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Wednesday, March 30, 2005
Agustin Blazquez is Angry With His Local PBS Station...
Here's why, the Cuban-American filmmaker sent us a copy of his complaint:
Ms. Sheryl Lahti, Director of Audience Services
WETA Channel 26
2775 South Quincy Street
Arlington, VA 22206
703 998-3407
Dear Ms. Lahti,
On Saturday, March 26, 2005, while watching "Viewer Favorites" on your
public television station, I was shocked and offended by the singer Eric
Burton - formerly of the group "The Animals" - wearing a Che Guevara shirt
while performing a song on a segment of your presentation.
As a Cuban American, as a writer and a filmmaker, I am acquainted with the
Che as a mass murderer who executed, without trial, many Cubans at La Cabaña
fortress in Havana as well as in the Sierra Maestra Mountains before 1959.
Below I enclose a recent open letter from the famous saxophonist Paquito
D'Rivera to the famous guitarist Carlos Santana who sported a Che t-shirt
while performing at the last Oscar Awards ceremony.
Below D'Rivera's letter I am enclosing one of my published articles, this
one about Che.
It is shocking that your educational public television station is not
aware of Che's criminal record and let pass such an insensitive and
offensive display of disrespect to Che's victims and the Cuban American
community in the U.S. If Mr. Burton had worn a Hitler shirt, he wouldn't
have been presented - rightfully so - in order not to offend the Jewish
victims and Holocaust survivors.
I think your public television station should apologize.
Sincerely,
Agustin Blazquez
Writer & filmmaker
Silver Spring, MD
cc. Michael Pack and John Prizer of the Corporation for Public
Broadcasting
Paquito D'Rivera and various publications
Enc:
Open letter to Carlos Santana by Paquito D'Rivera, March 25-2005
Hello, Santana:
I found out, through our friend Raul Artiles, that you'll be performing in
Miami soon; I find this rather ill-advised, since not too long ago you
committed the faux-pas of appearing at the "Oscar Awards" ceremony,
brandishing, with pride, an enormous crucifix over a tee-shirt with that
archaic and stereotyped image of "The Butcher of the Cabaña," the moniker
given to the lamentable character known as Ché Guevara by those Cubans who
had to suffer his tortures and humiliations in that nefarious prison
One of these Cubans was my cousin Bebo, imprisoned there just for being a
Christian. He recounts to me on occasion, always with infinite bitterness,
how he could hear, from his cell, in the early hours of dawn, the executions
without prior trials or process of law, of the many who died shouting, "Long
Live Christ The King!"
The guerrilla guy with the beret with the star is something more than that
ridiculous film about a motorcycle, my illustrious colleague, and to
juxtapose Christ with Ché Guevara is like entering a synagogue with a
swastika hanging from your neck; it's also a harsh blow in the face of that
Cuban youth from the 60's, who had to go into hiding to listen to your
albums which the Revolution, and the troglodite Argentinian and his cohorts,
dubbed as "imperialist music" (i.e. Rock & Roll)
I can't find all the words to express my indignation over your
irresponsible attitude, but believe me that in spite of all, as an artist I
always wish you luck. And you're going to need it, Carlos. Especially in
Miami.
Sincerely,
Paquito D'Rivera
CHE'S MOTORCYCLE FOLLIES © 2004 ABIP
by Agustín Blázquez with the collaboration of Jaums Sutton
Jaime Costas recently said Che "didn't know how to ride a motorcycle!"
And Jaime would know because he participated in Castro's 1953 ill-fated
assault on the Moncada Barracks and was aboard the Granma expedition with
Che Guevara, Castro and his brother Raul to infiltrate into Cuba to fight
Batista.
Costas, now in his seventies, made that comment on September 29, 2004, in
New York City during the presentation of his book of his memoirs answering a
question from the audience about the movie "The Motorcycle Diaries" (Robert
Redford, its executive producer, is an unapologetic Castro collaborator).
Costas knew Castro, Raul and Che personally for many years.
He added that he "unequivocally" knows that detail because on various
occasions he went motorcycling around Havana with Castro and his comrades
and "Che never went along with them even when asked to accompany them. All
he did was sheepishly wave 'good-bye', because he didn't know how to ride a
motorcycle!"
A person present at this presentation commented, "Ah, the mythmaking of
the left that ceaselessly lionizes Che! Pretty soon, they'll have him
coming down on a cloud!"
Another person acquainted with the history of the Cuban revolution said to
me, "It is good to know that but please inform the Harley-Davidson
Corporation before they put him [Che] in a commercial.
"I might add that Dr. Guevara, like all his fellow comic-book characters,
is essentially mythical, or at least fictional.
"Although he was there in person, Guevara was so disconnected from the
actual facts of the so-called Cuban Revolution as to be, in a sense, quite
pathetic. He interpreted a Cuban soap opera as if it had been the Iliad.
He projected Mao's epic Long March onto the battle for the provincial
capital of Santa Clara, Cuba, in effect a cakewalk made possible by the
money with which Julio Lobo and other fellow Cuban magnates bought out
Batista's miserable army.
"So, when he tried to replicate that in Bolivia and the Bolivian army
fought back - incidentally, in far tougher terrain than Cuba's - Guevara's
operation rapidly unraveled and he ended up like a side of beef on the
counter of a Bolivian kitchen, a fate none other of his fellow extreme lefti
e loonies has deemed fit to emulate.
"The problem with Guevara is that he is not a positive, life-enhancing
myth, but a completely counterproductive one which feeds the worst and most
destructive impulses in the Latin American mind - what I call 'political
sophomorism' combined with an adolescent's grasp of the world and a
nihilistic yearning for martyrdom (and even some good old fashioned
Argentine necrophilia). Remember that Guevara's canonization began with
that infamous shot of him dead, looking like Christ by Mantegna.
"Guevara was catastrophic for Cuba, and would have been catastrophic for
Latin America but for his early transit.
"Guevara is actually laughable, and the sadness of it all is that no one
has done to him what Michael Moore did to Bush, that is, a good spoof.
"We treat him like a legend, a Promethean, almost tragic figure, instead
of what he really was: a no-good physician, a Mickey Mouse with a beret, an
Argentine spoiled youngster that almost by accident walked into - we can no
longer say he motorcycled his way into - a political swindle aspiring to be
called a revolution.
"Treat him for what he was--he even looked a bit like-- the Cuban
Revolution's own Cantinflas."
This comparison with Cantinflas, the late famous Mexican comic movie star,
evoked my memories of when I met Che Guevara in 1963 when I was in the cast
of a movie being filmed in Cuba's Sierra Maestra Mountains.
One afternoon Che came to pay us a visit at the barracks we were staying.
I was within a foot from him. And I was utterly disappointed by that
unremarkable little man (who was very photogenic) and most women in Cuba at
that time were fawning over him as some sort of movie star. Actually, his
raggedy mustache was similar to the one sported by Cantinflas. I found him
so uninteresting that in the diary I was keeping of those says I dedicated
only one sentence to him.
The Washington Times in the Business section on September 25, 2004, pg.
C10, published an article about Che paraphernalia being offered for sale.
In addition of being offensive to Cuban Americans who knew who Che really
was, the article promoted and generated interest in those merchandises among
the less informed, insensitive and ignorant Americans. Meanwhile, Hollywood
is putting together yet another movie about Che and Benicio del Toro, may be
playing him.
I made the comment to an American friend as to how the left in America
keeps offending Cuban Americans with impunity. I said, "Can you imagine
what would happen if T-shirts, articles, books and movies idolizing Hitler
were produced and promoted in the U.S.?"
He replied, "Well of course the neo-nazis have a lot of Hitler stuff you
can buy on eBay."
I said, "The difference between the neo-nazis on eBay and the cult of the
criminal Che, is that the later is in the main stream, in the open, from
schools to universities and promoted by the media" - even by The Washington
Times!
While, admittedly not as romantic as the myth, the reality about Che is
that he was unwanted by Castro and did not have any place to go. Castro
sacrificed the inept Che for his own personal and political benefit. He
eliminated Che from Cuba, enabling the creation of a false admirable myth
that he must continuously, actively support in order to maintain and as a
result make a lot of good propaganda and money for his regime. Castro
turned a liability into an asset.
Che has a long and documented criminal history. It was Che, in the Sierra
Maestra Mountains of Cuba, years before Castro's 1959 triumph, who revealed
his fascination with cruelty by asking to be the executioner who kept the
troops in line.
At the onset of the revolution on January 1, 1959, Castro appointed Che in
charge of La Cabaña fortress in Havana. There, execution squads flourished
under Che's command, assassinating, in mass, those perceived as enemies of
the revolution. Che ordered that women and children visiting his prisoners
be paraded in front of the execution wall, gruesomely stained with blood and
brain parts. All of this was well publicized in Cuba in order to spread
fear throughout the population. The surviving ex-prisoners of the infamous
La Cabaña fortress remember Che as a "mass murderer."
The myths that surround Che are much more interesting than the man;
problem is, they simply do not resemble reality.
In February 1959, Che began training foreign guerrillas and terrorists in
Cuba. His first guerrilla attack (planned with the brothers Fidel and Raul
Castro) was to "liberate" Panama in April 1959. But by May 1, he suffered a
humiliating defeat by Panama's National Guard. On June 14, 1959, Fidel
Castro sent Che's guerrillas to the neighboring island of the Dominican
Republic to fight against dictator Trujillo. But Che's guerrillas again
failed miserably.
After this second fiasco in June 1959, Castro sent Che to tour third world
countries. After his return, Castro put him in charge of the National
Institute of Agrarian Reform (INRA), Industries Division and later, as
President of the National Bank (where he signed the currency "Che"). He
proved himself inept for those assignments as well and Castro reassigned him
again.
On October 29, 1959, Castro sent Che to communist countries to establish
commercial ties, negotiating the initially secret sale of sugar to the
Soviet Union. He made trade agreements with Czechoslovakia, China and North
Korea, announcing on September 10, 1960, that Cuba "had received arms from
Czechoslovakia."
In 1965, Castro sent Che as far away as possible. This time to "liberate"
Africa. After Che's failure in Africa, he was summoned to Havana for two
days of secret conversations with Castro. He was then sent back to Africa
with 200 Cuban soldiers to help a Congolese leftist group. After he failed
there, in late 1965, he secretly returned to Cuba, leaving his soldiers
behind. Che was kept hidden all through 1966.
Obviously, Castro needed to carefully get rid of him, but all of his
attempts to get Che involved in international wars of "liberation" and get
him killed and converted into a martyr had failed.
As secretly as he returned to Cuba, Che left again in September 1966, sent
by Castro on another international mission. He went to Prague and then on
to Paraguay, where disguised as a businessman, he traveled by plane to
Bolivia.
Along with 17 Cubans (clandestinely smuggled into Bolivia), he began
organizing a guerrilla movement. But he was able to recruit only 15
Bolivians. By the end of March 1967, Castro stopped supplying Che's
guerrillas. The last contact with Havana was in July 1967.
Denounced by the peasants and Indians in the region (who never supported
his intrusion), Che and his guerrillas were finally apprehended by the
Bolivian army on October 7, 1967. As we all know Che was executed and
Castro at last had the martyr he was longing for. His amputated hand is
proudly displayed in the Museum of the Revolution in Havana.
Out of Castro's way, the cruel and inept Che could be heralded now as a
big hero. Finally, Castro was free to create an international legendary
myth. Che's image flooded Cuba and posters began to appear in the domain of
the academic left: colleges and universities of the U.S. and the free world
in order to attract the romantics and uninformed. As with much communist
misinformation, it worked! We still have fools displaying posters and
wearing Che's junk offending his victims.
For heaven sake, there is more hatred from the left in America directed
against Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush than against a real
bad guy and a mass murderer: Che Guevara.
I have not seen in our learning centers an urge for romantic and
misleading presentations about criminals like Charles Manson, David "Son of
Sam" Berkowitz, John Wayne Gacy, Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dahmer, etc. Why Che?
© 2004 ABIP
Agustin Blazquez, Producer/director of the documentaries
COVERING CUBA, CUBA: The Pearl of the Antilles, COVERING CUBA 2: The Next
Generation & COVERING CUBA 3: Elian presented at the 2003 Miami Latin Film
Festival and the 2004 American Film Renaissance Film Festival in Dallas,
Texas and the upcoming COVERING CUBA 4: The Rats Below
Author with Carlos Wotzkow of the book COVERING AND DISCOVERING and
translator with Jaums Sutton of the book by Luis Grave de Peralta Morell THE
MAFIA OF HAVANA: The Cuban Cosa Nostra.
For a preview and information on the documentary and books click here:
ABIP
--
Aforismo Samurai: De nada vale que los demas digan que tienes razon, cuando
tu corazon pregunte, ¿que le responderas?
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