Guevara

Main Points:
3 fundamental lessons from Cuba: (50)
-        Popular forces can win a war against the army.
-        It is not necessary to wait until all conditions for making revolution exist; the insurrection can create them.
-        In underdeveloped America the countryside is the basic area for armed fighting.
It must always be kept in mind that there is a necessary minimum without which the establishment and consolidation of the first center is not practicable: (51)
-        People must see clearly the futility of maintaining the fight for social goals within the framework of civil debate. When forces of oppression come to maintain themselves in power against established law, peace is considered already broken.
-        Where a government has come into power through some form of popular vote, fraudulent or not, and maintains at least an appearance of constitutional legality, the guerrilla outbreak cannot be promoted, since the possibilities of peaceful struggle have not yet been exhausted.
-        The situation (as compared to the urban) in the open country is not so difficult.  There, in places beyond the reach of the repressive forces, the inhabitants can be supported by the armed guerrillas.
Though geographical and social conditions in each country determine the mode and particular forms that guerrilla warfare will take, there are general laws that hold for all fighting of this type. (51)
-        The guerrilla band is an armed nucleus, the fighting vanguard of the people. (52)
-        The guerrilla fighter needs full help from the people of the area.  This is an indispensible condition. (52)
-        Good knowledge of the countryside… The guerrilla fighter is above all an agrarian revolutionary. (53)
-        The fundamental principle is that no battle, combat, or skirmish is to be fought unless it will be won. (54)
Guerrilla Strategy: the analysis of the objectives to be achieved in light of the total military situation and the overall ways of reaching these objectives. (55)
Incumbent Object: have to achieve the total destruction of each one of the components of the guerrilla band. (55)
Guerrilla Object: final objective of defeating the enemy army. (55)
At the outset, the essential task of the guerrilla fighter is to keep himself from being destroyed. (56)
The strike is a most important factor in civil war, but in order to reach it a series of complementary conditions are necessary which do not always exist and which very rarely come to exist spontaneously.  It is necessary to create these essential conditions, basically by explaining the purposes of the revolution and by demonstrating the forces of the people and their possibilities. (57)
-        sabotage, weaken industrial zone, morale of enemy falls
-        It is essential always to preserve a strong base of operations and to continue strengthening it during the course of the war.
-        Guerrilla band must grow in numbers and arms and then split into more bands
Tactics: The fundamental characteristic of a guerrilla band is mobility. (58)
Terrorism: a measure that is generally ineffective and indiscriminate in results, since it often makes victims of innocent people and destroys a large number of lives that would be valuable to the revolution.  Should be considered a valuable tactic when it is used to put to death some noted leader of the oppressing forces well known for his cruelty… (60)
Guerrilla Warfare: A Method:
To be the vanguard of the party means to be at the forefront of the working class through the struggle for achieving power. (151)
Our reply is: Violence is not the monopoly of the exploiters; and as such the exploited can use it too and, what is more, ought to use it when the moment arrives. (152)
Guerrilla warfare, in the present situation of America, is the best method because: (155)
-        The enemy will fight to maintain itself in power.  In order to gain political power the army must be destroyed and to do that requires a people’s army the roots of which are the guerrilla forces. (155)
-        There is a general situation of the Latin American peasantry and the ever more explosive character of the struggle against feudal structures within the framework of an alliance between local and foreign exploiters. (156)
-        There is the continental nature of the struggle. The struggle between the people’s forces and the forces of repression will be to the death. (157)
A guerrilla force which has just begun its development must follow three conditions: (158)
-        constant mobility
-        constant vigilance
-        constant distrust
The struggle is politico-military, and as such it must be developed and understood. (159)
Side Notes:
The vanguard arises as the leader of the guerrilla band vs. as the party elite in Leninism or Maoist theory.
Can create some of the circumstances needed for revolution vs. Leninism or Maoist theory which believe that the revolution must wait until the situation is ready.
Time is not on the side of the revolutionary vs. Leninism and Maoists theory which believe time is on the side of the revolutionaries.