HAVANA -- Jesus Montane, 76, a close aide of President Fidel Castro and one of the revolutionaries who fought alongside Castro against President Fulgencio Batista in the 1950s, died Friday of ``acute respiratory failure,'' the government announced.

Batista jailed Montane with Castro and other guerrillas on Cuba's Isle of Pines -- now the Isle of Youth -- after they launched the revolution with an attack on the Moncada army barracks in Santiago de Cuba in 1953.

The revolutionaries were freed in a general amnesty in 1955 and later went to Mexico, where they planned a second attack on Cuba.

They returned in 1956 aboard the yacht Granma and were attacked by army troops after a disastrous landing. The survivors vanished into the countryside and continued fighting Batista, finally overthrowing him Jan. 1, 1959.