand what half his deal was (I am still learning)?  Sure.  And then you have your right wing types who only see him as a Marxist tryin to spread the Red disease thru Central and South America.   Did he kill people? Of course, and so did Patton, Sherman, and other commanders of armed forces in combat.  Big deal.  Fidel wasn't nearly as intelligent, well-spoken or admired as Che and seemed to forget the original ideals they were fighting for and against...But shit, it's not like the Cold War and those advancing both idealogies was as black and white as you would like to think. Read a couple of his books, then criticize.  And if you have done so, explain to me specifics why you hate the guy, not just the morons that buy his image. "Our lives count for nothing before the fact of the revolution."- EGdlS  (Under my graduating yearbook picture in 97)

How dare you equate his butchering of bound persons to Military personnel.

Go the fuck back to DU.

Quoted: What truth?A biopic of an elusive subject killed by CIA trained goons that probably wasn't too close to being accurate.  Have any of you read "The Motorcycle Diaries", or any his diaries from Bolivia (The Guerrilla Campaign) or "Guerilla Warfare"?  Che was a passionate, writer, "doctor", figther and philosopher who took it upon himself to travel his continent and ultimately see the hardships of the working class and poor and tried to help out wherever he could to lift the oppressed.   Is his commericalized and idolized by ignorant and naive douche-bags who don't understand what half his deal was (I am still learning)?  Sure.  And then you have your right wing types who only see him as a Marxist tryin to spread the Red disease thru Central and South America.   Did he kill people? Of course, and so did Patton, Sherman, and other commanders of armed forces in combat.  Big deal.  Fidel wasn't nearly as intelligent, well-spoken or admired as Che and seemed to forget the original ideals they were fighting for and against...But shit, it's not like the Cold War and those advancing both idealogies was as black and white as you would like to think. Read a couple of his books, then criticize.  And if you have done so, explain to me specifics why you hate the guy, not just the morons that buy his image. "Our lives count for nothing before the fact of the revolution."- EGdlS  (Under my graduating yearbook picture in 97)

Boy, I'm sure glad I don't have to sit down when I take a piss.

Quoted: How dare you equate his butchering of bound persons to Military personnel. Go the fuck back to DU.

Hey, Patton slapped a cowardly grunt, Che blew prisoners' brains out! Same thing!

if Guevara = Patton, then it is logical to say that Ed Gein = Batman.


The revolutionary marxist who helped bring Castro to power is in no way comparable to country-serving patriots fighting against fascist armies across the sea. For christ sake Guevara killed his OWN countrymen. Most people who follow him or wear his shirts dont know who he was, only that he is on a t-shirt.

This is a dumb discussion. It was a shitty movie about a shitty guy. End.

That's some funny shit.

I love watching liberals climb all over Che like he's some sort of hero. Anyone who claims to have read his books must have forgotten where he voiced his opinions regarding his underlings and volunteers. Not very inclusive was Che.

Quoted: What truth?A biopic of an elusive subject killed by CIA trained goons that probably wasn't too close to being accurate.  Have any of you read "The Motorcycle Diaries", or any his diaries from Bolivia (The Guerrilla Campaign) or "Guerilla Warfare"?  Che was a passionate, writer, "doctor", figther and philosopher who took it upon himself to travel his continent and ultimately see the hardships of the working class and poor and tried to help out wherever he could to lift the oppressed.   Is his commericalized and idolized by ignorant and naive douche-bags who don't understand what half his deal was (I am still learning)?  Sure.  And then you have your right wing types who only see him as a Marxist tryin to spread the Red disease thru Central and South America.   Did he kill people? Of course, and so did Patton, Sherman, and other commanders of armed forces in combat.  Big deal.  Fidel wasn't nearly as intelligent, well-spoken or admired as Che and seemed to forget the original ideals they were fighting for and against...But shit, it's not like the Cold War and those advancing both idealogies was as black and white as you would like to think. Read a couple of his books, then criticize.  And if you have done so, explain to me specifics why you hate the guy, not just the morons that buy his image. "Our lives count for nothing before the fact of the revolution."- EGdlS  (Under my graduating yearbook picture in 97)

Biblical fail.

Does it hurt, being that ignorant?



(Oh yeah... in on first page of a potential classic!)

Quoted: That's some funny shit. I love watching liberals climb all over Che like he's some sort of hero. Anyone who claims to have read his books must have forgotten where he voiced his opinions regarding his underlings and volunteers. Not very inclusive was Che.

Some people excel at fail.

Quoted: What truth?A biopic of an elusive subject killed by CIA trained goons that probably wasn't too close to being accurate.  Have any of you read "The Motorcycle Diaries", or any his diaries from Bolivia (The Guerrilla Campaign) or "Guerilla Warfare"?  Che was a passionate, writer, "doctor", figther and philosopher who took it upon himself to travel his continent and ultimately see the hardships of the working class and poor and tried to help out wherever he could to lift the oppressed.   Is his commericalized and idolized by ignorant and naive douche-bags who don't understand what half his deal was (I am still learning)?  Sure.  And then you have your right wing types who only see him as a Marxist tryin to spread the Red disease thru Central and South America.   Did he kill people? Of course, and so did Patton, Sherman, and other commanders of armed forces in combat.  Big deal.  Fidel wasn't nearly as intelligent, well-spoken or admired as Che and seemed to forget the original ideals they were fighting for and against...But shit, it's not like the Cold War and those advancing both idealogies was as black and white as you would like to think. Read a couple of his books, then criticize.  And if you have done so, explain to me specifics why you hate the guy, not just the morons that buy his image. "Our lives count for nothing before the fact of the revolution."- EGdlS  (Under my graduating yearbook picture in 97)

Is that a joke?

A mass murderer terrorist is the same as a man who lead troops into combat to liberate Europe from the nazis or a man that freed slaves throughout his campaign to save the Union?  Really?

You have no moral compass if you can't recognize the difference between heros and a mass murderer.   You may as well say Hitler was like George Washington and that we should all read Mein Kampf so that we can see what a great guy he was.  

Communists are not welcome here. We believe in freedom, minority rights, and the Constitution.  Go to moveon.org Communist filth.

Quoted: What truth?A biopic of an elusive subject killed by CIA trained goons that probably wasn't too close to being accurate.  Have any of you read "The Motorcycle Diaries", or any his diaries from Bolivia (The Guerrilla Campaign) or "Guerilla Warfare"?  Che was a passionate, writer, "doctor", figther and philosopher who took it upon himself to travel his continent and ultimately see the hardships of the working class and poor and tried to help out wherever he could to lift the oppressed.   Is his commericalized and idolized by ignorant and naive douche-bags who don't understand what half his deal was (I am still learning)?  Sure.  And then you have your right wing types who only see him as a Marxist tryin to spread the Red disease thru Central and South America.   Did he kill people? Of course, and so did Patton, Sherman, and other commanders of armed forces in combat.  Big deal.  Fidel wasn't nearly as intelligent, well-spoken or admired as Che and seemed to forget the original ideals they were fighting for and against...But shit, it's not like the Cold War and those advancing both idealogies was as black and white as you would like to think. Read a couple of his books, then criticize.  And if you have done so, explain to me specifics why you hate the guy, not just the morons that buy his image. "Our lives count for nothing before the fact of the revolution."- EGdlS  (Under my graduating yearbook picture in 97)

I read one of his books for a politcal science class.....I walked away with two impressions.

1)  Che had two types of thoughts, plagerized and incomprehensible.  It's a known fact that a great many of his writings are direct copies of Trotski.

2)  He gave two shits about the "working man".  He was more intoxicated with the premise of being the oppressor then rescueing the oppressed.  


Oh, and comparing this mental midget to american soldiers deserves a hot steaming cup of go fuck yourself

Quoted: What truth?A biopic of an elusive subject killed by CIA trained goons that probably wasn't too close to being accurate.  Have any of you read "The Motorcycle Diaries", or any his diaries from Bolivia (The Guerrilla Campaign) or "Guerilla Warfare"?  Che was a passionate, writer, "doctor", figther and philosopher who took it upon himself to travel his continent and ultimately see the hardships of the working class and poor and tried to help out wherever he could to lift the oppressed.   Is his commericalized and idolized by ignorant and naive douche-bags who don't understand what half his deal was (I am still learning)?  Sure.  And then you have your right wing types who only see him as a Marxist tryin to spread the Red disease thru Central and South America.   Did he kill people? Of course, and so did Patton, Sherman, and other commanders of armed forces in combat.  Big deal.  Fidel wasn't nearly as intelligent, well-spoken or admired as Che and seemed to forget the original ideals they were fighting for and against...But shit, it's not like the Cold War and those advancing both idealogies was as black and white as you would like to think. Read a couple of his books, then criticize.  And if you have done so, explain to me specifics why you hate the guy, not just the morons that buy his image. "Our lives count for nothing before the fact of the revolution."- EGdlS  (Under my graduating yearbook picture in 97)

Oh, you were being serious?

Quoted: Now I know why I saved this picture: homepage.mac.com/rlmorel/.Public/Che.gif

Cju1979 - Since you are 28 years old, I hope you are in a PhD program in poli sci.  You would make a perfect college professor.  You have certainly never gone through MEPS or known anyone who has.

Man, I thought this thread was gonna be fun.

I guess the troll just dropped his little bomb and then left.


"Another victory for the people's revolution!"

Quoted: Man, I thought this thread was gonna be fun. I guess the troll just dropped his little bomb and then left. "Another victory for the people's revolution!"

Those who can't stand the heat post and skedaddle.

I hope you don't think you own Page 2, fxntime.

It belongs to the people!

Quoted: What truth?A biopic of an elusive subject killed by CIA trained goons that probably wasn't too close to being accurate.  Have any of you read "The Motorcycle Diaries", or any his diaries from Bolivia (The Guerrilla Campaign) or "Guerilla Warfare"?  Che was a passionate, writer, "doctor", figther and philosopher who took it upon himself to travel his continent and ultimately see the hardships of the working class and poor and tried to help out wherever he could to lift the oppressed.   Is his commericalized and idolized by ignorant and naive douche-bags who don't understand what half his deal was (I am still learning)?  Sure.  And then you have your right wing types who only see him as a Marxist tryin to spread the Red disease thru Central and South America.   Did he kill people? Of course, and so did Patton, Sherman, and other commanders of armed forces in combat.  Big deal.  Fidel wasn't nearly as intelligent, well-spoken or admired as Che and seemed to forget the original ideals they were fighting for and against...But shit, it's not like the Cold War and those advancing both idealogies was as black and white as you would like to think. Read a couple of his books, then criticize.  And if you have done so, explain to me specifics why you hate the guy, not just the morons that buy his image. "Our lives count for nothing before the fact of the revolution."- EGdlS  (Under my graduating yearbook picture in 97)

He was a fucking piece of shit that actually GOT OFF on murdering bound children.  NOTHING else he could have ever done or written will come close to making up for the piece of shit that he was.

short version of Che's life:  I rode a motorcycle around, witnessed poverty, decided to do something about it, and ended up murdering a bunch of handcuffed/bound children.  Then I got killed.  The end.

Quoted: Read a couple of his books, then criticize.  And if you have done so, explain to me specifics why you hate the guy, not just the morons that buy his image.

Che's dead and gone and not worth the time.


I hate people like you.

Quoted: Quoted: Read a couple of his books, then criticize.  And if you have done so, explain to me specifics why you hate the guy, not just the morons that buy his image. Che's dead and gone and not worth the time. I hate people like you.

I agree with the lumped one

“I'm here in Cuba's hills thirsting for blood,” Che wrote his abandoned wife in 1957. “Dear Papa, today I discovered I really like killing,” he wrote shortly afterwards. Alas, this killing very rarely involved combat, it come from the close-range murder of bound and blindfolded men and boys.

Lest we forget who we're up against:

The best pic ever taken of Che was the holey one.

Good shootin boys, may he rest in pieces.

Stinks like troll in here.

Quoted: What truth?A biopic of an elusive subject killed by CIA trained goons that probably wasn't too close to being accurate.  Have any of you read "The Motorcycle Diaries", or any his diaries from Bolivia (The Guerrilla Campaign) or "Guerilla Warfare"?  Che was a passionate, writer, "doctor", figther and philosopher who took it upon himself to travel his continent and ultimately see the hardships of the working class and poor and tried to help out wherever he could to lift the oppressed.   Is his commericalized and idolized by ignorant and naive douche-bags who don't understand what half his deal was (I am still learning)?  Sure.  And then you have your right wing types who only see him as a Marxist tryin to spread the Red disease thru Central and South America.   Did he kill people? Of course, and so did Patton, Sherman, and other commanders of armed forces in combat.  Big deal.  Fidel wasn't nearly as intelligent, well-spoken or admired as Che and seemed to forget the original ideals they were fighting for and against...But shit, it's not like the Cold War and those advancing both idealogies was as black and white as you would like to think. Read a couple of his books, then criticize.  And if you have done so, explain to me specifics why you hate the guy, not just the morons that buy his image. "Our lives count for nothing before the fact of the revolution."- EGdlS  (Under my graduating yearbook picture in 97)

Wow. Now run along back to DU and tell them how you brought the light of socialist reason to those knuckle-draggers on that bad 'ol gun board.

So you all love Reagan for backing the "democratic" Contras in Nicaragua against the Sandinistas (and under UN guidelines being judged war criminals) but you hate Che for trying to overthrow Batista's oppressive pro- US regime?

In a discussion on September 14, 1961 Guevara opposed the right of dissidents to make their views known even within the Communist Party itself. However, privately Guevara was critical of the Soviet bloc, but so was also Nikita Khruschev. When the executions of war criminals started Guevara acted as the highest prosecuting authority. The condemned were soldiers found guilty of murder, torture and other serious crimes. Because Guevara was a doctor, one of his friends once asked how he could work in such a position. Guevara's answer was like from Western movies: "Look, in this thing you have to kill before they kill you

So you want to back whatever foreign policy the US has no matter who it hurts.

If I am ignorant for missing the train on him killing boys/bound men than so be it, but like a lot of you have said, especially regarding the war on terror (Iraq, Afghan), civilians and so-on are unintended casualties for a greater gain, correct?

You can say you hate me, fine.  I don't give a shit.  I read his books and studied the fuck and believe he was thrown under the bus by Castro and "American Interests" working in cohoots to not fully let Cuba become a power bowing down to no-one including the US.  

Communism was sponsored by fucking Wall Street and the same banks that are still in power now.  Read "Wall Street and the Bolshevik Revolution".  You guys are so quick to call Hillary a socialist and Barrack a commie but what about McCain, Bush and all these other leaders who bow down to same policy makers like Brzezinski, Kissinger and the Queen of England.

Che was killed because he showed what a handfull of determined people could do against trained killers, against imperial tyrants and against oppressive regimes.  Maybe "Absolut power, corrupted absolutly", I don't know for fact, but I do know that even Jefferson said every generation needs it's own revolution.

I don't like the status quo now or in my younger days and won't bow down to any man.  Especially one that taxes my wages, purchases, property, wheels, car/boat/bike, gas, food, bonuses, profits, what the fuck ever...

Let's hear another DU reference or how about I hear real evidence about Che's horrible intentions for Latin America or how he actually became that which he hated most.  

Interesting quote from Che Grandson...

From che Guevara's grandson, Canek Sanchez Guevara: "The Cuban Revolution died some years ago: it had to be killed off by those who act in its name to make sure it didn't turn against them; it was institutionalized and smothered by its own bureaucracy, by corruption, nepotism and the rigidity of the much-celebrated Cuban 'revolutionary' state. All of my criticism of Fidel Castro comes from his walking away from the ideals of liberty, from his betrayal of his own people and his frightening zeal to place the interests of the state above those of his people. Let's be honest, a young rebel like Fidel Castro in today's Cuba wouldn't be sent into exile. He would be shot." Published in the Mexican newspaper Proceso in October of 2004.

I am still looking for more proof than the standard quotes from CHe himself saying "we need to be a cold killing machine" and other tid-bits saying he killed boys.  Thats boys, not Pro-Us, Batista cabinet members, businessmen, police and others that I keep finding.  

After witnessing American intervention in Guatemala in 1954, Guevara radicalized and become convinced that the only way to bring about change was by violent revolution. He wrote in a letter to home: "Along the way, I had the opportunity to pass through the dominions of the United Fruit, convincing me once again of just how terrible these capitalist octopuses are. I have sworn before a picture of the old and mourned comrade Stalin that I won’t rest until I see these capitalist octopuses annihilated."

So yes he idolized Stalin and was against the American Imperialist forces...He was a witness to what foreign policy was doing to the people of his continent and decided to side with the enemy of such power.  

Let's say I don't know my neighbor and some woman is walking a dog down the street and the dog shits in my yard.  If said unknown neighbor comes out and makes that woman pick that shit up, I would automatically have a favorable view of him even though I don't know him too well, correct?

So you have the great big USA profitting off of another countries people and you think that isn't an issue?  Kinda like when Guiliani took offense to Ron Paul saying that foreign policy in the middle east was the catalyst for 9/11.  Guiliani apparently didn't read the 9/11 commision report WHICH STATED THAT EXACT PREMISE.

So, why did the CIA seek out Che and not Fidel?  They could've and didn't.  The fact is that he was the essence of lower class, popular uprising against the State.  Whether or not he became the state needs more debate besides saying  "You suck for getting that shirt...I am cooler for idolizing Reagan"...Especially when the same CIA fucks that killed Che were the same guys that were doing all of the drug running into the US.  Thank you GHWB for saving me from an independent Latin American socialist ideal and putting more crack on our streets.

These 2 guys (described as Cuban American CIA agents) over dead Che look like they care about the welfare of all the boys Che supposedly killed...

Quoted: Stinks like troll in here.

I guess...It's just I have some other shit to do...Besides I like my odds in this one

IBSRGOOH

Quoted: Quoted: Stinks like troll in here. I guess...It's just I have some other shit to do...Besides I like my odds in this one IBSRGOOH

You sound like a communist.  No wonder you love Che so much.

Quoted: What truth?A biopic of an elusive subject killed by CIA trained goons that probably wasn't too close to being accurate.  Have any of you read "The Motorcycle Diaries", or any his diaries from Bolivia (The Guerrilla Campaign) or "Guerilla Warfare"?  Che was a passionate, writer, "doctor", figther and philosopher who took it upon himself to travel his continent and ultimately see the hardships of the working class and poor and tried to help out wherever he could to lift the oppressed.   Is his commericalized and idolized by ignorant and naive douche-bags who don't understand what half his deal was (I am still learning)?  Sure.  And then you have your right wing types who only see him as a Marxist tryin to spread the Red disease thru Central and South America.   Did he kill people? Of course, and so did Patton, Sherman, and other commanders of armed forces in combat.  Big deal.  Fidel wasn't nearly as intelligent, well-spoken or admired as Che and seemed to forget the original ideals they were fighting for and against...But shit, it's not like the Cold War and those advancing both idealogies was as black and white as you would like to think. Read a couple of his books, then criticize.  And if you have done so, explain to me specifics why you hate the guy, not just the morons that buy his image. "Our lives count for nothing before the fact of the revolution."- EGdlS  (Under my graduating yearbook picture in 97)

Wow, just when I thought GD would be a total bore today...

Quoted: <SNIP> "You suck for getting that shirt...I am cooler for idolizing Reagan"...

What's with all the Reagan/Contras references? You're the only person in this thread that's brought that stuff up.

Get some new rhetoric.

Quoted: What truth?A biopic of an elusive subject killed by CIA trained goons that probably wasn't too close to being accurate.  Have any of you read "The Motorcycle Diaries", or any his diaries from Bolivia (The Guerrilla Campaign) or "Guerilla Warfare"?  Che was a passionate, writer, "doctor", figther and philosopher who took it upon himself to travel his continent and ultimately see the hardships of the working class and poor and tried to help out wherever he could to lift the oppressed.   Is his commericalized and idolized by ignorant and naive douche-bags who don't understand what half his deal was (I am still learning)?It's immensely obvious you haven't even begun to learn Sure.  And then you have your right wing types who only see him as a Marxist tryin to spread the Red disease thru Central and South America.   Did he kill people? Of course, and so did Patton, Sherman, and other commanders of armed forces in combat.  Big deal.  Fidel wasn't nearly as intelligent, well-spoken or admired as Che and seemed to forget the original ideals they were fighting for and against...But shit, it's not like the Cold War and those advancing both idealogies was as black and white as you would like to think. Read a couple of his books, then criticize.  And if you have done so, explain to me specifics why you hate the guy, not just the morons that buy his image. "Our lives count for nothing before the fact of the revolution."- EGdlS  (Under my graduating yearbook picture in 97)

So you think that being a Marxist is some kind of good thing? Let me guess you've never read the Gulag Archipelago?  or reviewed the millions killed in the name of the People in the soviet Union and China?  Or you don't care?

"Not like the Cold War,"??? if it wasn't pray tell us what it was?  

How about you tell us why in your mind there is any semblance of thinking in that you are so naive as to consider that advancing Marxist-Leninist  repressive dictator ship as a valid political and economic system is in any way comparable to protecting democracy?  Of course it's black and white, one was horrendously WRONG on ALL levels.  I suppose the Avilas, or almost anybody who survived being on the wrong side of the party in Russia, Poland, East Germany, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Hungary, (you remember the Hungarian Revolution don't you?), Czechoslovakian Democracy in the Prague Spring of 1968.

You do remember those wonderful days of Marxist Paradise?

Compare and contrast.

cju, read The Gulag Archipeligo. Shhh!, just read it.

Quoted: If I am ignorant for missing the train on him killing boys/bound men than so be it

/end

WOW! I'm just going to say thatChe was a murdering,sadistic motherfuckinasshole.


Fuck Communists!

To quote Al Pacino in SCARFACE: "I'll Kill a communist for fun,but for a Green Card,I'll carve him up real nice!"

And and again: FUCK commies!!! They must all die!

Quoted: What truth?A biopic of an elusive subject killed by CIA trained goons that probably wasn't too close to being accurate.  Have any of you read "The Motorcycle Diaries", or any his diaries from Bolivia (The Guerrilla Campaign) or "Guerilla Warfare"?  Che was a passionate, writer, "doctor", figther and philosopher who took it upon himself to travel his continent and ultimately see the hardships of the working class and poor and tried to help out wherever he could to lift the oppressed.   Is his commericalized and idolized by ignorant and naive douche-bags who don't understand what half his deal was (I am still learning)?  Sure.  And then you have your right wing types who only see him as a Marxist tryin to spread the Red disease thru Central and South America.   Did he kill people? Of course, and so did Patton, Sherman, and other commanders of armed forces in combat.  Big deal.  Fidel wasn't nearly as intelligent, well-spoken or admired as Che and seemed to forget the original ideals they were fighting for and against...But shit, it's not like the Cold War and those advancing both idealogies was as black and white as you would like to think. Read a couple of his books, then criticize.  And if you have done so, explain to me specifics why you hate the guy, not just the morons that buy his image. "Our lives count for nothing before the fact of the revolution."- EGdlS  (Under my graduating yearbook picture in 97)

Yah, putting 60,000 people into Death Camps and torturing and killing them is a real fucking hero...

And Fucking Comparing him to Patton, that Dumb ass to Fucking Patton? Fuck

You like fucking Castro too?

Quoted: What truth?A biopic of an elusive subject killed by CIA trained goons that probably wasn't too close to being accurate.  Have any of you read "The Motorcycle Diaries", or any his diaries from Bolivia (The Guerrilla Campaign) or "Guerilla Warfare"?  Che was a passionate, writer, "doctor", figther and philosopher who took it upon himself to travel his continent and ultimately see the hardships of the working class and poor and tried to help out wherever he could to lift the oppressed.   Is his commericalized and idolized by ignorant and naive douche-bags who don't understand what half his deal was (I am still learning)?  Sure.  And then you have your right wing types who only see him as a Marxist tryin to spread the Red disease thru Central and South America.   Did he kill people? Of course, and so did Patton, Sherman, and other commanders of armed forces in combat.  Big deal.  Fidel wasn't nearly as intelligent, well-spoken or admired as Che and seemed to forget the original ideals they were fighting for and against...But shit, it's not like the Cold War and those advancing both idealogies was as black and white as you would like to think. Read a couple of his books, then criticize.  And if you have done so, explain to me specifics why you hate the guy, not just the morons that buy his image. "Our lives count for nothing before the fact of the revolution."- EGdlS  (Under my graduating yearbook picture in 97)

Let's have a big'ol hand (s) for Che...

how did such a dreadful bore, sadist and and epic idiot attain such iconic status?

Still trying to figure that out myself.

Quoted: ...So yes he idolized Stalin...

it is rather comical that you try to minimize this bit of minutae.  

what were stalin's exploits again?

this is good! TAG!

Quoted: What truth?A biopic of an elusive subject killed by CIA trained goons that probably wasn't too close to being accurate.  Have any of you read "The Motorcycle Diaries", or any his diaries from Bolivia (The Guerrilla Campaign) or "Guerilla Warfare"?  Che was a passionate, writer, "doctor", figther and philosopher who took it upon himself to travel his continent and ultimately see the hardships of the working class and poor and tried to help out wherever he could to lift the oppressed.   Is his commericalized and idolized by ignorant and naive douche-bags who don't understand what half his deal was (I am still learning)?  Sure.  And then you have your right wing types who only see him as a Marxist tryin to spread the Red disease thru Central and South America.   Did he kill people? Of course, and so did Patton, Sherman, and other commanders of armed forces in combat.  Big deal.  Fidel wasn't nearly as intelligent, well-spoken or admired as Che and seemed to forget the original ideals they were fighting for and against...But shit, it's not like the Cold War and those advancing both idealogies was as black and white as you would like to think. Read a couple of his books, then criticize.  And if you have done so, explain to me specifics why you hate the guy, not just the morons that buy his image. "Our lives count for nothing before the fact of the revolution."- EGdlS  (Under my graduating yearbook picture in 97)

Quoted: <snip>

I am almost 19, and even I recognize the fact that Che Guevara MURDERED and TORTURED CIVILIANS.

He was a goddamned pinko commie.


I would have happily blown his brains out if I was alive back then.