Che and stalin

He may have become a trotskyist in 73 but he still could have been interested in Trotsky's writings before that and if he was close to che, and feeling that he was a great revolutionary, might have wanted Che's thoughts on Trotsky's work. None of us can say for sure what actually happened, we can only really base our conclusions on what we read and how we interperet it.

Quote:

recent publications in Cuba on Che and economics also show how Che adopted many ideas that were laid out in permenant revolution. If you really care to learn about it get the books and read them, they are only offered in spanish as of now

and which ideas exactly?

Josh wrote:

None of us can say for sure what actually happened, we can only really base our conclusions on what we read and how we interperet it.

Well now, this is very different than your original thesis.

Originally, you claimed that, thanks to Trotsky:

-Che disavowed the concept of socialism in one country
-Che gained his sense of internationalism (even if it wasn't as good as Trotsky's was)
-Che to left Cuba to foment revolution in Congo, etc.
-Credited the importance of Trotsky's analysis with regards to post-Lenin Soviet Russia.

Certainly an amazing transformation!

I'm trying to be civil, I'd didn't want to join the board and get into arguing matches on Stalin and Trotsky. I will admit that I did start the arguements but I would like to apologise and discuss the issue. Infighting amongst communists is counterproduction we have enough to worry about.
I was bold in my original statement but I stand firm on my analysis of Che. I don't think that Trotsky was the only reason Che felt the way he did... he was merely just influenced by what he read of his.

when I re-read this, I could see that I drank alittle too much before writing. It's kind of jumbled.... my apologies

Don't mind Greggers too much. He can get a bit dogmatic at times. We still love him though.

haha Cata, here we have:

a) A variety of people insisting that Che was in favor of, a militant of, or otherwise sympathetic to Trotsky, to varying degrees despite all evidence to the contrary;

b) Myself, along with several others, doubting such claims as well as presenting circumstantial evidence that Che was pro-Stalin in addition to his longstanding membership in one of the world's foremost Marxist-Leninist parties;


... And I'm the one being dogmatic!? To do so simply redefines the meaning of the word

did I already say that Che put flowers on Stalin's tumb when he visited the USSR, which wasn't to the liking of Cuban ambassador Faure Chomón (nor to that of the Soviet authorities)
source: Jorge Castañeda, "La vida en rojo" p.231

Apuntes Críticos sobre Economía Política ,Critical Notes on Political Economy is the book published in Cuba that has many of Che's unpublished works. It includes an unfavorable assessment of the Soviet economy. It's only in spanish but I think an English version will be available soon.



[/quote]a) A variety of people insisting that Che was in favor of, a militant of, or otherwise sympathetic to Trotsky, to varying degrees despite all evidence to the contrary;[/quote]

Where is this overwhemling evidence??? I posted an article with an interview of a friend of Che's saying that he asked to read Trotysky's work and found it quite good. You dismissed it. Why should I believe your claims when you've only offered insults and sarcastic remarks

Quote:

b) Myself, along with several others, doubting such claims as well as presenting circumstantial evidence that Che was pro-Stalin in addition to his longstanding membership in one of the world's foremost Marxist-Leninist parties;

(a bit of hair-splitting) The Communist Party of Cuba wasn't founded until 1965 so I don't think Che's membership of it could have been longstanding.

he was gone by 1965. he was in the congo..

I'd be curious to find the dates on both to guarantee no overlap..

Quote:

Apuntes Críticos sobre Economía Política ,Critical Notes on Political Economy is the book published in Cuba that has many of Che's unpublished works. It includes an unfavorable assessment of the Soviet economy. It's only in spanish but I think an English version will be available soon.

I know about that book and am very eager to read it but my question was: "which ideas that were laid out in the permanent revolution were adopted by che and how is this revealed in those recent publications on economics?"

Quote:

(a bit of hair-splitting) The Communist Party of Cuba wasn't founded until 1965 so I don't think Che's membership of it could have been longstanding.

Thanks for that, I was getting mixed up with that clause in the Cuban constitution which was made specifically for Che with regards to citizenship, without naming him specifically. It's the one that begins something like, "any person, having attained the rank of major or higher in the revolutionary army prior to 1960...", or something like that....

Quote:

"any person, having attained the rank of major or higher in the revolutionary army prior to 1960..."

IIRC it was Commandante.

Also, I'll restate my 2 cents. Che wasn't into factions. He would have not of declared himself a Stalinist/Trot/Maoist. He believed in a Communist movement against capitalism. This failure to see the splits in the Communist movement led to his demise in Bolivia.

That supposed orientation is definitely something to investigate. I know there was a lot of jockeying for power amongst the different factions in the early days of the Cuban revolution, especially the percieved sectarianism of the Partido Socialista Popular (the pro-Moscow Communists) on the part of the veterans of the Movimiento J26 (i.e., Che & Fidel).

Quote:

I posted an article with an interview of a friend of Che's saying that he asked to read Trotysky's work and found it quite good.

It seems to me that that episode (Che reading Trotsky and finding it quite good) occurred in 1959.
(I don't exclude the possibility that Ricardo Napuri's views have (unintentionally) become a bit distorted after all those years. I'd be amazed if Che really said that they did the revolution without the working class in Cuba, but it's not impossible)
On the 4th of December 1965, Che wrote a letter to Armando Hart, a Trotskyist who's been minister of culture and still forms part of the Cuban 'council of state' (maybe a bad translation). In that letter (which you can read at http://cheguevara.cubasi.cu/Content.asp ... o=0&id=681) he writes: "[it is] necessary to publish the complete works of Marx and Engels, Lenin, Stalin [underlined by Che] and other great marxists"
Trotsky, on the other hand, is placed in the category of "great revisionists".
So I really don't see where Che's supposed sympathy for Trotsky appears in all this.

Well, that pretty much closes an already closed question as far as I can see. That is a great article, he also calls Krushchev a "big revisionist" if I read the spanish correctly. +5 pts. Che...

interesting story about that letter:
An Italian Trotskyist (Moscato) has completely distorted Che's letter, by omitting the reference to Stalin, and placing Trotsky in the category of the "classics".
Some would call it a 'stalinist' distortion...

source: http://www.pasti.org/censure.html

so why is this letter the end all be all. It was claimed that my evidence was biased because it was an interview with a Trot. I could say the same. I will say this though, I don't so much think that Che became a Trot, I just feel that Che's thought developed over time and encompassed idea's laid out by trotsky. Che was no God he made mistakes like every other human on the planet. If he thought Trotsky was a revisionist then he was wrong plain and simple. I still think che was one of the greatest revolutionaries of the 20th century

How is Trotsky not a revisionist with his whole "permenant revolution" thing?

Quote:

How is Trotsky not a revisionist with his whole "permenant revolution" thing?

The Trotskyist theory of permanent revolution is not a form of Revisionism, Cata. Revisionism is derived from the ideas of Eduard Bernstein in the 1890s. The Bible of Revisionism is Bernstein's book, Evolutionary Socialism. I suggest you read it; you clearly have no understanding of the ideological basis of Revisionism.