30 men who were to join us. At that point there were three of us: Commander Moja, an Afro-Cuban, who was the official head of our force; Mbili, a white compañero with great experience in these matters; and Tatu—myself, presented as a doctor—whose color was explained by the fact that I spoke French and had guerrilla experience. Our names meant: one, two, three, in that order. To save ourselves headaches, we decided to number ourselves by order of arrival, and to use the corresponding Swahili word as our name.
I had not told any Congolese of my decision to fight in their country, and opted not to inform them of my presence for the time being. I didn’t mention it in my first conversation with Kabila because nothing had been decided; and once the plan was approved, it would have been dangerous for the plan to be known before I reached my destination as I had to travel through a lot of hostile countries. I therefore decided to present my arrival as a fait accompli and to proceed from there, according to how they reacted. I was not unaware that a negative response would put me in a difficult situation as I could no longer return [to Cuba], but I also calculated that it would be difficult for them to refuse me. I was blackmailing them with my physical presence.
But an unexpected problem arose. Kabila was in Cairo with all the members of the revolutionary government, discussing aspects of combat unity and the new constitution of the revolutionary organization. His deputies, Massengo and Mitoudidi, were there with him. The only person left with authority was Tchamlesso, later to acquire the Cuban nickname “Tremendo Punto.” Tchamlesso accepted on his own responsibility the 30 instructors that we offered initially, but when we told him that we had some 130 men, all black [Afro-] Cubans, ready to begin the struggle, he took responsibility for accepting this also. This slightly changed the first part of our strategy because we had assumed we would be operating on the basis of 30 Cubans accepted as instructors.
A delegate headed off for Cairo to tell Kabila and his compañeros that the Cubans had arrived (but not that I was there), while we waited for the arrival of the initial contingent.
Our most urgent task was to find a fast boat with a good motor, so that we would be able to cross in relative safety the 70 kilometers that was the width of Lake Tanganyika at the crossing point. One of our good experts had arrived in advance to take charge of both buying the launches and exploring the way across the lake.
After waiting several days in Dar es-Salaam—a wait which, though short, made me anxious because I wanted to get to the Congo as soon as possible—the first group of Cubans arrived on the night of April 20. Fourteen of us then set off, leaving behind four new arrivals for whom equipment had not yet been purchased. We were accompanied by two drivers, the Congolese representative (Tchamlesso), and a Tanzanian policeman to clear up any problems en route.
Right from the start, we confronted a reality that would vex us throughout the struggle: the lack of organization. This greatly concerned me because our passage must have been detected by imperialism, which has power over all the airline companies and airports in the region, apart from the fact that the purchase of unusual quantities of backpacks, nylon sheeting, knives, blankets, etc. must have attracted attention in Dar es-Salaam.
Not only was the Congolese organization bad; ours was too. We had not thoroughly prepared for the task of equipping a company, and had obtained only rifles and ammunition for the soldiers, all armed with Belgian FALs.
Kabila had not arrived and announced he expected to remain in Cairo two more weeks, so that, as I had been unable to discuss my own involvement with him, I had to carry on incognito, not even announcing myself to the Tanzanian government in order to ask for its acquiescence. To be honest, these problems did not bother me particularly because I was eager to play a role in the Congo struggle and I feared that my offer might arouse an extremely sharp reaction and that the Congolese—or the friendly government itself—might ask me not to become involved in the conflict.
On the evening of April 22 we reached Kigoma after an exhausting journey, only to find the launches were not ready and we had to wait another day to make the crossing. The regional commissioner, who received us and organized accommodation, wasted no time in telling me of the Congolese complaints. Unfortunately, all indications were that many of his judgments were correct: the commanders in the area, who had received our first exploratory delegation, were now in Kigoma; and we verified that they were granting passes for men to go there from the front. That little town was a sanctuary where the fortunate ones could go and live away from the hazards of the struggle. The nefarious influence of Kigoma—its brothels, alcohol and especially its secure refuge—would never be sufficiently understood by the revolutionary command.
Finally, at dawn on April 24, we landed on Congolese soil and met a surprised group of well-armed infantry, who solemnly formed up into a little guard of honor. We were shown into a hut that had been specially vacated for us.
Our original information, obtained (I have no idea how) by our inspection agents, had been that on the Congolese side there was a 10-mile-wide plain stretching inland to the mountains. In reality, however, the lake is a type of ravine and the mountains, both at Kigoma and on the other side, begin right at the water’s edge.2 At a place known as Kibamba, where the General Staff was located, a difficult climb began 10 paces or so from our point of disembarkation, all the more difficult for us given our lack of previous training.
1. The process of selecting and training the Cuban combatants to participate in the guerrilla struggle in the Congo began toward the end of January of 1965, after Che passed on to the Cuban government the requests he had received from African liberation movements. Men were selected from units of Cuba’s Revolutionary Armed Forces (FAR). The volunteers selected for this internationalist mission had to be Afro-Cuban in order to facilitate their integration into the African liberation movements. Training took place in the months of February and March in various camps located in the mountains of Pinar del Río province and involved about 500 members of the Cuban military with various military ranks and levels of combat experience from which 113 were selected. Commander Victor Dreke was initially appointed to head the column, but toward the end of March he was informed of the decision to name Che Guevara as head of the mission.
2. This refers to the Mitumba Mountains on the western (Congolese) shore of Lake Tanganyika.
On arrival, after a brief rest on the floor of the hut among backpacks and assorted junk, we began to become acquainted with Congolese reality. We immediately noticed a clear distinction: besides people with very little education (generally peasants), there were others better educated, a distinct style of dress and a better knowledge of French. The distance between the two groups could hardly have been greater.
The first people I got to know were Emmanuel Kasabuvabu and Kiwe, who introduced themselves as officers on the General Staff, the former in charge of supplies and munitions, the latter, information. Both were loquacious and expressive young men and what they said, and what they held back, soon revealed the divisions inside the Congo. Later, “Tremendo Punto” invited me to a small meeting, which was not attended by those compañeros but by another group comprising the commander of the base and several brigade leaders. This included the head of the First Brigade, Colonel Bidalila,1 who commanded the Uvira front; the Second Brigade, under the command of Major-General Moulana, was represented by Lieutenant-Colonel Lambert; and Ngoja Andre, who was fighting in the Kabambare area, representing what seemed likely (from various remarks made) to become a future brigade. Agitated, “Tremendo Punto” proposed that Moja, the official head of our forces, should participate in all meetings and decisions of the General Staff, along with another Cuban chosen by Moja. I observed the others’ faces and noticed no approval of the suggestion; “Tremendo Punto” did not appear to be particularly popular among the leaders.
The reason for the hostility among the groups was that, one way or another, some men did spend a certain amount of time at the front, whereas others merely traveled back and forth between the Congo base and Kigoma, always to go get something that was not to hand. The case of “Tremendo Punto” was more serious in the combatants’ eyes because,