 In the face of a loss of commercial connections with Western states , Guevara tried to replace them with closer commercial relationships with Eastern Bloc states , visiting a number of Marxist states and signing trade agreements with them . At the end of 1960 he visited Czechoslovakia , the Soviet Union , North Korea , Hungary and East Germany and signed , for instance , a trade agreement in East Berlin on December 17 , 1960 . Such agreements helped Cuba 's economy to a certain degree but also had the disadvantage of a growing economic dependency on the Eastern Bloc . It was also in East Germany where Guevara met Tamara Bunke ( later known as " Tania " ) , who was assigned as his interpreter , and who would years later join him , and be killed with him in Bolivia . 
