AMERICAN "
OBSERVER" PRESENT WITH MURDERERS OF CHE
[Te following account of the way in which the Bolivian dictatorship displayed the body of Che Guevara was sent by the special correspondent of Agence France-Presse from Valle Grande, Bolivia. Datelined October 11, it was published in the October 12 issue of the Paris daily Le Monde. The translation is by World Outlook. ]
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Yesterday afternoon, I saw the lifeless body, riddled with bullets, of a guerrilla known as "Ramén," the alleged nom de guerre of Comandante Ernesto "Che" Guevara. Thirty of us journalists, including three foreign correspondents, went to Valle Grande, a small town, somnolent in the heat of Southeast Bolivia, in order to verify the death of the most prestigious of the guerrillas.
Coming down from the misty heights of the military airdrome at La Paz (13,451 feet), our Dakota landed in Valle Grande during the siesta. At the other end of the deserted streets of the town, a gate, before which some fifty curiosity seekers were standing, opened on a field at the bottom of which, at the side of a hill, a morgue had been improvised in a former stable. Some spruce officers and armed soldiers greeted us.
The body of a bearded man, with long hair, dressed solely in olive green pants, lay on a stretcher placed ona stone sink. The smell of formaldehyde was strong around the body riddled with bullets and drained of blood. The officials charged with meeting all our possible objections concerning the identity of "Ramén" did their utmost to point out the resemblances, feature by feature, between the body and the guerrilla. "No doubt is possible," they told us; "the fingerprints of the body correspond with those of Guevara."
"Ram6n" was mortally wounded in a battle last Sunday [October 8], a few miles from Higueras, near Villa Grande. He succumbed to his wounds early Monday morning. "He was not finished off," we were told by Colonel Arnaldo Saucedo, commander of the second battalion of "Rangers" operating in this sector.
"I am 'Che' Guevara, I have failed," he is supposed to have whispered to the soldiers who took him prisoner. At least that is what General Alfredo Ovando, commander in chief of the Bolivian armed forces stated. Questioned about this a little earlier during a press conference, Colonel Saucedo told us however that "Ramén" at no time regained consciousness.
The journalists who walked around the morgue, among the photographers and cameramen, displayed a mixture of stupefaction and incredulity. Nevertheless, any error in identity seemed impossible.
At the foot of the body of "Ram6én," two other guerrillas lay on the same floor. These were the bodies of "El Chino," a Peruvian, and "El Moro," a Cuban doctor. Two other bodies, which appear to be those of Bolivians, had not yet been identified. Colonel Saucedo said that only nine guerrillas remained in all of Southeast Bolivia and that hardly any other insurrectional centers existed. Athletic, his face crossed with a black mustache, he spoke under a religious image decorating one of the walls in the hotel where we reassembled.
An American military man was present at this conference. He wore no insignia, but his bearing, his complexion and his battle dress betrayed his nationality. I went up to him to ask him some questions in English. He turned toward a Bolivian soldier and asked him, in Spanish, what I wanted. In my direction, he added, "No comprendo..." [I don't understand] and left the place.
During the subsequent questioning, Colonel Saucedo told me: "Yes, that's an American military man, an instructor at Santa Cruz center. He came here as an observer. No American 'green berets' are participating in the military operations in Bolivia."
"The guerrilla adventure has come to an end," he said, "as any senseless adventure must come to an end. The defeat was due to the lack of any popular support and to the arid terrain that was chosen." He added: "We will bury Guevara here in Valle Grande."
The guerrilla "Ramén" was killed at the end of a narrow valley, in a desperate battle. The nine shots that hit him were fired from a distance of 50 meters [164 feet].
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