A NEW VERSION OF THE EXECUTION OF ERNESTO CHE GUEVARA
A new version of the execution of Ernesto Che Guevara was published in The New York Times of October 4. The previous version, emanating from Bolivian army circles and passed on by journalists to the world press, was that the revolutionary hero had been executed by a bullet fired from a pistol through his heart. The new version is that he was machinegunned. The two versions are, of course, not contradictory. Guevara may have been machine-gunned and then given a coup de grace by a Bolivian army officer.
The latest details were supplied by Juan de Onis, special correspondent of the Times, in a December 2 dispatch from Pucara, Bolivia.
"Mr. Guevara was captured near La Higuera by the Bolivian Army on Oct. 8," writes de Onis. "Two days later, the army's high command announced that he had been killed in a clash between Government troops and the guerrilla band he was leading. An army spokesman said that Mr. Guevara had admitted his identity before dying of his wounds. On Oct. 17, the army said an autopsy report showed that loss of blood from nine bullet wounds had caused death."
The Times correspondent then reports his own findings after investigation in the area:
"It was learned in this remote mountain region thut Mr. Guevara had been held as prisoner in the La Higuera schoolhouse for a night after he was captured, slightly wounded. On the following day he was machine-gunned by a Bolivian nonconmmissioned officer."
Juan de Onis provides the following additional information:
"On Oct. 8 Mr. Guevara, a hero of the Cuban revolution who tried unsuccessfully to recreate in Bolivia the exploits of Fidel Castro's guerrilla insurrection, was captured in a gorge a mile from La Higuera during a battle with Bolivian troops.
"Mr. Guevara was taken to La Higuera with wounds in one leg and a flesh wound in the back. He was held overnight in the schoolhouse, questioned by Bolivian officers, and executed the morning of Oct. 9 on orders received by radio fron armed forces headquarters in La Paz, the Bolivian capital. .
"In La Higuera, a hamlet with about 20 houses, the circumstances of Mr. Guevara's death are common knowledge. Many people in Pucara have relatives in La Higuera and have been there recently."
According to de Onis, the death and subsequent disposition of Che Guevara's body remains a touchy subject with the Bolivian military.
"Capt. Gary Prado, the infantry officer who led the troops that captured Mr. Guevara, has submitted a battle report dissociating himself from the execution. He said he turned over his prisoner, along with papers, including a campaign diary found in Mr. Guevara's knapsack, to Lieut. Col. Andres Selich on the afternoon of Oct. 8.
"Colonel Joaquin Zenteno, commander of the Eighth Division, arrived by helicopter in La Higuera on the morning of Oct. 9. About 11 A.M. bursts of gunfire in the schoolhouse were heard. A noncommissioned officer with a machine gun was in the schoolroom at the time.
"Shortly after the shots were heard, the body of Mr. Guevara was brought out, with bullet wounds in the chest and neck. The wounds had not been there when Captain Prado turned over Mr. Guevara, who had been able to walk with assistance at that time.
"The body of another guerrilla, identified as Aniceto, who had been brought to the schoolhouse as a wounded prisoner, was also brought out. Mr. Guevara's body was lashed to the landing sled of a helicopter and flown to Valle Grande."
Barrientos, it appears, would now like to wipe out even the scene of the crime:
"La Higuera, 10 miles from here," Juan de Onis reports from Pucara, "has been placed out of bounds for all visitors. According to villagers, the schoolhouse is being torn down and a new one will be built."
The Times correspondent also re~ ports that the top officials in the dictatorship continue to give contradictory versions about what they did with the body.
"At one point, Gen. Alfredo Ovando Candia, commander of the armed forces, informed the Argentine Embassy that Mr. Guevara, who was born in Argentina, had been cremated. Last week, during a visit to Rio de Janeiro, General Ovando was quoted as having said that there had been no cremation of the body, rather a secret burial.
"Yesterday, armed forces headquarters said in a statement that the general's words had been misinterpreted and
that the body had been burned. The location of the ashes is a military secret, according to the statement."
In a December 4 dispatch from La Paz, Reuter identified the "armed forces headquarters" statement as having been issued by the interim commander in chief of the armed forces, General Juan José Torrez, and said that he had explained that the misinterpretation of Ovando Candia's statement in Rio de Janeiro was due to his superior's "poor understanding of Portuguese."
In Rio de Janeiro, however, Gen. Ovando brushed aside the explanation made by his subordinate. "I don't know what the intentions of my government are concerning the future disposal of the mortal remains of Guevara. So far as I am concerned, I suppose that they will be turned over to his family, as they should be.