Publications on brotherly ties between North Korea and Cuba (and by extension Cuba-style insurgencies in Latin America) are few and far between, so Taylor's book is automatically a valuable contribution. It is also one of a kind, because it is essentially pro-North Korea. That said, it is the offshoot of a PhD dissertation in History at the University of British Colombia. It is a scholarly book, with no theoretical ambition but with copious and useful empirical material in English, Spanish, and Korean.
The book features seven chapters on North Korea and the Cuban Revolution, the anti-US imperialist front, and North Korea as a “model” for Latin America in the areas of economic policy, leadership, and revolution. The final chapter covers the premature death of the Organization of Solidarity with the People of Asia, Africa and Latin America (OSPAAAL), better known as the Tricontinental, after only a few years of existence.
Although the idea of Kim Il Sung's North Korea as a “model” can exercise the imagination, Taylor finds that it offered much to admire to young Latin American revolutionaries inspired by the Cuban revolution. “North Korea's economic growth and industrialization in the years following the Korean War was remarkable and suggests that many North Koreans accepted the WPK's [Worker Party of Korea] call to work harder and sacrifice for the better future ahead” (123). For Taylor, the country “emerged from the destruction of the Korean War to undergo a miraculous process of rapid industrialization,” and for that, it “gained considerable international attention during the 1960s” (131). In fact, “for many outside visitors, especially those from the developing world, the somewhat austere lives most North Koreans lived during the 1960s did not make the achievements in such areas as housing, education, and healthcare any less admirable, nor did it diminish the power of Pyongyang as a symbol of socialist modernity, with its tall, modern budlings and wide, paved boulevards” (132).
North Korean and Cuban archives are not accessible to researchers. Therefore, Taylor's main indicators are statements made by Cuban or North Korean officials (especially Kim Il Sung), as well as some Latin American political pilgrims. The focal point is the 1966 Tricontinental Conference held in Havana and attended by delegates from 82 countries, but Taylor examines the whole movement, not only the conference itself. There is little in the book on the two political systems or on specific policies.
Taylor shows the extent to two which “the Cuban and North Korean governments developed exceptionally intimate political, economic, and cultural ties” (6). North Korea assisted revolutionaries in Cuba with arms, financial support, and military training, and did so not only in Cuba but also in Brazil, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Peru, Mexico, and Venezuela. For instance, we learn that the Mexican Movimiento de Acción Revolucionaria received training in North Korea, that members “became proficient with North Korean arms” and “also trained in hand-to-hand combat, which they described as a combination of judo and karate” (109). By 1971, North Korea “operated 10 military facilities in which it trained more than 5,000 guerrillas from around the world, including 1,300 from 9 Latin American countries” (81). There are surprising pages on Juan Emilio Bosch Gaviño, the first democratically elected president of the Dominican Republic, who was overthrown in the 1963 coup. He visited North Korea in November 1969 and “struggled to find words to adequately describe what he saw as a genuine symbiosis between people and leader” (148).
Taylor muses about Che's “historic visit to Pyongyang in December 1960” (15), and how “adamant [he was] in his admiration for North Korea” (126). Both Che and Kim affirmed the need to “utilize moral rather than material incentives” (125). Taylor also quotes Raúl Castro: “If someone wants to know the opinion of compañero Fidel Castro on the basic problems of our times, let him ask compañero Kim Il Sung . . . compañero Fidel thinks exactly the same as compañero Kim Il Sung” (70).
Within the intramural parameters chosen by Taylor, one could wonder if he overstates how Cuba, North Korea, and Tricontinentalism “broke with Marxist-Leninist orthodoxy” (6), or truly proposed an “alternative” model of socialism (115). The book seems to suggest that fissiparious tensions in the communist movement concerned foreign policy and national interest, not disagreement on the Marxist-Leninist toolkit. Taylor claims that “Tricontinentalism was a distinct, communist-led political project that rejected non-alignment, neutralism, peaceful coexistence, reformism, and sectarianism” (10). How could it not be a smidge sectarian if it starts by peeling off all these “revisionist” tendencies in its midst? Taylor gives abundant examples of Kim's adroit use of the Leninist lingo of excommunication against China and the Soviet Union.
Finally, and here is the heart of the matter, which Taylor elides: was it not deeply irresponsible to call for “two, three, or many Vietnams” (Che Guevara's apocalyptic message to the Tricontinental in 1966), whether conditions for successful revolution were met or not? What did Tricontinentalism's call to arms achieve in Latin America, besides sending thousands of youths (mostly university students) to a heroic but pointless death? Taylor prefers to conclude on a positive note: “Tricontinentalism established human networks that continued to facilitate transnational political cooperation and collaboration within the Third World Left for decades to come” (212).
