In their 1969 book “
The great rebel Che Guevara in Bolivia” Bolivian journalists Salazar and Gonzalez describe the last failed mission of the Argentinian Ernesto “Che” Guevara in Bolivia. I´ve searched in vain for a freely viewable version on the internet...
They describe that Che and his army of some 50 men were getting more and more desperate, while the Bolivian army with the help of the CIA was closing in.
As Che Guevara knew that his mission would fail, it´s puzzling why he didn´t try to escape. My guess is that he didn't want to be remembered as some “coward” that flees in the face of problems, but as a martyr executed by the dirty imperialists.
My conclusion is that either Che should be considered stupid for not trying to escape or some sort of genius for knowing that more than 50 years later, people would still hang Che posters in front of their window and is considered a great revolutionary.
Another interesting piece of information on Che´s murder, is that at first it was officially reported that he died in gunbattle, instead of the true story of being executed.
I couldn´t find additional information on when the story was changed.
The following 14 October 1967 “SECRET-SENSITIVE/Eyes Only” memorandum, 5 days after Che’s death, was prepared for President Lyndon Johnson.
It contains a short summary from CIA director Richard Helms, which confirm that the official story, that Guevara had died from “battle wounds” during a clash with the Bolivian army, was a blatant lie but that he had been executed “
at 1315 hours…with a burst of fire from an M-2 automatic rifle”:
http://web.archive.org/web/20180509205448/https://www.thenation.com/article/the-death-of-che-guevara-declassified/
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