Che’s 98th Anniversary: “You Can’t Trust Imperialism One Bit, Not at All”

By Luis Manuel Arce Isaac on June 16, 2026

This June 14 marked the 98th anniversary of the birth of the Heroic Guerrilla, Ernesto Che Guevara, in Rosario, Argentina. He was only 39 when his assassins, acting on orders from the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, took his life and, unwittingly, immortalized him and placed him in the pantheon of the greats, in such a prominent place that his figure became universal, surpassing even any mythological deity.

His anti-imperialist ideology shaped his life, and his actions—at the same time—exerted a profound influence on how people began to view the world and perceive U.S. expansion through a different lens—an expansion previously led by European powers whose ambitions created the conditions for the rise of figures like Adolf Hitler and devastating conflicts such as World War II.

In his memorable speech on December 11, 1964, at the United Nations, and his famous retort to U.S. Representative Adlai Stevenson regarding his lies about Cuba, Che provided a thorough analysis of imperialism and its behavior following the end of the war with the defeat of Nazism.

His anti-imperialist consistency was immortalized for history in the famous phrase he uttered on November 30, 1964, during a speech in Santiago de Cuba at the inauguration of an industrial complex: “You can’t trust imperialism one bit, not at all.”

He issued this warning while recalling the assassination of Congolese leader Patrice Lumumba, as he explained the criminal nature of imperialism. Che said, verbatim:

“Now, in that Congo so far from us and yet so present, there is a history we must know and an experience that must serve us. The other day, Belgian paratroopers stormed the city of Stanleyville, massacred a large number of citizens, and, as a final act, after having killed them beneath the statue of the hero Lumumba, blew up the statue of the former president of the Congo.

This tells us two things: first, the brutality of imperialism—a brutality that knows no specific borders nor belongs to any specific country. The Hitlerite hordes were beasts, just as the Americans are beasts today, just as the Belgian paratroopers are beasts, just as the French imperialists were beasts in Algeria, because it is the nature of imperialism that turns men into beasts, that turns them into bloodthirsty beasts willing to slit throats, to murder, to destroy even the last image of a revolutionary, of a supporter of a regime that has fallen under its boot or that fights for its freedom.

And the statue commemorating Lumumba—destroyed today but to be rebuilt tomorrow—also reminds us, through the tragic history of that martyr of the world revolution, that imperialism cannot be trusted, not even a tiny bit, not at all.”

These are words that take on overwhelming relevance today in light of the Yankee-Zionist fascism into which the United States has drifted under Donald Trump.

Che occupies an unchanging space and time in humanity, as if they were permanent dimensions, because in him is verified the immanent force of the ideas that his action and example made transcendent. That essence is inexhaustible, and in it lies the origin of the creative principle that immortalizes him.

The Heroic Guerrilla was, at the same time, the builder and paradigm of the new man, the forger of revolutionary mystique, and a tenacious critic of imperialism—for him, the source of all the grave problems that the world has faced since the bourgeois regime lost its revolutionary character and went from being a fighter for transformation to the cause and agent of change in its imperialist era.

In this sense, Che’s anti-imperialism demonstrated that revolutionary action is an existential and ethical act, a profoundly human one, and not merely a tactical or institutional necessity, as his adversaries minimize it, and he remained consistent with this principle until his assassination at La Higuera.

His proposal still stands and is a challenge that humanity has either been unwilling or unable to face. It is painful that this is the case, for had his vision been realized, there surely would not have been a Gaza so savagely devastated, nor before that an Iraq destroyed to steal its oil, nor now an Iran bombed and with thousands dead, also for petty materialistic purposes, because the new man that Che advocated and sought to create is an ally of peace and harmony and an enemy of war, a defender of life and a fighter against death caused by man himself.

Che always maintained that a just society was impossible without an internal moral transformation of each individual; therefore, his ideal of the new man was that of a person who must rid himself of selfishness, individualism, and the pursuit of material wealth, replacing them with work, solidarity, and social duty,and that was not only for the ordinary citizen, but also, above all, for his leaders.

This philosophy was frowned upon by the ruling elites, who viewed him as a very dangerous enemy, particularly because his revolutionary and anti-imperialist ideas resonated deeply with the youth, who already regarded him as their hero and their new paradigm. He had become a universal symbol of authenticity who embraced love as a powerful weapon, and this included necessary war, which he considered an extreme act of sacrifice for the homeland.

Although it may seem paradoxical, his death without surrender elevated his figure to the zenith of glory; he was adopted by the student movements of 1968 in Paris, Mexico City, and Prague, and his legacy became universal. Almost six decades after his vile and cowardly assassination, his revolutionary and anti-imperialist thought remains more alive and relevant than ever, because what he predicted about imperialism has, unfortunately, been coming true.

Che is being revitalized every day, and this has allowed his image and his ideal of rebellion to transcend the borders of Cuba and Argentina, becoming a global icon of resistance that anyone in the world, regardless of their language, can instantly identify as a symbol of the struggle against injustice. His searing words remain a whip for those who act against humanity and its well-being.

For him, anti-imperialism and revolution are synonymous with conscious sacrifice for a just and necessary cause such as independence, sovereignty, and refusing to submit to the foreign boot that seeks to crush peoples, their history, and their values.

Feeling his presence through his timeless thought and his nobility on the battlefield becomes an extraordinary instance in which what matters is not turning him into a myth of the revolution, but into a spur to resume the battles to achieve the goals for which he gave his life.

Just as it was for him, the anti-imperialist struggle must also become for new generations the very foundation of the horizon of the grueling battle against Yankee imperialism, exacerbated by the narcissism of Donald Trump and his entourage of billionaires, obsessed with establishing a global dictatorship that is a historical, political, economic, and military impossibility.

Just as in that era of Cuba—which took him in as its own son and which he loved as his own parents, and for which he gave his all to defend it and lift it out of the centuries-old backwardness into which the capitalism of the time had plunged it—the island today also faces the problems that Che denounced at the UN in that memorable speech on December 11, 1964, but multiplied by the genocidal actions of an imperialism that has devolved into a form of fascism more aggressive and criminal than Nazism.

The fact is that ever since the bearded ones came down from the Sierra Maestra on January 1, 1959, following the defeat of the dictator Fulgencio Batista, U.S. imperialism has not wavered in its strategy to isolate Cuba with a ruthless and inhumane economic, commercial, and financial blockade, now compounded by an oil embargo and a diplomatic and political offensive aimed at ensuring nothing reaches the people—not a single gram of rice or even an aspirin—in order to decimate them through hunger and disease. It is cynical and cowardly.

On this 98th anniversary of his birth, it is good to remember and reread some excerpts from his speech on November 30, 1964, in Santiago de Cuba, and the unforgettable one at the United Nations on December 11 of the same year.

He said this in the beginning:

“So, let us remember today, on the anniversary of our glorious deeds of the past, the day we honor our martyrs, that the socialism we are building is close at hand, but that this socialism is founded on the blood of many of the finest sons and daughters of this people, those who never spared their sacrifice or risked their lives to fulfill their duties, and that this socialism will still have to be built upon a great number of new victims, whom the imperialist enemies will claim in one way or another.

And that we must stand firm and united to respond blow for blow and to build in the midst of battle. And that our slogans must be these that I have more or less explained: that of creative work day by day, that of training to make that work more fruitful, and that of unquenchable hatred for the imperialist enemy that keeps us constantly alert and makes us unyielding in the fulfillment of our duty as revolutionaries.

And let us always remember that the presence of Cuba, alive and fighting, is an example that gives hope and inspires people throughout the world who are struggling for their liberation, and particularly our compatriots on our continent, who speak our language, who share our culture, who have our habits and customs, and who, in ever-increasing numbers, are beginning to fight for their definitive liberation.

Let us, then, fully carry out, today, tomorrow, and every day, the slogan imposed on us by the sacred duty to build socialism in the country and to be a living example for all the peoples of the world. Homeland or Death! (Applause and shouts of: “We shall overcome”).

At the United Nations

In denouncing the imperialist plunder of the peoples, and its consequences, particularly in Latin America, Che addressed the delegates to the 19th UN General Assembly:

“The hour of its vindication, the hour it has chosen for itself, is being marked with precision from one end of the continent to the other. Now this anonymous mass, this dark, taciturn, people of color America, which sings across the entire continent with the same sadness and disillusionment—now this mass is the one that is definitively entering its own history, beginning to write it with its blood, beginning to suffer and die, because now, through the fields and mountains of America, on the slopes of its mountain ranges, across its plains and jungles, amid the solitude or the bustle of the cities, on the shores of the great oceans and rivers, this world full of hearts is beginning to tremble with fists burning with the desire to die for what is theirs, to claim their rights—rights that have been mocked for nearly five hundred years by one group or another.”

Che maintained that the future of Latin America would belong to the historically excluded sectors: the poor, the exploited, and those who for generations had been marginalized from political and economic decisions. He believed that these peoples had begun to take a leading role in shaping their own history, mobilizing in an organized manner to demand the rights that had been denied them.

In his view, the vast majority of the people were already occupying spaces of struggle and resistance, demanding land, resources, and dignified living conditions. He saw peasants, workers, and impoverished sectors expressing their demands through marches, demonstrations, and various forms of collective organization, carrying symbols, slogans, and flags that represented their aspirations for social justice.

For the revolutionary leader, this process was a response to a historical accumulation of injustices and violated rights. He was convinced that the growing popular mobilization in Latin America would not be a passing phenomenon, but an expanding force fueled by those who produce wealth, generate value through their labor, and sustain the development of societies. In his view, these majorities were beginning to awaken from a long period of political and cultural subjugation.

Che interpreted this awakening as a collective decision to put an end to resignation and to undertake a struggle for true independence. He believed that the Latin American peoples would continue advancing until they achieved full sovereignty, for which numerous generations had sacrificed their lives. On that path, he asserted, those willing to bear the greatest costs would do so convinced that they were defending a cause they considered legitimate, necessary, and inalienable.

Source: Alma PlusTV, translation Resumen Latinoamericano – English