VIEW: El Che and Sheikh Osama — Saad Hafiz
Unlike bin Laden, Che was a daring and courageous commander who led from the front
It has been reported from the interrogation of the bin Laden widows in Pakistan that Osama Bin Laden admired Ernesto 'Che' Guevara. Che Guevara was the charismatic Argentine-Cuban revolutionary and close confidante of Fidel Castro, who was executed in Bolivia in 1967. It is worth exploring bin Laden's admiration for Che beyond just as a fellow political outlaw and rebel against US domination.
There are definitely some eerie similarities in the story of the life and death of Che and bin Laden, the most conspicuous being that both men had 'declared war' on the United States and also suffered violent death in actions that smacked of US frontier justice. However, their respective legacies seem vastly different as Che's ideas of an independent, united Latin America, with social justice continue to resonate nearly 50 years after his death, while the murderous and divisive al Qaeda ideology is generally discredited after bin Laden's demise.
Unlike bin Laden, Che was a daring and courageous commander who led from the front, but can hardly be considered an outstanding military tactician and guerrilla fighter like the Vietnamese General Giáp whose forces thrashed French and American forces in Indo-China. From his Cuban experience in the overthrow of the detested American-supported Batista dictatorship, Che argued that small groups of determined armed fighters (called focos) could take to the mountains and use armed actions to rally other forces, triggering the crisis and collapse of hated governments. In the early 1960s, several attempts at armed focos were made in Peru, Argentina, Venezuela and other countries. None of them succeeded including the one in Bolivia that ultimately led to Che's own death.
In his fight against US imperialism, Che sought and failed to create 'one, two, three, many Vietnams' to draw in the US military, sap its strength, and ultimately bring about a new, socialist world order. After 9/11, in a strange unintended way and aided by colossal US stupidity, bin Laden and al Qaeda had been far more successful when compared to Che in drawing in and sapping the strength of the US military through the twin wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Many fellow luminaries such as Nelson Mandela, Jean-Paul Sartre and Gabriel Garcia Marquez admired Che for his idealism and for serving as an inspirational symbol of hope for the struggling masses around the globe. Fidel Castro said of Che: "A man of profound ideals, a man in whose mind stirred the dream of struggle." The larger than life image of Che, emblazoned on tee shirts and trinkets sold all over the world, is that of a poster child and highly romantic martyr of the people's cause, a revolutionary leader, strategic thinker and action figure of the 20th century.
To his detractors, mostly Cuban exiles who fled to the US after being on the losing side of the Cuban revolution in 1958, Che was a blood-thirsty narcissistic murderer, a Latin Beria who enjoyed executing enemy prisoners at close range and who helped to establish and operate 'gulags' for opponents of the Cuban revolution. There is no evidence, however, that Che ever condoned targeting of civilian non-combatants during his guerilla operations, in contrast to bin Laden who had the blood of over 3,000 innocent Americans on his hands.
Latin America in particular has passionately debated Che's mixed legacy since his death. On the one hand, Cuba has consolidated as an independent nation in the face of an adversarial relationship and a punitive 50-year old US economic embargo and can rightly boast about offering universal healthcare and education for all citizens, but on the other hand, free elections have not been allowed in the country since the Revolution.
Ironically, unlike Cuba, a new scenario has been developing on the South American continent for the past two decades and for the first time in history, in which elected officials have come to power with the interests of their citizens at heart to an unprecedented degree. These leaders are not always Marxists or revolutionaries in the Che mould, just like those non-Marxist patriots who chose armed struggle in the 60s, but they share a common and explicit belief in their national independence and reject the hegemony of the United States, which is pretty much the cause for which Che started his original struggle. While bin Laden quite rightly belongs in the dustbin of history, El Che despite his imperfections remains a potent symbol of hope and struggle, reflected in a saying about his legacy written on many walls throughout Latin America: "You may cut the flowers, but it will not stop the spring."
The writer can be reached at shgcci@gmail.com
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