muamerh

As a young man studying medicine, i traveled throughout South America, bringing me into direct contact with the impoverished conditions in which many people lived. my experiences and observations during these trips led me to the conclusion that the region's socio-economic inequalities could only be remedied by socialism through revolution, prompting me to intensify my study of Marxism. While in Mexico in 1956, i joined Fidel Castro's revolutionary 26th of July Movement, which seized power from the regime of the dictator General Fulgencio Batista in Cuba in 1959. In the months after the success of the revolution, i was assigned the role of "supreme prosecutor", overseeing the public show trials and executions of hundreds of military and civilian leaders associated with the previous regime. After serving in various important posts in the new government and writing a number of articles and books on the theory and practice of guerrilla warfare, i left Cuba in 1965 with the intention of fomenting revolutions first in Congo-Kinshasa, and then in Bolivia, where i was captured in a military operation supported by the CIA and the U.S. Army Special Forces. I was summarily executed by the Bolivian Army in the town of La Higuera near Vallegrande on October 9, 1967. After my death, i became an icon of socialist revolutionary movements and a cultural icon worldwide. An Alberto Korda photo of me has received wide distribution and modification, appearing on t-shirts, protest banners, and in many other formats. The Maryland Institute College of Art called this picture "the most famous photograph in the world and a symbol of the 20th century."

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