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"Guevara started playing chess by the age of 12, only later to become one of the Island's Grandmasters." I'm guessing that "the Island" means Cuba, but at the age of 12 he was not on an island, was he? Assuming I have read correctly, could someone please reword appropriately? -- Jmabel | Talk 06:35, 26 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

It does say 'only later', so not at the age of twelve. So you didn't read correctly. :) DirkvdM 08:00, 1 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I understand that, but still nothing there is no grammatical antecedent for "the Island". -- Jmabel | Talk 05:36, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Jmabel, just wanted to write a note in support of your decision to take out the reference to Che's supposedly having been a Grandmaster of Chess. When that assertion first appeared in the Wiki article a few weeks ago, I was almost positive that it was an error. Nevertheless, since it is always possible that he was a Grandmaster of Chess but that this information had somehow escaped my notice, I did not feel that I should remove it without doing some research. Since then, I have looked through many print and internet sources and have not found any documentation to support the claim that he was a Grandmaster of Chess. He definitely was an aficionado of the game, and a somewhat skilled player, but I do not believe that his participation went beyond that. I have noticed that he is referred to on some Spanish language web sites as el Gran Maestro, which may be the source of the confusion -- however, this allusion is to the didactic value of his revolutionary example, not a title in Chess ... Polaris999 05:41, 14 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

It's almost certainly incorrect that Guevara was a Grandmaster. (This is an official title given by the world chess organztion FIDE. There are only ion the order of hundreds GM in the world today, and not even all professional players are GMs. The match against Najdorf was a blind-simultaneous game (Najdorf played against 10 or so others simulatneously without looking at the boards), and apparently he offered a draw to Guevara, who rejected the offer, but ultimately Najdorf won.

(There's a chess base article on Guevara and chess, unfortunately only in German, here: http://www.chessbase.de/events/events.asp?pid=569 )

INSERT As far as I know there was only one Cuban Grandmaster and he was José Raúl Capablanca y Graupera El Jigüe 4/10/05

Accuracy, coherency, grammar and vocabulary seem not to be a matter of concern to many of the people who are "contributing" here recently. For example, I have been waiting for several days now for someone to explain by exactly what means the "dissents" referred to in the section Revolutionary government were "executed".

Jmabel, since you are very knowledgeable about all things Wiki, would you please explain at what point a page becomes a candidate for protection, and whether this page is approaching that threshold? Thank you -- Polaris999 18:04, 26 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Someone has finally changed "dissents" to "dissidents" ... Polaris999 21:24, 26 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure how knowledgable I am, but as far as I can tell, this is nowhere near any threshold for protection. There are 3 reasons we protect pages:

1. For obvious reasons, we temporarily protect images while they are on the front page.
2. We temporarily protect articles that are receiving a storm of vandalism from a variety of IP addresses. If it's from a variety of IP addresses, we can't solve it with blocks, and this sort of thing can just plain render a page useless if not stopped somehow.
3. We sometimes temporarily protect articles that are the subject of edit wars: when the process has broken down, and there is no movement toward consensus on the talk page, this forces people to shift to discussion rather than edit warring.

We do not protect over poorly executed good-faith edits.

The only one of the three conditions for protection that even imaginably might be occurring (I haven't been following super-closely) is the last. But I haven't seen anyone (you included) raising important issues on the talk page and not getting responses. The (admittedly messy) wiki process seems to me to be working about as usual for a controversial topic. If you have some specific issues that you think are a problem, lay them out. But if it's just bad spelling, grammar, and usage, just fix it (or don't: you are not required to be the custodian). And if a passage is incoherent, then you can cut it to the talk page & reproduce it here with a message that you have no idea what it was intended to mean, and would the author please reword.

Given the topic of this article, many of the most knowledgable people may have better Spanish than English. If that looks like what is going on, and you can't understand what they are trying to say, you can invite them to write their stuff in Spanish on the talk page: there are plenty of people around who can translate Spanish to English. (But apparently this is not what was happening)-- Jmabel | Talk 04:31, 28 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Correcting myself: yes, the degree of edit warring the last few days does approach protection level (although it seems to have calmed down the last 20 hours or so). But no one, yourself included, has brought the substantive issues to the talk page (and there were so many edits that with a backlog on my watchlist, this never made it to the top.) Please, someone, summarize the differences here, and try to discuss them on the talk page rather than by warring edit summaries. -- Jmabel | Talk 05:29, 28 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you, Jmabel, for clarifying this matter. I had, of course, read the wiki page re protection, but was not sure exactly how the standards would apply to what was going on with the Che page. It is encouraging to see that the warring edits have slackened off over the past 20+ hours; perhaps this trend will continue. If not, I hope that the disputing parties will follow your advice and bring their disagreements to the talk page for resolution.

Polaris999 05:59, 28 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I have reverted the latest changes by User: NWOG. I thought I'd give the reasons

1. He says that Cuban exiles cannot be trusted because they hated Che and were responsible for his death. This assumes that every single Cuban exile is collectively responsible for the death and therefore no one can be trusted. I don't think it makes sense to assign collective guilt to a class of people.
2. If in fact I see a man shooting a 12 year old boy in cold blood, I am not going to like the man. You cannot then use my dislike of the man to claim that my testimony cannot be trusted because I am biased and have a point of view. If this standard were adopted, no case could possibly be decided.
3. To assign motives to a class of people as some people have done in their edit summaries ("They are an enemy of Cuba" etc.) is POV. If this were a valid way of doing things, then we could never quote primary sources on contentious topics like these- because every one of them will be too close to the action to be unbiased.

--Ravikiran 05:04, 29 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

According to this one person, he was already in jail when it happened. If so, why was he in jail? Was he a member of the secret police? A Batista-soldier? According to David Icke, Bush and Dick Cheney is a paedophile. He is serious when he claims Bush and Dick is responsible for the attack on the WTC. He also believe the world leaders are reptiles. But does his claims belong to an encyclopedia? There will always be conspiracy theories. You simply need proof if you are to suggest a person (whoever that may be) is a child-killer. Because these claims are even less reliable than German tabloids, if we are to discuss the Norwegian royal family. - NWOG

We are not trying Che Guevara. We are just reporting on what some people who are involved in a story are saying. The reader can read the books and make up his own mind. We are just pointing to him. There are many reasons why a person could be in jail in Cuba. One of them could be that he opposed the regime. It is an interesting point of view to assume that just because someone was in jail, he must be lying about other things too. --Ravikiran 15:23, 29 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

If Che was an avid photographer then wouldn't it be a good idea to include some of his photos (possibly on a separate page)? I assume they'd be free of copyright. Anyone know where to find any? DirkvdM 08:04, 1 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Here :

http://www.mkg-hamburg.de/english/ausstell/03_che/home.htm

Ericd 11:18, 1 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, thanks. Not a very large collection, but then it's only meant as an apetiser for the display. I'm still unsure about the copyrights, but the site states that the photos are on loan from the 'Centro de Estudios Che Guevara, Havana, Cuba'. And I seriously doubt if they'd object to publication of the photos elsewhere. It's been asked about at Google answers, but the answers aren't conclusive. So for now I'll just add the link you gave to the article. DirkvdM 08:22, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Guevara was not notable as a photographer. An external link to a wesbite featuring his photos can be added, but there's no reason to place them in the article. 172 | Talk 08:26, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry about messing up the formatting of the introduction to the article, but someone messed up the entire article's facts, so I was forced to replace that introduction. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.108.86.166 (talk) 21 November 2005

To say that Che was a commie yes but that man had ideas to end poverty and turning to communism is the best way the world can do.To me i think this man is a hero to the poor people .My mothers and fathers family didnt have that much and knowing that one man would change there life to be more comfortable where there would be no rich or poor is somethig great. What this man was fighting for was a cause and that was great. At the age of 39 Ernesto died and if he didnt die then mabye life would be alot more easier. This man is a hero and i belive in him and so dose the people of every other coutry.to my me and all my family he is ahero and nothing more. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.182.182.147 (talk) 22 November 2005

In December 1964, Che Guevara went to New York City to visit the UN. While there, he had little-known meetings with three associates of Robert Kennedy: newsman Tad Szulc, Senator Eugene McCarthy, and journalist Lisa Howard. A few weeks later, in January 1965, a Cuban exile supported by Robert Kennedy in 1963, Eloy Menoyo, was arrested while on a secret mission into Cuba.

This may be true (although it's uncited), but its placement immediately before "After April 1965 Guevara dropped out of public life and then vanished altogether," insinuates causality. Is there any basis for this? -- Jmabel | Talk 07:10, 24 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

If someone were to write a book speculating that Che Guevara had been an extra-terrestrial, would it be appropriate to include quotations from it in this article? Aren't there certain standards of credibility that are supposed to be observed when writing for Wiki? I could totally demolish, point by point, all of the bizarre and absolutely baseless speculations in the work that you are referring to, but consider that they are so absurd as to not merit the time this would require. Polaris999 09:50, 25 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I've deleted "Many of these same teachings, today, are criticized as revolution-through-terrorism, due to their emphasis on asymmetrical warfare." The sentence doesn't make a lot of sense; and the use of "asymmetrical warfare" (warfare between opponents of widely different capabilities) instead of the more precise "guerilla warfare" doesn't help. I presume that the intention behind this sentence is something like "Guevara's teachings have been criticised as tevolution-through-terrorism because the weak guerilla forces must perforce use terror as their primary method, due to their inability to mount conventional battles". I don't think that this is true, though I will leave the final decision to those with more knowledge than myself. I think Guevara's attitude, and the general intention of guerilla warfare, is to win the support of the population and to make hit-and-run raids on enemy forces. Terror is used only as a tool to prevent the population from supporting the enemy. Anti-guerilla forces use terror in the same way.

To clarify the mind, a less controversial case is useful. Think in terms of the French resistance to the German WWII occupation. Pol098 05:45, 25 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Hello Pol098 -- Just a note to say that I am in agreement with your decision to remove that sentence. Che strongly opposed the use of violence against the civilian population. In Bolivia, the people who lived in the area where the guerrillas were operating generally referred to him as "El Médico" because he spent most of his time with them diagnosing their medical problems and giving them whatever medicines he might have that were appropriate to treat their illnesses. When requested to do so, he even pulled their teeth. As to whether or not all guerrilla groups everywhere have always eschewed the use of terror, I believe that each group would need to be studied individually to find out exactly what its specific policies are/were. Polaris999 09:35, 25 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Polaris999. And the reason I removed the original sentence was that it was gibberish, didn't mean anything; and if you pushed it into meaning something it was wrong in general, not just about Guevara. Any tiny, ill-equipped, but sane group MUST gain local support, whether sincerely or cynically; 100 men can't terrorise a population into supporting them against an army. I don't think any guerilla groups, including Guevara's, eschew the use of selective terror, it's just a targetted tool, not overall policy: anyone local captured by the enemy of the guerillas must be very afraid of what will happen if (s)he talks. So I'd expect the standard guerilla policy to be: make friends with and help the local population in general, but deal very harshly with anyone who betrays, whatever the circumstances.

Pol098 12:58, 25 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

According to some Eutimio Guerra was a major figure in the "Agrarian Reform" movement in the Sierra Maestra. It is not known if he really was a traitor since with few exceptions we only have Guevara and Castro's versions of events. However, it is wise to remember that Guerra was only one of many people executed, or driven from the Sierra Maestra by Guevara to be killed by waiting Batista forces. These bloody events had few witnesses and seemed to have involved complex struggles between those loyal to Frank Pais, the clandestine communists who fled the 1933 Soviet of the Sugar factory at Mabay, bandits loyal to Cresencio Perez, and an odd assortment of Spanish Republic loyalists. There also seems to have been some CIA support of Castro. xe xe El Jigüe — Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.240.227.15 (talk) 27 November 2005

The recent edits by User:205.240.227.15 look to me to consist mostly of uncited disparagement of Guevara (ditto the remark above) and insertion of POV phrasing. I don't have time to go through these one by one, but:

• "Granma was conveniently delayed": "conveniently" for whom?
• "However, at least some of these were rivals or inconvenient non-ideologues. For instance even much maligned Eutimio Guerra had been "an (sic) land reform organizer." Citation?
• "…apparently the only significant achievement of Guevara was to severely damage the agricultural environment…": is this an encyclopedia article or a prosecution summation before a jury? And that's uncited, too.

There might be something worth having in some of this, so I am not unilaterally reverting at them moment, but I sure won't have a problem if someone else reverts.

Jmabel | Talk 03:53, 28

November 2005 (UTC)

Xe xe Jmabel it would seem that POV means things you disagree with. The citations are there you must have missed them. I have inserted them but here they are just for you Xe xe El Jigüe

On Utimio Guerra:

Morán Arce, Lucas 1980 La revolución cubana, 1953-1959: Una versión rebelde Imprenta Universitaria, Universidad Católica; Ponce, Puerto Rico ISBN: B0000EDAW9

Fuentes, Norberto 2004 La Autobiografia De Fidel Castro Editorial Planeta, Mexico D.F ISBN: 8423336042, ISBN: 9707490012

• "it would seem that POV means things you disagree with": are you telling me that "conveniently" here is not POV? How about a wording like "apparently the only significant achievement of Guevara was to severely damage…". If that's your idea of neutrality, I wouldn't want to see how you write when you are trying to disparage someone. -- Jmabel | Talk 08:03, 29 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Jmabel: Castro was and is famous for his discrete exits and delayed entrances. The first account I heard second hand, but from a reliable first hand source, was that of Rolando Masferrer (not a nice guy either also with communist links) who after Castro tried to kill him at Havana University, said he recognized Fidel by his fat backside "caderas anchas y amplias." It is generally believed that Castro never entered the Moncada Barracks. I believe it was at Ubero when Castro fired the first shot with his telescopic rifle at a great distance....the others had to charge in. He set up the landing so that there was successive sacrifice of three squads. Huber Matos relates Castro's terror of air attack. At Guisa Castro stayed at Mon Corona's estate behind thick reinforced concrete walls a least a mile behind the lines, and when that seemed unsufficient he fled with all his headquarter staff to the immense caves at Santa Barbara in the lower Guisa River canyon. This left all us other idiots on the front lines protecting him and the other brass. As to the Che Guevara, luckily I never met him although he did falsely accuse and then execute a rebel who I knew from childhood. When we were being strafed at the "Minas del Frio" I saw the deep caves he had ordered dug to protect himself, I saw they were built in clay and stayed in a trench outside. For further details you are going to have to buy my book "coming shortly to a book store near you." Now tell me I have a particular POV! xe xe el Jigüe 11/29/05

In the section "Cuba", one of the changes recently made is the following:

... at times during "La Offensiva" he lacked...

The phrase "La Offensiva" is designated as a link. I checked it and it is a link to an empty page. Furthermore, the conglomeration of letters making up "Offensiva" does not form a known word in either Spanish or English. What is this, Spanglish? Has the person who wrote this done so intentionally, as would be suggested by his having designated it as a link? Does it matter? Or is it the case that this article has now degenerated to the point where such gibberish is of no importance? Polaris999 22:33, 1 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Clearly should be changed; FWIW, there has at no time been an article under that title. -- Jmabel | Talk 18:50, 2 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

La Ofensiva perhaps if you knew anything about Cuban history you would know about this, but then you were not even born then, let alone close to the action....El Jigüe 12-4-05

When I created this query at 22:33, 1 December 2005 (UTC), I entitled it "La what?" referring to the fact that "Offensiva"(sic) does not exist as a word in either English or Spanish.

At 03:09, 4 December 2005, 205.240.227.15 changed its title to "La Ofensiva?"

I am reverting the title to the one I originally gave it because the title of a query is not supposed to be changed by someone who responds to it, and moreover, in this particular instance, the change obfuscated the issue at hand. Polaris999 05:38, 17 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Ay Vey! Polaris, you were not there, nor do you know the historical details, the personages, the details of combat, and above you never saw the betrayed and or innocent dead. The Che Guevara had only one "virtue" he was a ruthless executioner, he delayed the victory of a democratically inspired revolution and turned it into a marxist morass. El Jigüe 12-27-05

This article is tagged with {{disputed}}. Could someone please make a statement—preferably a neutrally worded statement—of what factual claims in the article are currently disputed? And please keep in mind that POV issues are a separate matter, this tag is a claim that the article is factually false. -- Jmabel | Talk 23:54, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Since it has been ~two/three days, and no-one has made any such statement, I have removed the tag. — Daekharel 01:32, 7 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I have corrected the Notes section many times over the past weeks, but from now on will leave that task to those who continuously wreak havoc upon it. Polaris999 07:22, 13 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

How did we get from "hero cult" to "hero reverence"? I suspect someone may have gotten a little carried away with Wikipedia:Words to avoid. "Cult" is certainly a word to avoid in describing a religion or an organization, but I believe this was its proper use. -- Jmabel | Talk 05:31, 14 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

hmm, while cult would be the word used by much of the popular press to describe the kind of following this individual has (in the same certain popular movies have a "cult following"), but from a technical point of view reverence is a more correct term. It seems to me to be a case of the common word usage differing from true linguistical correctness. I'm not really sure which word should be used, what is the standard Wikipedia position on this issue (I have not been able to find one in my limited search)? - Canderra 06:42, 14 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I'll raise the question at Wikipedia talk:Words to avoid. The policy seems to have nothing to say about this particular use. -- Jmabel | Talk 22:39, 14 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

"The remaining rebels fled into the mountains of the Sierra Maestra, where they slowly grew in strength, seizing weapons and winning support by terror and persuasion" was recently changed to "The remaining rebels fled into the mountains of the Sierra Maestra, where they slowly grew in strength, seizing weapons and winning support by persuasion and helping peasants." I suspect all three terms are true. However, "terror" is a pretty loaded word, so for the moment I am not restoring. Does someone have some citations for what specific actions "terror" here refers to? -- Jmabel | Talk 07:37, 15 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Ah come onnnnnnnnnn! Terror is the correct term when one persons really scares other people by executing their relatives and friends, with deliberate intent to induce fear. El Jigüe 12-28-05

Please look at the section "Cuba" and observe a bulleted list of six books that someone has inserted at the end of that section. What are these supposed to be? If they are supposed to be references, they need to be converted into the correct Wiki reference format and moved to the "Notes" section. Otherwise, they simply need to be deleted. Isn't it supposed to be the responsibility of each person who contributes to a Wiki article to use the standard Wiki format for the references and footnotes associated with each contribution s/he makes? And shouldn't other contributors enforce this Wiki policy by removing contributions that do not conform to this established standard? Polaris999 00:54, 16 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Anyone having questions about how to correctly cite sources for this or any other Wikipedia article should be able to find all the answers at Wikipedia:Cite sources. Polaris999 05:16, 17 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah! Yeah! Bureaucratic nonsense. If you dislike the format badly enough to want to remove pertinent references, change them yourself, or a least change one as an example. Anything else is nothing but a covert way of exerting censorship. Sometimes you people remind me of "Dean Wormer" in the movie Animal House with his double secret codicles. Talk of passive aggressive!!!!!!! El Jigüe 12-28-05

Are you the person who placed that list of six books at the end of the "Cuba" section? If so, I would like to point out that there is no possible way that I, or anyone else, except yourself, could know to which fact or sentence you intended any of those books to refer since no linkage was provided. All I, or anyone else, could determine by looking at that list of six books was that it didn't belong in that location. You will perhaps have noticed that jmabel moved that list of six books to the "References" section at the end of the Che article, which is the only place it could be situated since you did not provide any indication as to how each book in the list was connected to some aspect of the section "Cuba". Lacking such information, neither I, nor anyone else, could have converted your list of six books into footnotes, even if we had desired to do so. This also applies to your suggestion that I could have changed one of them into the correct format as an example, which I would have been glad to do had this been possible.

Judging from your hostile comments, I assume that you are unaware of the fact that over the past 24 hours I have spent considerable time trying to figure out the meaning of various footnotes that you have recently inserted into the Che article in an effort to preserve them. (My work on them is recorded on the History page.) I am referring specifically to those re the Congo, which I converted into the correct footnote format, and those re the failed attempts in Panama and the DR, which I converted into the correct in-line citation format. If, in addition to these examples, you are interested in learning more about how to work with Wiki reference formats, I would refer you once again to the page I recommended above, ie., Wikipedia:Cite sources. Polaris999 06:31, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Update: I have just discovered that jmabel has changed the two inline citations I had created for the references re the attempts in Panama and the DR to the standard Wiki footnote/reference style, which would be fine with me except that the footnote which he is calling "Jimenez" doesn't work. If you click on the superscript 8, it will take you down to the reference, but then the carat will not take you back up to the proper place in the text. Another problem is that the source cited is a truncated version of the complete URL which was originally given, and now reads only:

     ^  Peña, "La Expedición… 

jmabel, since I don't understand what you were intending when you modified this footnote in this way, would you please make it work? Otherwise, I will just have to re-do it as seems appropriate to me, and I would rather not undertake to do so since you are working on it now ... Polaris999 08:24, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

The shortened form is because it is a newspaper article, and I've listed the full citation in the references. I'll try to see why something is broken, though. -- Jmabel | Talk 08:37, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Found the problem: ref→note works find with accents, but note→ref doesn't! -- Jmabel | Talk 08:40, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Great! I do wish that somebody would do a bit of programming to remove bugs such as this one you just discovered and also to make the ref/footnote system easier to use. For example, it seems to me that it should be programmed in such a way that when a reader clicks on a ref, let's say "fuerte" as an example, the code would search the list of footnotes for "fuerte" and return the footnote labelled "fuerte", regardless of its physical location in the list. This would solve all of the problems we (and I assume all other editors) are currently experiencing with the existing primitive system which is an incredible time sink. Polaris999 13:43, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Unless I'm very mistaken, it already does that. The problem is that in both the article body and (assuming you use "# {{note}}" to generate numbering) in the notes, the numbering is necessarily sequential; thus, if things are out of line, the numbers don't match. -- Jmabel | Talk 23:32, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I have wondered about that but was afraid to experiment for fear doing so might have unexpected consequences. Should we try removing the # and see if this works better for us? (Perhaps we could test it on the "Involvement" article since there are fewer notes there and, if it doesn't work well, there will be less to re-do.) Polaris999 00:45, 30 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I promise you don't want to do that. It's been tried elsewhere, it's a worse solution. What we are doing here is the current state of the art; it's not so great in an article people keep messing with, but it's the most workable thing we've got. See Template talk:Ref and/or Wikipedia:Footnotes if you want to learn more. -- Jmabel | Talk 09:23, 30 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for the warning, Jmabel -- I will certainly heed it. BTW have you noticed the "workaround" I invented earlier today that allows the Harvard-type references (also called "simple hyperlinks") to be used without disrupting the order of the ref/note-template footnotes? Since Wikipedia:Inline_Citation allows for the usage of simple hyperlinks in combination with ref/note templates provided that the simple hyperlinks do not generate numbers, i.e. "Some editors feel that all inline references should be done with these templates, and all actual reference links should be in a references section. Other editors do not favor their use at all. Note that in any case if these templates are used, then simple hyperlinks without explanatory titles that generate numbers, as described in the previous section, should not be used. Using both will cause a mis-match between the numbers generated inline and the numbers that should correspond in the notes below.", I am hoping that this "fix", which consists of placing one space followed by the HTML code › for a "Right Single Guillemot" ( › ) immediately after the URL that is being linked to, will be amenable to all persons working on the Che article. Here is an example of its usage, which is my modification of an actual Harvard-type reference EJ had placed into the section "Insurgent" and which had generated its own number and thereby disrupted all of the other ref/note numbers in the article until I prevented it from doing so by applying my "fix":

... who had been installed as his primary agent in La Paz was reportedly also working for the KGB, and is widely inferred to have unwittingly served Soviet interests by leading Bolivian authorities to Guevara's trail ›.

and the following is the wiki code I used to generate this non-numeric simple hyperlink:

[http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/report/1985/SDR.htm ›].

Polaris999 02:38, 31 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Yup, that works, but why mix? -- Jmabel | Talk 07:30, 31 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Xe Xe. Yes I was the one who placed those hardcopy reference citations, I also added page numbers so some can find them without using the new Google or the Amazon.com systems. It was churlish (Churl as in Churls of the Castle, the origen of the House of Charlemagne of me to "beat up" on the graduate students of others. My apologies. In partial compensation I will add a link to the Basque inference in the Guevara section, and note that these were "Demons" from the "Demons and Moors" in the Song of Roland xe xe El Jigüe 12-30-05

"El Jigüe", the problem isn't that your references are hard copy and give page numbers: that's a good thing. The problem is that you inserted modified Harvard-style referencing into an article that otherwise uses footnotes. -- Jmabel | Talk 00:01, 31 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Ahahhhhhhh...I am a scientist that is the style most familiar to me. I hate footnotes, feeling that they reflect what scientists feel is sloppy imprecise humanities thought. Yet will see what can be done. El Jigüe 12-31-05

Did you notice my new "workaround" which I describe a couple of paragraphs above in this same section? I designed it hoping that you would find it more to your liking than the ref/notes style. It will work well with all references that are hyperlinks. In fact, I too prefer the Harvard-style references for hyperlinks because I like to click on them immediately when I come upon them while reading the text. The method that I have devised would make it clear while reading the article which references are hyperlinks and which are to printed material (but, unfortunately, those to printed material would still need to be done in the ref/notes style...) Polaris999 19:34, 31 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I removed the dispute tag. This article is very long. It has been subject to extensive debate and consensus has been reached in many areas. If you wish to dispute the factual accuracy of the article please put the tag only on the section that you dispute and list a specific reason on the talk page. Please do not readd without doing this. Savidan 03:10, 17 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Or, probably more usefully in most cases, put {{fact}} on the specific issue you are disputing. -- Jmabel | Talk 22:12, 17 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

An anon IP added a {{POV}} tag to the Che_Guevara#Disappearance from Cuba section of the article with this edit summary:

this section contains innacurate information and rumor that was formulated by anti-Castro factions in an attempt to isolate Fidel Castro.

I removed the tag, but left this here for discussion. BCorr|Брайен 22:52, 21 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

In this section it is written that Guevara became somewhat Maoïst. This is by no way obvious. Guevara was critical of the USSR, and called for "many Vietnams" that I understand as "World Revolution", a troskyist idea. I don't think Guevara became Maoïst, he was on his own line. Ericd 23:02, 21 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I would suggest that, while Che was primarily "on his own line", that line was considerably closer to the Chinese position in the Sino-Soviet dispute. Polaris999 23:08, 21 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

This line of thought was purposely fabricated and propogated by the anti-Castro community AFTER Che's death. The idea is to allow a way for people who look to Che to turn against Fidel and to think that what Che stood for and what Fidel and the Cuban government now stand for are two differnt things. Lacha 14:05, 22 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Really?? That is quite fascinating ... (Too bad no one told Carlos Rafael Rodriguez and his old PSP associates about that, they might have stopped persecuting Che had they only known ... ) Polaris999 00:20, 23 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

The idea of this project, I thought, was to create a database of fact, not to create a venue for converting rumors into "accepted" reality. It is obvious to anyone who has spent any time whatsoever looking at Che Guevara as a human being with a life and family, instead of as some mythical character, that the line of thought propagated here regarding a rift between El Che and El Comandante is pure nonsense. How would the promotors of such thought explain the close personal relationships between El Comandante and the wife and children of El Che? Are we expected to believe that his own family was unaware of the rivalry between them? Or that the Guevara family has chosen to ignore what this line of thought leads to: namely, the betrayal of El Che by Fidel. While the personal life of the Guevara family and the Castro family are kept private, it is no secret to anyone in Cuba that they are very close indeed and there is no evidence whatsoever of a break between the two men or any evidence of discord between the families. It is pure nonsense that is easily spread, but dificult to counter since most people who write on the subject have never spent any time in Cuba and instead refer to "testimony" offered by those who have abandon the Revolution for whatever personal.

I strongly suggest that this section be removed. It is purely conjecture and has no factual basis whatsoever. It discredits Wikipedia as a legitamate reference tool.

AND since this IS in dispute.... I would like to know WHY the in dispute tag has been removed??? -----a gringa writing from Cuba Lacha 16:18, 1 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• 200px|thumb|Rodríguez with the captured Che Guevara
  (La Higuera, Bolivia - October 9, 1967)
• 200px|thumb|The schoolhouse in La Higuera where Che Guevara was executed at 1:10 PM on October 9, 1967

In the last few days, with a lot of edits at cross-purposes, these two pictures seem to have been removed from the article without comment in any edit summary. I suspect that this was not a consensus decision and they should be restored. -- Jmabel | Talk 06:10, 22 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Yes -- please put them back -- they definitely add to the article. BCorr|Брайен 15:19, 22 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Restoring -- Jmabel | Talk 00:11, 23 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

can we get this photo put up in the criticism section? http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/006596.html

I can hardly think of anything less appropriate in a biographical article. - Jmabel | Talk 19:57, 5 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

On 21 November 2005, an unregistered user (70.19.159.81) inserted into the Che Guevara article several paragraphs based on and alluding to a recently published book written by Hartmann and Waldron. It seemed to be the intention of this person to incorporate a mini-review of that book into this article, an action which I believe is in clear violation of the Wikipedia policy, "Wikipedia is not a propaganda machine", as promulgated in Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not. Earlier today most of the paragraphs in question were transferred to the newly-created article entitled "Che Guevara's involvement in the Cuban Revolution" by another editor, so I will not discuss them here. However, a fragment remains in this article and that fragment consists of the second and third sentences of the first paragraph of the section "Disappearance from Cuba". It appears to have been the intention of Hartmann and Waldron to imply that Che Guevara, rather than Rolando Cubela, was AMLASH. The AMLASH matter has been thoroughly investigated by several Senate Committees and, in all cases, their conclusion has been that AMLASH was Rolando Cubela. Furthermore Cubela himself confessed and served a lengthy prison term in Cuba. Until Hartmann and Waldron came up with their absurd hypothesis, no one had ever suggested that Che Guevara had been implicated in Project Mongoose or any other plot organized by the CIA and/or Robert Kennedy. Since there is no evidence whatsoever to link Che to any such conspiracy, or any indication that he was involved in the activities of Eloy Menoyo, I am removing these two sentences from the article. Polaris999 02:05, 23 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Hmmmmmmmm it always surprises me how ready some are to accept the Castro version of events, and assume that "confessions" as is common in stalinist show trials reveal truth. While it may seem unlikely that Guevara, would link permanently to US interests, the devious and duplicious self-serving nature of the Che and his overweaning ruthless ambition might have viewed such as an expedient temporary alliance. Thus to purge this aspect completely from Wikipedia seems most unwise. One should never forget that the Che viewed even Castro as a rival, and is reputed to have challenged Fidel Castro's rather discrete courage in battle in front of representatives of the USSR. I suggest that at least some of those two sentences, be restored; however this kind of purge of details of history seem to be done with some frequency here, thus one would not expect this to happen. Xe xe El Jigüe 12-27-05

"Guevara was born in Rosario, Argentina, the eldest of five children in a family of mixed Spanish, Basque^[1] (see The Song of Roland) and Irish descent." See The Song of Roland? Seemed like an odd cross-reference, but I did. The name Guevara does not appear there; what is the relevance supposed to be? I'm cutting it because it doesn't make sense; if there is relevance, someone needs to reword this in a way that makes that relevance clear. - Jmabel | Talk 08:10, 31 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Interesting, instead of trying to understand you simply remove, a most interesting personal view. Try reading some Basque history......and find out why the "Song of Roland" records the Basque demons...takes one to know one xe xe. El Jigüe 1-5-05.

Depending on which version of the Song of Roland one reads, there may or may not even be explicit mention of Basques (though of course the "Moors" and "Demons" who defeated Charlemagne were, in fact, Basques). But this is practically Easter Egg linking. The events of Roncesvalles have nothing to do with Che Guevara some 1,200 years later. One might as well link the Gernikako Arbola. This is an encyclopedia, not a phantasmogoria. -- Jmabel | Talk 22:26, 7 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

From the article, discussing The Motorcycle Diaries (film).

The details portrayed in this film, such as the size of the vehicle, are considered "legendary" rather than "accurate," and subject to much debate for instance Marcelo Gioffré › (English translation at ›) places the leper colony in Venezuela and cites fellow rebel Humberto Vázquez Viaña in stating that Guevara found relief from his asthma in the combat generated adrenalin.

Why is this here? As far as I can tell, this belongs in the article about the movie, not the article about Guevara. -- Jmabel | Talk 08:24, 31 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

It is about the film don't understand your query, please clarify. El Jigüe. 12/31/05

We have an article on the film. This is the article on the person. Why does discussion of inaccuracy in the film belong in the article on the person? We certainly don't go into the many inaccuracies in films about (for example) Napoleon or Van Gogh in our respective articles about them. -- Jmabel | Talk 00:46, 1 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

thanks, then, I'll move that. -- Jmabel | Talk 05:59, 1 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Then references to the film, beyond a few words does not belong here. El Jigüe. 12/31/05

Others will have to decide whether the youth section is to part of hagiography or a more balanced presentation. The provide balance I have rewritten and reinserted the "murder of innocence" theme which was removed. This now reads:However some of Guevara's detractors sustain that in these years a far darker character begins to emerge. A passage in these diaries describes how "Che wakes in the middle of the night and, mistaking his hosts' beloved pet Alsation for a vicious Chilean Puma, shoots the poor creature dead [2]" This theme, the symbolic murder of innocence, is to be repeated in Cuba, when as the Che writes "Reminiscences of the Cuban Revolutionary War" he has to kill his puppy [3] in the Sierra Maestra. The Che's detractors take this theme to its ultimate level with Guevara's unnecessary murder of a 14 year old [4]. Now it is up to contributors and editors to decide what this section will be like will it show the tender photo of the puppy but not mention how this poor animal died thus to return to mere worshipful hagiography as this section once was or will it be a more balanced presentation. I have little hope for the latter. El Jigüe 1-1-06

Actually Fidel Castro's own victory at Guisa probably was much more decisive (see Castro 1972 pp. 439-449) than the Che's shared victory in Santa Clara. In addition Cantillo representing The Batista Army surrendered not much later. Don't argue with me I was there. xe xe El Jigüe 1-1-06

Concerning the dog that Che mistook for a puma and accidentally shot, I have never seen any reference other than the one posted here to its having been an Alsatian (German Shepherd). In the English translations I have of the Motorcycle Diaries, no breed is mentioned. Similarly, in the book, Mi hijo el Che, Ernesto Guevara Lynch includes what appears to be a verbatim extract from Che's diary about this incident and again the breed of the unfortunate dog is not mentioned. So, I am interested to know what source, if any, (other than the amazon.co.uk reviewer cited) has provided this information? Polaris999 09:51, 2 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Dunno where the critic got his data, will keep looking. However, a German Shepherd is readily identified by its description. These dogs are about as large as a puma, a favorite of German immigrants and most other dogs in the area are not that large. El Jigüe 1/5/05

Thank you for checking on this. Unfortunately, the amazon.co.uk website does not give an email address for that reviewer so it seems that there is no way to ask him directly ... Polaris999 23:49, 5 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

This newly-implemented system sounds like it may be the solution to all of the problems with references, footnotes, etc. that the Che article has been experiencing lately.

Cite.php

Shall we adopt it? Polaris999 05:19, 3 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Absolutely; it's what I've been using on everything new, but I usually haven't bothered retrofitting unless I'm doing a cleanup. -- Jmabel | Talk 06:04, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds good. Could you possibly recommend one of your articles that uses it and has many different kinds of notes and references so that I could study it and learn the system? Polaris999 06:06, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Not exactly an exciting article, but maybe Palatul Telefoanelor? -- Jmabel | Talk 07:47, 5 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you, that article is very useful for reference. I think that I figured the system out and now I have converted all of the "source footnotes" in the Che article to this new format. It is certainly much better than the old ref/note one! However, there was still the matter of a few "content notes" -- I don't think that the <ref></ref> system was designed to handle them. Moreover, trying to include them in with the "source footnotes" no doubt would have been unaesthetic and somebody has recently posted that flag and comment complaining about the appearance of the Notes section. So, I decided to separate out the "content notes" and put them on a page of their own. I am using the simple hyperlink method and the "fix" I developed for it (described elsewhere on this page) to put links in the Che article to the page on which the "content notes" are located. I have also included "internal targets" on the Content Notes page and when a user puts the mouse over the › symbol of the simple hyperlink in the article, in the scrollbar s/he can see the name of the associated "content note". When the › symbol is clicked, the name of the "content note" will appear in the address bar of the Content Notes page. In many ways, a better system would be to place each "content note" on its own sub-page, but I felt that it would be too time-consuming to try to watch all of those pages for vandalism, so having all content notes combined on a single page seemed the preferable option. Perhaps you might have other suggestions as to how to present these "content notes"?

Another question: is there a good description of the <ref></ref> system somewhere that we could provide a link to from this page in case other editors who are working on the Che article want to read about it? (In the meantime, they can take a look at Cite.php which, however, seems not very user-friendly to me ... ) Polaris999 00:15, 6 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think this method of adding footnotes has yet been written up; it's only been around about a week.

I don't think the separate page thing is a good idea; it is very non-standard. There are not supposed to be subpages in article space. I'm going to take the liberty of doing this a different way. -- Jmabel | Talk 22:21, 7 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I've done this; I think some of these can just be moved into the text instead of as notes, but before I do that, I wanted to check and make sure you agree with the change I made so far. If so, we can put Che Guevara/Content Notes on WP:AFD and get rid of it. -- Jmabel | Talk 22:39, 7 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hello Jmabel -- I think it is great that you moved them into the article. I wanted to put them there myself but was afraid someone would say that the content notes added too many bytes to the length of the article (even though this isn't true). I really have no preference as to where or how this information is presented, be it in the text or as content notes, so long as all of it is available to readers ... Polaris999 22:59, 7 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Jmabel, I just noticed that one disadvantage of having them on the main page is that there isn't any simple way to get back to the referring sentence once you go down to the note ... Do you know of a fix for this? (Bearing in mind that I cannot number these notes because EJ's method of using embedded links will explode any numbering system that I might attempt to use ...) What I need to do is to develop some way to pass the position of the referring location to a temp variable and then give the reader a symbol next to the content note to click on to get back up there. Do you know how I can find out where the variable in question is stored so that I can try to grab it? Polaris999 23:09, 7 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hello again, Jmabel. I found a solution!! Content Notes remain on the main page and now they link back and forth perfectly. Take a look and you will see how I did this ... Polaris999 02:23, 8 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

This is a copy of the note that I just posted on the Talk page of Aranda56:

Stop reverting without discussion. Just because you like Che and have a misguided view of him does not give you the right to delete cited and sourced information regarding views contrary to your own beliefs. (Gibby 19:26, 14 January 2006 (UTC))

Em...yes it does... (rokbas 0:26, 15 January 2006 (UTC))

This is an encyclodpedia. All entries must be Neutral point of view based and any critisms (or praise for that matter) must be backed up by (preferably first-hand) scientific evidence. Linking to a blatently biased article written by a right-wing reporter or a column on a news website does not constitute sufficient evidence.

The appropriate balance for neutrality can be gathered by looking at the many other articles on famous historical persons from all backgrounds. Canderra 04:18, 15 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Gibby has declared his intention to ignore this, and the points made to him by another user, and reinsert this material later.[5]. He can't at the moment as he's blocked for edit-warring elsewhere. Worth keeping an eye on the article. Mattley ^(Chattley) 13:03, 15 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Um, actually I think that its acceptable to link to things other than "scientific evidence". The point is to document the Criticism of Che Guevara and thus linking to someone who is critical of him is proof that someone has articulated that criticism and thus that it does not constitute original research. Granted, we can talk about the sources which are acceptable but I believe most mainstream news organizatioons are. This is an article about a controversial topic and we should include the most notable criticism of Che Guevara. Savidan 00:52, 16 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It is not original research to cite sources. It is not pov to cite sources with pov's. NPOV policy prohibits us editors from adding pov through our own language and legitimizing cited works. NPOV requires us to present evidence...including evidence you all might not like. I have been subjected to undo criticism on my posts by being forced into higher standards by certain people who simply don't want information contradictory to their own beliefs present in articles. (Gibby 03:48, 16 January 2006 (UTC))

Do you mean undue criticism? Mattley ^(Chattley) 18:14, 16 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

spoonman says: Gibby if you make claims about an historical figure and cite a propoganda page as fact, you do not have a 'neutral point of view'. It is clear that you are trying to re-direct wikipedia readers to a biased source for information on this subject which does not contribute to the information. I have read your agenda of 'ruling wikipedia' KDRGibby and I find it strange that you are so keen on dominating and censoring information when these were such a huge critisism of communist regimes. By enforcing your opinion in the manner you claim on your user page, you are behaving no exactly the same as Pravda in the communist days. I hope that you will join us in making factually verifiable pages in the future as you are clearly a clever writer.

It is a fact that his sources exist. It is a POV (yours) that they are propaganda. Citing that "X person makes Y criticism of Che" is neutral point of view. We should be directing wikipedia readers to sources which are critical and complementary of Che. Spoonman, this discussion should be about how to strike a proper balance without giving undo weight but by insisting that Gibby's edits be completely removed you have taken up a very untenable wiki position which is in fact another form of censorship, just like the communists, eh. Savidan 03:03, 18 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Apparently spoonman hasnt heard about the word: sarcasm. My rules for ruling wikipedia were my observations based on dealing with defending editors of articles such as communism...who were actual communists. The irony was not lost on me, but it sure missed you. (Gibby 03:41, 18 January 2006 (UTC))

Does anyone find it moronic to attempt to deny Che's sociopath tendencies as cited by that author with a statement that he loved his mother? Why the hell does that get put back in? This is why wiki is not a good source for information, any moron can add any bit of bull they want. Someone to an IP check on that guy I want to know what their screen name is if possible. This person really looks like some serious communist apologist. (Gibby 02:42, 28 January 2006 (UTC))

The addition of the original research "claims are dubious" is very O.R. and that the O.R. evidence that love of ones mother makes it impossible for someone to be a sociopath is bogus. 1. The supplied definition by this editor mentions love of followers, not family. 2. most other definitions do not define sociopaths with any metnioning of the word love...including wikipedia. The entire addition is moronic and out of place and should be deleted from this communist revisionist. (Gibby 16:26, 29 January 2006 (UTC))

http://cheguevaralies.blogspot.com/ Hey whats wrong with this blog, why did they remove it?

The section Criticism of Che opens with the following sentences:

The U.S. claim that the Che Guevara was "personally responsible" for the torture and execution of hundreds of people in Cuban prisons,and the murder of many more peasants in the regions controlled or visited by his guerrilla forces. They also believe that Guevara was a blundering tactician, not a revolutionary genius, who has not one recorded combat victory. Some critics also believe that Che failed medical school in Argentina and that there is no evidence he actually ever earned a medical degree. [2] ,[3], [4], [5], [6],[7],[8]

To whom exactly does "The U.S." refer here? Also, why is "The U.S.", which is apparently intended as a collective noun, followed in the next sentence by "They also believe ..." ? And, finally, who specifically are "They"?

Polaris999 00:32, 27 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

That was added by someone trying to discredit the criticisms of Che by linking it or associating such critisms with the United States (As if they have some secret agenda in making him look bad). I removed it because it is not only improper to say the United States held this view but its just moronic. The section however should stay. (Gibby 06:20, 27 January 2006 (UTC))

The referenced claims are all made by US (predominantly right-wing) newspapers and associated journalists and therefore calling them U.S. claims is quite apt I would think. It is not the best possible wording and the issue of use of words such as "They" is addressed in the Wikipedia style help section on how to avoiding weasel words.

However it is quite proper in my opinion that due note be made of the fact that the critisims listed are predominantly from newpaper and magazine sources with a strong political bias against the individual and therefor should be treated as such and not stated as if they are in any way accepted facts. Canderra 17:04, 27 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

why arent any of you socialists complaining about the moronic reverts by that communist propagandist from ip 83... who keeps making OR claims about sociopaths and love and dubiousness and other bs...watch this guy...he thinks the communist party of Cuba rules by "moral authority" he is a NUT JOB!!!! (Gibby 16:31, 29 January 2006 (UTC))

A note about anti-Che t-shirts may be notable in a section on CG in popular culture, but they hardly constitute serious criticism. Should we link to every company that uses his image on a t-shirt? No. Mattley ^(Chattley) 18:06, 29 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The figure of 2,000 deaths which someone inserted into the section "Cuba" is one which I have never seen elsewhere and I therefore support 83.108.6.54's request for sourcing (which s/he placed on the article's "History" page.)

In a document entitled "COMPENSATION CLAIM AGAINST THE UNITED STATES", the Cuban government writes:

"THE mercenary Bay of Pigs invasion, in April 1961, left a count of 176 deaths, more than 300 wounded and 50 maimed for life, for which reason it constitutes Point Four of the Cuban people’s claim against the government of the United States."

Please refer to COMPENSATION CLAIM AGAINST THE UNITED STATES for more details ...

Polaris999 22:27, 27 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Polaris those figures are far lower than serious most references on the subject report Triay (2001) p. 110 mentions 4,000 casualities; Lynch p. 148 50X or about 5,000 (statistics only comparible to Soviet loss ratios at the beginning of WWII). "Over 2,200 casualties [6]. In one air attack alone Castro forces suffered 1800 casualities caught on an open causeway in civilian buses and hit by napalm (and thus mostly horribly dead) [7][8] [9]. It is not wise to trust "I am not a communist!"-Castro's numbers El Jigüe 1-27-06

Thank you for providing these sources. It is perplexing that so long after the event there is still such a wide range of casualty figures given. I notice that in the wiki article on the Bay of Pigs, on which I believe you are one of the collaborators, the figure of "2,200; estimated casualties" is given. For the sake of consistency, shouldn't this be the figure used in this article also? Furthermore, wouldn't it be more appropriate to present the discussion of Fidel Castro's military tactics in either the "Fidel Castro" or "Cuba" articles, or one about the Cuban military, rather than here in the Che article? Moreover, it is unclear what is meant by your statement: " ... Lynch (p. 148 50X or about 5,000) ." To what does this "50X" refer?

A very specific problem that I have with the changes you have made in this section is the fact that you modified the last sentence in the paragraph from what it had been, i.e. "The victorious Castro government declared Guevara "a Cuban citizen by birth"; he divorced his Peruvian wife, Hilda Gadea, and married a member of Castro's army, Aleida March."

to read:

"Despite the fact that he was not involved in the fighting at the Bay of Pigs, the victorious government declared Guevara "a Cuban citizen by birth"; he divorced his Peruvian wife, Hilda Gadea, and married a member of the 26th of July movement, Aleida March." (You made this change at 10:22, 28 January 2006 , as can be seen on the History page.)

This non sequitur is so absurd that I can only wonder if you meant it as a joke? Surely everyone who has any familiarity at all with the subject at hand knows that the official decree making Che a Cuban citizen "by birth" was published in La Gaceta Oficial on 8 February 1959, i.e. more than two years before the Bay of Pigs invasion! And, he married Aleida March on 2 June 1959. I am therefore going to revert this sentence to its previous, correct version.

Finally, although the following comment refers to an error you have inserted into the section enntitled "Guatemala", I will include it here rather than setting up a separate topic to address it. To wit, at 11:56, 27 January 2006, you wrote:

"His economic survival was precarious and he pawned some of Hilda's jewelry. Then a shipment of weapons from Communist Czechoslovakia for the Arevalo Government arrived and he left Guatemala for El Salvador and then returned to Guatemala. As the invasion by Carlos Castillo Armas faltered and then began to gain ground. He joined an armed militia organized by the Communist Youth for several days but then returned to medical duties, tried to resist the new government of Castillo Armas, but when Hilda was arrested he fled to the refuge of the Argentine Embassy."

The statement that the shipment of weapons from Czechoslovakia was for the Arevalo Government (which I asked you to clarify previously) is certainly erroneous. I assume that you meant that the shipment was for the Arbenz Government? I will make this correction also, and hope that you will let it stand. Polaris999 01:49, 31 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Good shot Polaris You are correct that mention of Arevalo instead of Arbenz was one of my "brain farts." 50x merely means 50 fold a standard notation in some fields. El Jigüe 1-31-06

Thank you for your reply, El Jigüe. Re the "50X", I was actually trying to find out what the base number for the 50X was, i.e. 50 times what? It would not seem to mean that Castro's casualties were 50X those of the invading forces which are generally estimated to be about 1,300 (see Bay of Pigs Invasion) since in order to have lost 50X that number, Castro would have had to suffer approximately 65,000 casualties which certainly didn't happen. Furthermore you write "50X or about 5,000" which suggests the base number you are using is about 100, but, if this is indeed the case, to what exactly does that 100 refer?

After much consideration, I have removed the following sentences (delimited by parentheses below) from the Che article. While quite interesting, most of this information does not pertain to Guevara or battles in which he participated (in the case of Angola, he had, as you know, been dead for many years when that intervention occurred) and it therefore will be better placed elsewhere. I hope that you will expand this section and insert it into another Wikipedia article, perhaps Military of Cuba or Fidel Castro.

(While some consider Camilo Cienfuegos-Guevara's march on Santa Clara in late 1958 as the final blow that forced Batista to flee the country; there are others who consider Fidel Castro's own far bloodier far harder fought victory at Guisa ^[1], November 20 to 30, 1958 ^[2], the so called "Gate of Victory" ^[3] and the rest of the subsequent Cauto Basin campaign far more decisive (see Castro 1972 pp. 439-449)^[4]At Guisa the still fighting Batista army lost perhaps 200 men, while in the armored train (shades of Trotsky) that Guevara attacked the demoralized Batista army only offered token resistance. Later wars when Castro changed to regular USSR style military tactics caused his forces to have far higher losses. During the Bay of Pigs Invasion Castro's losses were very high, Triay (2001 p. 110) mentions 4,000 casualities; Lynch (p. 148 50X or about 5,000) (as statistics only comparible to Soviet loss ratios at the beginning of WWII). Other sources indicate over 2,200 casualties [10]. In one air attack alone Castro forces suffered 1800 casualities caught on an open causeway in civilian buses and hit by napalm (and thus mostly horribly dead) [11][12] [13]. Thus over 2,000 militia died defending Castro at the Bay of Pigs; and perhaps ten fold that again Cubans were lost in the War in Angola. These statistics are comparable to Soviet loss ratios at the beginning of WWII, and reflect the Eastern Block training these militia were receiving.)

Polaris999 23:29, 2 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It seems that some one has confused the statistics of the Bay of Pigs *(April 1961) with that of the explosion of the ammunition ship Le Coubre (La Coubre) (March 196))in which according to Castro Government information:

"Bombs planted at the point of departure and set to explode when the ship was unloaded. Whoever set the bombs did it quite carefully: a second bomb had been set to detonate soon after the first trapping and killing those who had come to help. More than 100 people died that day, among them six French sailors. Hundreds more were hurt.

Alberto Solís Sotolongo, the son of one of the longshoremen killed on the dock while unloading La Coubre, was 14 at the time of the explosion." [14].

The suggestion that this is the source of the confusion is that Che Guevara was around during Le Coubre disaster [15] this reference only has initial figures of 75 killed, in another reference a more complete figure of 136 killed is mentioned by Alberto Korda [16]. Others who place the Che and Korda there mention "hundreds" killed [17]. It is said that Guevara was perhaps responsible for sending people in after the first explosion to be caught in the second explosion. The Castro government had allowed the unloading of the ship at a dockside instead the regulation requiring unloading on to a lighter in the harbor. Guevara was not around the action at the Bay of Pigs, he was chasing a fake invasion (in Pinar del Rio I think). For further details read my coming book El Jigüe 1-27-06

This section has recently been created, in part because of a comment I made above (though I wasn't suggesting that we should have such a section). At the moment it consists mainly of links to commercial retailers of CG related merchandise, which is not really appropriate for a wikipedia. The rest is covered elsewhere in the article. Thoughts on removing it? Mattley ^(Chattley) 18:06, 30 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Che Guevara has been listed as a good article; it adheres to certain quality standards, and may become a featured article. Please continue improving this article!

If by "good" we mean "biased", and if by "quality standards" we mean "adheres to an angenda", then I have to agree. Haizum 12:55, 6 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for your helpful remarks, which we all find witty, erudite and incisive. Or perhaps not. Mattley ^(Chattley) 13:31, 6 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

(Chortle) It's funny that such a blatant patron of Thesaurus.com would use the word "erudite." Haizum 17:08, 6 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Whilst the statement

Guevara had expected assistance and cooperation from the local dissidents. He did not receive it; and Bolivia's Communist Party, oriented towards Moscow rather than Havana, did not aid him.

may be true, it should be noted that some members of the Bolivian Communist Party did join/support him, such as Rodolfo Saldana, Serapio Aquino Tudela, and Antonio Jimenez Tardio. PJB 15:11, 8 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]