Speaking of the hero of the Cuban revolution and the famous Latin American revolutionary Che Guevara, I think everyone will not be unfamiliar with this legendary hero who has now become the embodiment of idealism, who, together with the famous Cuban revolutionary Brother Castro, overthrew the bourgeois dictatorship of the Cuban government and successfully established a socialist system in Cuba. After the establishment of the socialist system in Cuba, Che Guevara read a lot of works about Chairman Mao, visited China twice, and left behind many classic stories that are popular among the population.
Pictured: The classic image of Che Guevara smoking a cigar
Not Cuban, Che Guevara was born into a privileged family in 1928 and aspired to practice medicine from an early age. But like Lu Xun, in the process of practicing medicine, Guevara deeply felt that the spiritual suffering of the Latin American people was incurable, and it was at this time that he came into contact with the works of Marxism-Leninism, so he made up his mind to carry out the cause of proletarian revolution in Latin America and to make the liberation of Latin America his life's goal.
In 1957, Guevara met the Cuban revolutionary Fidel Castro in Mexico, and the two quickly became close friends, and soon led a small army back to Cuba to carry out guerrilla warfare, and more than a year later overthrew the Cuban bourgeois government. On January 2, 1959, the rebel army under the command of Che Guevara entered Havana, the capital of Cuba, and was warmly welcomed by the people.
Pictured: Che Guevara (left) and Castro (right), comrades and comrades- and comrades-in-arms, jointly led the Cuban Revolution
In April 1959, Pang Bing'an and Kong Mai, from The Chinese Xinhua News Agency, set foot on the unfamiliar land of Cuba to interview Che Guevara. Five days later, Guevara received them in a busy schedule, and in an interview of more than 2 hours, Guevara gave them a detailed account of the reasons and process of the victory of the Cuban Revolution.
Before leaving, Che Guevara suddenly turned his head and took a mimeographed pamphlet from his bookshelf and introduced himself to the two reporters: "You see, I am a student of Chairman Mao. Pang Bing'an fixed his eyes on it, and it turned out to be a pamphlet of Chairman Mao's "On Guerrilla Warfare", which Che Guevara gave to the Chinese reporter, and particularly emphasized that it was printed on the front line of the guerrilla war in Cuba and was "spiritual food" from China.
Pictured: Che Guevara was interviewed by reporters
According to Pang Bing'an's later recollection, Che Guevara had expressed his admiration for Chairman Mao on many occasions, and he was very fond of reading Chairman Mao's works, and based on his own perception of Chairman Mao's works, he also wrote two books, one was "Guerrilla Warfare" and the other was the sequel "Guerrilla Warfare : A Means."
However, when the Chinese ambassador to Venezuela, Huang Zhiliang, led a Chinese delegation to Cuba in 1963, he asked Guevara for a copy of "Guerrilla Warfare" signed by himself, but Che Guevara refused. Che Guevara explained: "Chairman Mao is a master of guerrilla warfare, but I am only a primary school student, so how can I be so kind as to show the works of primary school students to the Chinese comrades?" Isn't this 'peddling honey to beekeepers' (Spanish proverb, similar to the Chinese Banmen axe)? ”
In July 1960, Comrade Tao Dazhao, who worked in the U.S.-Australia Department of the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, suddenly received a diplomatic mission: the leadership of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs decided to let him follow the Chinese delegation headed by Lu Xuzhang, vice minister of the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Trade, to Cuba for three weeks and held talks on foreign trade. The meeting was very smooth between the two sides, and finally Lu Xuzhang and Guevara signed the agreement separately, which was the first time Tao Dazhao saw Che Guevara. In his impression, although Che Guevara was often accustomed to wearing an olive-green costume and looked like a military temperament, in fact he was modest and cautious, good at thinking, and very respectful of the opinions of Chinese comrades.
Pictured: Comrade Lu Xuzhang, the founder of China's foreign trade cause
The three foreign trade agreements signed by New China against Cuba this time were signed without China formally establishing diplomatic relations with Cuba, and the Chinese delegation signed a trade contract with the Cuban side with a total trade volume of about 13 million pounds, and China will purchase a large amount of sugar, nickel and other items from Cuba, as well as aid to Cuba for food and light industrial products. At the meeting, Guevara repeatedly expressed to Lu Xuzhang the gratitude of the Cuban people for the selfless assistance of the Chinese government.
On the eve of the Chinese delegation's departure from Cuba, Che Guevara hurried to the airport in the capital Havana to see him off, and before leaving, Tao Dazhao personally saw Guevara take out a ballpoint pen from his body and give it to Lu Xuzhang. According to Guevara, the ballpoint pen is the ballpoint pen that Fidel Castro used to sign legal documents when he confiscated 26 American sugar mills, and he hopes that the ballpoint pen can be collected and exhibited at the Chinese Museum. Although Che Guevara did not say much, the Chinese comrades present were very understanding, and this ballpoint pen represented the Cuban people's deep feelings for China's simplicity, and even more represented their strong will and great determination to safeguard their national independence.
On November 18, 1960, Guevara led a Cuban economic delegation to officially visit New China, which was the first official delegation sent by Cuba since the establishment of diplomatic relations between New China and Cuba. Before coming to China, Che Guevara often had a saying on his lips: "It is not a good man to go to the Great Wall." This time he finally came to the china of his dreams. On November 18, Premier Zhou Enlai hosted a banquet for Che Guevara, at which Che Guevara made one of his most sincere demands: He must see Chairman Mao.
Pictured: Zhou Enlai meets with visiting Cuban revolutionary leader Guevara
After Zhou Enlai conveyed this message to Chairman Mao, Chairman Mao decided to meet with Che Guevara at the Zhongnanhai Qinzheng Palace on the afternoon of November 19. After actually meeting Chairman Mao, Che Guevara was so excited that he could not say a word, or Chairman Mao was the first to ease his embarrassment: "Che, you are so young!" Chairman Mao first created a light and humorous atmosphere for the conversation between the two men.
Pictured: When I first met Chairman Mao, Che Guevara was very excited
Only then did Che Guevara reply in a very respectful tone: "Chairman Mao, we were not even born when you made the revolution!" Major Sunuel here (who is also a member of the Cuban delegation) is 35 years old, but he is already an old man of our generation of revolutionaries, and he has been wounded 6 times in the Cuban Revolutionary War. ”
After hearing this, Chairman Mao praised: "You are all internationalists! ”
Che Guevara said proudly: "We have always had great admiration for Chairman Mao in the course of our struggle. The members of our Cuban delegation come from four countries, I am from Argentina in addition to cuban natives, the economist Latast, who is in charge of industrial opportunities in Cuba, is Chilean, and Maldonado, who works at the Cuban Foreign Trade Bank, is from Ecuador. Although we are not Cubans, the Cuban masses are not against us, and we actively defend the Cuban revolution, because Fidel Castro represents the will of the people of All Latin America. ”
Subsequently, Che Guevara tasted tea from China and talked to Chairman Mao about his study of Chairman Mao's writings: "Although we did not eat well when we fought guerrilla wars and were short of spiritual food, I can find the common ground between the Cuban Revolution and the Chinese Communist Revolution from the few works of Chairman Mao. In China, Chiang Kai-shek's attack on the revolutionary base areas was described as 'encirclement and suppression', and the Cuban reactionaries also used these two words for the rebel army. ”
Pictured: Che Guevara and his guerrillas
Speaking of the methods of warfare and the policy toward the captives, Guevara said gratefully to Chairman Mao: "In Chairman Mao's article, Fidel Castro saw a very important point, that is, the policy of preferential treatment of prisoners, that is, to heal the wounds of the prisoners and send them back. In the beginning when we were engaged in the revolution, we took off the clothes and shoes of our captives and put them on ourselves, because our fighters did not even have these things, and then Fidel did not let us do this. ”
He also told Chairman Mao a very interesting thing: "When I first led the troops to fight, the strength was not even a company, and once I led the company to capture an enemy tank, and I was very happy, but Fidel had to take my tank, and later he exchanged it with me with a rocket launcher." Just as you 'thanked' Chiang Kai-shek, we also want to thank Batista's dictatorship, because he brought more people to our side. ”
Pictured: Che Guevara participates in the Battle of Santa Clara in December 1958
During the conversation, Chairman Mao smiled and shook Che Guevara's hand, saying that he had read Che Guevara's article "Studying the Handwriting of the Ideology of the Cuban Revolution" and saying that he was in favor of Che Guevara's ideas, which made Guevara feel invigorated, and later Che Guevara gave Chairman Mao a copy of "Guerrilla Warfare" with a handwritten signature.
After bidding farewell to Chairman Mao, Che Guevara and Vice Premier Li Xiannian prepared to sign the Sino-Cuban joint communiqué. He first said to Li Xiannian: "The goods we first sell to great China are the purest and sweetest crystallization of our Cuba - sugar... We have to find a way to break a peso (Cuban currency) in half to spend. In this regard, Li Xiannian comforted him: "Major Che Guevara, you can rest assured, we guarantee that every peso of yours will not be wasted, you just want to suffer losses, and we will not let you suffer losses!" "Their economic and trade negotiations are going well.
Subsequently, Che Guevara met with Premier Zhou. At the beginning of the conversation, Che Guevara happily shook Premier Zhou's hand and said: "This time I came to China to be able to personally know some lofty figures of the world revolution that we feel deeply admired, and on the other hand, to personally observe and understand how the Chinese people built socialist society after the victory of the revolution." ”
Pictured: Che Guevara speaks with Premier Zhou
He told Premier Zhou that they had always paid attention to learning from the successful experience of the Chinese revolution. Since there were very few books on China in latin America in the past, after they came to Beijing, they looked for two volumes of the "Selected Works of Mao Zedong" and found that although China and Cuba were large and small, they were both colonial or semi-colonial countries in the past, and there were many similarities and differences in the construction after the revolutionary experience and the victory of the revolution.
At this time, China and Cuba had reached a loan agreement, and Che Guevara bluntly said to Premier Zhou: "Although the current New China has the ability to aid Cuba, we do not have the right to disrupt your five-year plan. Premier Zhou replied: "We are all comrades-in-arms in the same trench, and we should help you if you have difficulties, otherwise you will not be considered a revolutionary country." "There is no doubt that Che Guevara was very touched by the new China's move to provide assistance to Cuba under his own difficult circumstances.
Pictured: Castro and Che Guevara in the Cuban Revolution
When Premier Zhou proposed that Cuba could postpone the repayment of its debts, or even negotiate not to repay them, Guevara lamented: "Among the assistance of socialist countries, China is one of the most generous countries, and we hope that we will not encounter difficulties and be able to return them in time, after all, we in Cuba have a saying: 'Only if you help yourself, God will help you'." ”
Pictured: The Sino-Cuban Joint Communiqué published by the People's Daily
According to the agreement, from 1961 to 1965, New China bought 1 million tons of sugar and 5,000 tons of nickel from Cuba every year, and gave Cuba a total of 60 million US dollars in huge loans. Therefore, after returning to China, Che Guevara gave a high evaluation of the friendship between Cuba and China, and in a national television speech, Guevara also introduced a very touching story to the Cuban people: After the signing of the agreement, Che Guevara asked to write 10 words in the national gazette of the two countries, "Cuba thanks China for its selfless assistance", but Premier Zhou resolutely disagreed, and Premier Zhou believed that the assistance between our proletarian countries was mutually beneficial and mutually concessional.
Che Guevara finally said to the Cuban people in a televised speech: "In the end, Premier Zhou convinced me, and he won. ”
This allusion was later well known in Cuba, further cementing the friendship between the two countries, and according to Pang Bing'an, "Until recent years, some cuban old people can still recall this event, and from their words and deeds, they can find gratitude to the Chinese people." ”
In December 1960, Tao Dazhao followed Shen Jian, china's first ambassador to Cuba, to Havana, accompanied by Shen Yunfu, who was in charge of the Spanish translation. After departing from Beijing, they traveled through Moscow to Switzerland, from where they boarded A KLM airliner to Cuba. After many trips, they reached the island of Aruba near the Caribbean Sea, and according to the air route plan, the next stop should be havana, the capital of Cuba.
But who knows that the sky is unpredictable, after the plane of the Chinese ambassador to Cuba arrived over Havana, the capital of Cuba, the local lightning flashed and thundered, and a fierce wind and rain fell, and the plane that Shen Jian and Tao Dazhao were riding on repeatedly hovered up and down in the sky, but it was impossible to land, and due to the airsickness, the female comrades accompanying them were very weak.
Pictured: On December 28, 1960, Ambassador Shen Jian presented his credentials to President Dorticos
At first, the crew reassured them that they were going to do their best to land in Cuba. Later, however, the crew told them that the plane was preparing to land in Miami, and Shen Jian was shocked when he learned that the United States had not even resumed diplomatic relations with China, so how could the first Cuban ambassador of New China go to the United States? Once it landed in the United States, how much damage would it cause to the reputation of new China in the world?
So Shen Jian said that he would never go to the United States, and asked them to do everything possible to contact the Airport in Havana, Cuba, and at the same time signaled Tao Dazhao and his party to take out confidential documents and prepare to destroy them at any time. Seeing the Chinese ambassador's resolute attitude, the crew seemed to realize the gravity of the situation, so they promised to try to make a last resort. After a period of urgent radio contact, the crew finally made contact with the Airport in Havana, Cuba, and forced a landing under the command of ground radar.
After the plane landed safely at the Havana airport, Tao Dazhao found two figures dressed in olive-green military uniforms appearing from the rain and fog, one of whom was Captain Jimenez, the director of the Cuban Land Reform Commission, and the other was Che Guevara, whom they were very familiar with. After stepping off the plane, Ambassador Shen Jian shook Che Guevara's hand next to the plane gangway and said excitedly: "Today we almost flew to Miami!" Che Guevara said solemnly: "We will never let them send the Chinese ambassador to the United States." ”
Photo: On December 28, 1960, Ambassador Shen Jian presented his credentials to the President of Cuba in the reception room of the Presidential Palace.
Subsequently, Che Guevara introduced Captain Jimenez to the Chinese ambassador and instructed them to ask the Chinese Embassy to provide an up-to-date Cadillac sedan, 3 Cuban guards with live ammunition, and a guard car. Since then, these configurations and personnel have been accompanied by the Chinese Embassy in Cuba until Ambassador Shen Jian left office.
Photo: Before Ambassador Shen Jian left office in 1964, he took a picture at the entrance of the official residence of the Chinese ambassador in Havana
On October 1, 1961, Tao Dazhao and other Chinese diplomatic envoys held a National Day reception at the Embassy in Havana, Cuba, and in addition to Che Guevara, the leaders of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro and Raúl Castro, also attended the scene. At that time, more than 400 people from all walks of life in Cuba attended the reception, and everyone celebrated the 12th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China and the 1st anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Cuba.
Pictured: Young translators at the Cuban Embassy in the early 1960s. From right, Li Guoxin, Li Yunxi, Huang Zhiliang, Yu Chengren, and Shen Yunfu are in order
Among Cuba's senior leaders, Guevara stayed the longest at the Chinese embassy, leaving almost at the end of the reception, and many important Latin American figures waved hello to him and spoke eagerly with him.
At this moment, Tao Dazhao pulled a Chinese comrade to take advantage of the gap to walk in front of Comrade Guevara and asked him for a group photo, and Guevara smiled and nodded, saying: "It is a pleasure to take a group photo with you." However, just as Liu Dongao, a reporter of the Xinhua News Agency in Cuba, was about to raise his camera, Comrade Yu Liguang, commercial counselor of the Chinese Embassy, also ran over to liu dongfu and shouted to Liu Dongao: "Don't worry, I will also participate!" ”
Yu Liguang's shout was terrible, and suddenly the Commercial Department of the Chinese Embassy, the Cultural Department, the representatives of the International Bookstore, the representatives of the film company, and others all ran over to participate in the group photo with Comrade Guevara, and even Comrade Mu Sen, who was shooting the film at the reception, hurriedly put down the heavy photographic equipment and rushed over to participate in the group photo. As a result, when the photo was taken, there were 10 Chinese comrades standing next to Che Guevara, and the comrades of the Chinese Embassy in Havana were sincerely happy to be able to take a photo with Guevara.