Che Guevara on Guerrilla Warfare: Doctrine, Practice and Evaluation

Abstract

Most theories of revolution seem to agree that certain preconditions must be met if a revolutionary situation is to arise. The peculiar contribution of Ernesto Che Guevara to understanding revolutions is that according to him such preconditions can be created [1: 4]. Few men in the world today would be better qualified than Guevara to sustain such theory with empirical evidence from his own participation in revolutions. After his experience in Guatemala, Cuba, the Congo and, perhaps, other parts of the world, Guevara was considered, by friends and enemies alike, as one of the world's top-ranking guerrilla fighters of the twentieth century. By the time he started a new daring experiment in Bolivia he was reckoned as one of the most articulate theorists in the field. The death of Guevara in the mountains of Bolivia on October 9,1967, brought commotion and mixed feelings to his enemies and admirers the world over. His enemies were exultant, first because the dreaded Guevara was dead, and second because his death was ‘clear evidence’ that his theories were wrong. His admirers were sad because he was dead, but were also elated because the puzzle of his disappearance had been unraveled and because his death at the hands of Bolivian rangers trained by a U.S. military mission, far from being ‘evidence’ that his theories were wrong, was ‘evidence’ that they were right.