Should be required viewing for any young person who thinks it's cool to wear a Che Guevara t-shirt.
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The first time I was in Cuba, shortly before Brothers to the Rescue dropped pamphlets over the island, an old man came up to me in the Parc Central in Old Havana. "Che Guavara? One U.S. Dollar?" he asked, showing me a shiny one peso coin with the likeness of the world's most famous revolutionary on it. He glanced nervously in all directions, eyes on the lookout for police. That's because what he was doing was illegal. Tourists had to pay in U.S. currency and there were dollar stores in Havana, but the rest of the Cubans had only their pitifully devalued peso, which was worth far less than one U.S. dollar. He made quite a profit off me, and probably was first in line at the dollar store that day to spend it.
I was in Cuba twice, and on both occasions I saw conditions and talked with people which made me realize it's a complicated place. Almost everyone I met agreed that before the revolution more than 50 percent of Cubans were living in shantytown poverty, lacking proper clothes, nutrition, housing, and of course education. When Castro and his 26th of July Movement wrestled power from the Batista regime which had been installed by the U.S. to protect U.S. interests, one of the first things they did was to nationalize property and businesses. Well-off Cubans--those whose higher standards of living which were the result of large family plantations or dealings with multinational corporations--had to flee the island. So the story of Castro's Cuba is literally a tale of two Cubans: the haves, and the have-nots. To the have-nots, Fidel Castro and Che Guevara remain heroes, because for the average Cuban, health care, education, and housing have improved dramatically. They admit that the revolution has gone off track, or else that old man who tried to sell me that shiny peso wouldn't have been so nervous. But they have high hopes that it will get back on track again. To the haves, who now live in exile, Castro and Guevara are the men who killed their grandfathers and fathers and who took their family estates and factories. They're petty thieves, and nothing more.
Though it's subtle, this 1999 documentary comes at it from the point of view of the have-nots, because it reveres the revolutionary reader rather than disparaging his accomplishments. We're reminded of what a driving force Guevara was in Castro's revolutionary organization. Recruited because he was a doctor and Castro needed a physician for his second attempted coup, Guevara quickly rose to the rank of Commander. Once Batista was driven from the island, it was Guevara who established broadcast and print communication systems to educate the public to the revolution, and it was Guevara who was appointed supreme prosecutor and presided over the execution of hundreds of "traitors" by firing squad. Guevara formed the Cuban Secret Service, and was appointed president of the National Bank of Cuba. He founded a massive literacy campaign and devised a plan for agrarian reform which would redistribute land to the peasants. Guevara was also the face of the new Cuba abroad, sent by Fidel to countries all over the world on goodwill tours that were designed to make new allies and trade partners.
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