WEBVTT

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His face is recognized all over the world.

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The young medical student
who became a revolutionary icon.

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But was Che Guevara 
a heroic champion of the poor

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or a ruthless warlord 
who left a legacy of repression?

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Order, order.

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Hey, where have I seen that guy before?

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Ahem, your Honor, this is Ernesto Che Guevara.

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In the early 1950s,

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he left behind a privileged life 
as a medical student in Argentina

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to travel through rural Latin America.

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The poverty and misery he witnessed
convinced him that saving lives

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required more than medicine.

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So he became a terrorist

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seeking to violently overthrow 
the region's governments.

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What?

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The region's governments 
were brutal oligarchies.

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Colonialism may have formally ended,

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but elites still controlled 
all the wealth.

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American corporations bought up land
originally seized from indigenous people

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and used it for profit and export,

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even keeping most of it uncultivated
while locals starved.

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Couldn't they vote to change that?

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Oh, they tried, your Honor.

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In 1953, Che came to Guatemala

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under the democratically-elected 
government of President Árbenz.

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Árbenz passed reforms to redistribute

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some of this uncultivated 
land back to the people

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while compensating the landowners.

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But he was overthrown 
in a CIA-sponsored coup.

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The military was protecting against
the seizure of private property

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and communist takeover.

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They were protecting corporate profits

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and Che saw that they would use
the fear of communism

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to overthrow any government
that threatened those profits.

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So he took the lessons of Guatemala
with him to Mexico.

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There, he met exiled Cuban revolutionaries

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and decided to help them 
liberate their country.

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You mean help Fidel Castro 
turn a vibrant Cuba into a dictatorship.

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Dictatorship was what Cuba 
had before the revolution.

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Fulgencio Batista was a tyrant
who came to power in a military coup.

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He turned Havana into a luxury playground
for foreigners

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while keeping Cubans mired in poverty and
killing thousands in police crackdowns.

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Even President Kennedy called it
the worst example

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of "economic colonization, humiliation,
and exploitation in the world."

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Whatever Batista's faults,

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it can't compare to the totalitarian
nightmare Castro would create.

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Forced labor camps, torture of prisoners,
no freedom to speak or to leave.

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But this isn't the trial 
of Fidel Castro, is it?

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Che Guevara was instrumental in helping
Castro seize power.

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As a commander in his guerilla army,

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he unleashed a reign of terror
across the countryside,

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killing any suspected spies or dissenters.

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He also helped peasants build
health clinics and schools,

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taught them to read,

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and even recited poetry to them.

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His harsh discipline was necessary
against a much stronger enemy

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who didn't hesitate to burn entire
villages suspected of aiding the rebels.

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Let's not forget that the new regime
held mass executions

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and killed hundreds 
of people without trial

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as soon as they took power in 1959.

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The executed were officials
and collaborators

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who had tormented 
the masses under Batista.

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The people supported 
this revolutionary justice.

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Which people?

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An angry mob crying for blood
does not a democracy make.

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And that's not even mentioning
the forced labor camps,

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arbitrary arrests,

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and repression of LGBT people
that continued long after the revolution.

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There's a reason people kept
risking their lives to flee,

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often with nothing but the clothes
on their backs.

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So was that all this Che brought to Cuba?

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Just another violent dictatorship?

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Not at all.

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He oversaw land redistribution,

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helped established universal education,

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and organized volunteer literacy brigades
that raised Cuba's literacy rate to 96%,

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still one of the highest in the world.

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Which allowed the government to control
what information everyone received.

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Guevara's idealistic incompetence
as Finance Minister

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caused massive drops in productivity

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when he replaced worker pay raises
with moral certificates.

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He suppressed all press freedom,

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declaring that newspapers 
were instruments of the oligarchy.

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And it was he who urged Castro
to host Soviet nuclear weapons,

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leading to the Cuban Missile Crisis

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that brought the world
to the brink of destruction.

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He was a leader, not a bureaucrat.

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That's why he eventually left to spread
the revolution abroad.

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Which didn't go well.

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He failed to rally rebels in the Congo

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and went to Bolivia 
even when the Soviets disapproved.

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The Bolivian Government, 
with the help of the CIA,

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was able to capture and neutralize
this terrorist in 1967,

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before he could do much damage.

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While doing plenty of damage themselves
in the process.

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So that was the end of it?

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Not at all. As Che said, 
the revolution is immortal.

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He was publicly mourned in cities
all over the world.

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Not by the Cubans who managed to escape.

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And his story would inspire 
young activists for generations to come.

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Ha. A trendy symbol of rebellion for those
who never had to live under his regime.

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Symbols of revolution 
may become commodified,

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but the idea of a more just world remains.

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Maybe, but I'm not sharing my coffee.

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Che Guevara was captured and
executed by government forces in Bolivia.

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His remains would not be found
for another 30 years.

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But did he die a hero 
or had he already become a villain?

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And should revolutions be judged
by their ideals or their outcomes?

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These are the questions we face
when we put history on trial.