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The CIA might claim Che's body, but it will never be able to shackle his spirit. The most fitting memorial to Che was the intensely moving speech about his death delivered by his old comrade-in-arms, Fidel Castro. In that speech, Fidel declared:
"No matter how difficult it may be to imagine that a man of his stature, of his prestige, of his personality, could have died in a clash between a guerrilla patrol and an army force, no matter how illogical it may seem, we who know him well realize, however, that it is not at all strange. Because he was always, during the whole time that we knew him, characterized by an extraordinary daring, by an absolute scorn of death, by his way, in every difficult and dangerous moment, of doing the most difficult and dangerous things. He did this many times during our struggle. . . .
We were always worried lest his temperament, his habit of always being present during the moments of danger, should lead him to his death in combat. No one could ever be sure that he would take even the slightest precautions. Many times he went forward with the advance patrols. . . .
Above all else we would have liked to have seen him as the builder of the great victories of the people rather than as the precursor of those victories. But the fact is that a man of that temperament, of that personality, of that character, of that way of reacting before certain circumstances, is unfortunately usually destined to be the precursor rather than the one who realizes the victories. And the precursors are also, of course, the builders of victory, the greatest builders of victory. . . .
It should not surprise anyone that he was among the first to fall in a guerrilla combat, since it would have been almost a miracle, almost impossible for it to have been otherwise. . . .
The imperialists' cries of victory, in which they say that this will discourage revolutionary struggle, will shortly be disproven by actual events. The imperialists also know the power, the impact of an example, and they also know that even though a man can be physically eliminated, an example like that can never be eliminated by anything or anyone. . . .
Newspapers of all tendencies have universally recognized Che's virtues. . . . He is an almost unique example of how a man could win the recognition and respect of his enemies, of the very enemies he faced with his arms in his hands, of those who have been ideological enemies and have nevertheless expressed feelings of admiration and of respect toward Che. . . .
Has the history of revolutions or of revolutionary peoples been characterized perhaps by the absence of hard blows? Aren't true revolutionaries the ones who rise above those blows, those setbacks, and are not discouraged? Aren't we revolutionaries precisely the ones who proclaim the value of moral principles, the value of example? Aren't we revolutionaries the ones who believe in the durability of man's works, of man's principles? Aren't we revolutionaries the first to recognize how ephemeral the physical life of man is and how durable and lasting man's ideas, conduct, and example are, when it has been man's example that has guided the people throughout history?"
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