1959
Triumph of the Revolution
1959 was the year of the Revolution’s triumph in Cuba.
Events occurred in rapid succession – after Guevara’s decisive victory in Santa Clara against the government’s forces, the dictator, Fulgencio Batista, fled from the island on the night of 31st December.
On 3rd January Che’s column entered Havana and occupied the “La Cabaña” military fortress that overlooked the city. Fidel Castro reached the capital on 8th January and the guerilla fighters were welcomed by a jubilant crowd.
On 9th January Ernesto’s parents arrived in Cuba and saw their son again for the first time in six years.
Guevara was awarded Cuban citizenship for the great service rendered during the fight for freedom.
The Agrarian Reform law was issued on 17th May, with the aim of expropriating land and redistributing it. Guevara was the one of the main supporters of this reform. The large North American land estates were confiscated immediately.
Wedding!
After divorcing from his first wife (Hilda Gadea), Ernesto Che Guevara married Aleida March on 2nd June.
Fidel and Raúl Castro, with Camilo Cienfuegos, attended the wedding.
The bride and groom had met in Sierra del Escambray in mid-1958. He was already a column commander and she was a passionate young revolutionary. Aleida had become Che’s inseparable assistant and was also at his side when they fought.
On a mission
around the world
Guevara was now one of the major characters in the revolution. On 9th June he was appointed head of the young Cuban government’s first mission abroad. The delegation visited the countries of the so-called Bandung Conference, which preceded and prepared the Non-aligned Movement. At the age of 31, Che left Havana for 87 days and visited 12 countries, meeting some of the most important leaders at the time, including Gamal Abdel Nasser (the president of the United Arab Republic), Jawaharlal Nehru (the Prime Minister of India), Achmed Sukarno (the president of Indonesia and the main promoter of the Bandung Conference), and the president of Yugoslavia, Josip Broz Tito, one of the leaders of the “non-alignment” policy. While in Japan, Guevara visited Hiroshima and paid homage to the victims of the atomic bomb.
President of the Banco Nacional de Cuba
On 7th October Guevara was appointed manager of the Department for Industrialization of the Instituto Nacional de la Reforma Agraria (INRA) [National Institute for Agrarian Reform]. He was given his second official duty shortly after – on 26th November the Council of Ministers appointed him president of the Banco Nacional de Cuba. The main task was outlined immediately – defending the national currency. On 28th December, in the University of Las Villas, Che was awarded an honorary degree in Pedagogy. Without a gown and wearing his olive-green uniform, Guevara declared he did not deserve it and accepted it in homage to the rebel army. During his speech, he turned directly to the “dear professors, colleagues mine”, encouraging them to “color themselves black, mulatto, worker, peasant”. It was a strong invitation to universities to welcome all the people who had been until then excluded for racial and economic reasons.
and then