Ch Guevara and the Foco Model

In the 1960s, the success of counterinsurgency efforts in the countryside of Latin America led to the development of a theory of guerrilla warfare in which Maos traditional base, the rural populace, was ignored in the initial state warfare. Thus, Ch and Debray1 advocated the development of isolated guerrilla focos of twenty or thirty individuals who would operate independently of any political party [emphasis mine], rural base, or other group that might compromise them in the face of well-trained counterinsurgent forces. Most theories of revolution seem to agree that certain preconditions must be met if a revolutionary situation is to arise. The peculiar contribution of Ernesto Ch Guevara to understanding revolutions is that according to him such preconditions can be created.2 According to friends and enemies alike, Ch Guevaras experience in Guatemala, Cuba, the Congo and other places in the world qualified him as one of the worlds top ranking guerrilla fighters of the twentieth century. The death of Guevara in the mountains of Bolivia on October 9, 1967, brought commotion and mixed feelings to his enemies and admirers the world over. His enemies were exultant, first because the dreaded Guevara was dead, and second because his death was 'clear evidence' that his theories were wrong.3 According to Guevara a process of revolution can be created through the emergence, in rural areas, of a band of highly trained guerrilla fighters organized into a group called a foco.4 The foco refers to a mobile point of insurrection. The theory implies that a small revolutionary force, by using violence, can mobilize popular support much more quickly than through political mobilization leading eventually to violence. Violence transforms the

Regis Debray, was a professor of Philosophy at the University of Havana in Cuba in the 60s. He wrote the book Revolution in the Revolution? and accompanied Guevara to Bolivia. 2 Jose A. Moreno, Ch Guevara on Guerrilla Warfare: Doctrine, Practice and Evaluation, Comparative Studies in Society and History, Vol. 12, No. 2 (Apr. 1970). Stable URL: http://www.jsto.org/stable/177959 accessed 04/09/2011 23:04. 3 Moreno, ChGuevara, 114. 4 The word foco comes from the Spanish for focus.

political situation. If violence is to be employed, a set of conditions need to be established before a revolutionary situation can be developed:5 1. A lack of legitimacy by the incumbent elite to govern the country. 2. Existence of tensions that cannot be redressed by regular channels. 3. All legal avenues to change the situation are perceived as closed.

A foco is composed of a group of 25 to 35 men under the politico-military leadership of one man who is in charge of the operation. Although it is rural based and needs to establish close relations with the peasants in the area in which it operates, it will at no time sacrifice the mobility and safety of the band for the village or territory. According to Guevara, the guerrilla foco is not only the vanguard but also the political and military center of the revolution.6 The purpose of the foco is to create and speed up the revolutionary process. Other functions of the foco, such as attacking the enemy, protecting the peasants or implementing agrarian reform will never be undertaken if by these the very existence of the foco is jeopardized.7 Against an enemy far superior in number and equipment, Guevara recommends the use of constant mobility, constant vigilance and constant wariness. Ch in his Guerrilla Warfare8 stated the fundamentals of the lessons he gained from the Cuban Revolution. 1) Popular forces can win against the army; 2) It is not necessary to wait for all the conditions for the revolution exist; the insurrection can create them; 3) In underdeveloped America, the countryside is the basic area of armed fighting. The second condition caused Mao himself to comment on the heresy of speeding up history. Instead, they want to extend our political influence through the easier method of roving guerrilla actions, and, once the masses throughout the country have been
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Moreno, Che Guevara, 115. Moreno, Che Guevara, 119. 7 Moreno, Che Guevara, 117. 8 Ernesto Che Guevara, Guerrilla Warfare (Omaha, NB: University of Nebraska Press,1961).

won over, or more or less won over, they want to launch a nationwide armed insurrection, which, with the participation of the Red Army, would become a nation-wide revolution.9 Nearly every Latin American guerrilla movement of the 1960s adopted Guevaras model. Chs theory was popular throughout the Americas particularly in Nicaragua, where Daniel Ortega was President. From 1965 onward, Ch made several trips throughout the world where he personally sought to export the Cuban Revolution.10 Perhaps the most serious blow to Guevara's plan to develop a foco in the Bolivian mountains was the negative response of the peasants to the call to join the struggle. Month after month, in summing up the major points of the period, Guevara painfully realized the absolute lack of peasant participation. In the last summary before his death, Guevara wrote that the peasants not only did not help, but had become informers for the army.11 The death of Guevara resulted in an almost wholesale abandonment of the foco theory for the pursuit of other tactics and strategies. On 3 October 1965 Castro read Ch's farewell letter which declared: 'Anywhere I am, I will feel the responsibility of being a Cuban revolutionary and as such I will act.12

Shy, Revolutionary War, 851. Childs, Emergence and Evolution, 606. 11 Moreno, Che Guevara, 124. 12 Childs, Emergence and Evolution, 621.
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