Book Description
This book tells the story--for the first time--of the United States government's response to Guevara's ill-starred insurgency in Bolivia in 1967. Henry Butterfield Ryan argues that Guevara's life must be re-evaluated in light of secret documents only recently released by the CIA, the State Department, the Pentagon, and the National Security Council. Ryan's dramatic account of the last days of Che Guevara is sure to appeal to scholars and students of United States foreign policy, Latin American history, military history, and to all others interested in this modern revolutionary's remarkable life. "Ryan offers a thoughtful critique of both the operational and intelligence-gathering aspects of the US intervention against the Cuban intervention in Bolivia....[He] enlivens his narrative with vivid portraits of the two American officials who played key parts in the hunt for Guevara....[This] is a welcome addition to the literature on both Che Guevara and US intervention in Latin America."--The Washington Monthly

FROM THE PUBLISHER

The Fall of Che Guevara tells the story of Guevara's ill-fated final campaign in the backwoods of Bolivia, where he hoped to ignite a revolution that would spread throughout South America. For the first time, this book shows in detail the strategy of the U.S. and Bolivian governments to foil his efforts. Based on numerous interviews, as well as secret documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act from the CIA, the State Department, the Pentagon, and the National Security Council, this work casts new light on the role of a Green Beret detachment sent to train the Bolivians and on the role of the CIA and other U.S. agencies in bringing Guevara down. Author Henry Butterfield Ryan - a former U.S. Foreign Service officer - shows that Guevara was an agent of Fidel Castro's policy from the time the two met in 1955 until his death, not an independent revolutionary, as many observers have claimed. Guevara's attempted insurgency in Bolivia was in reality a Cuban attempt to achieve another badly needed revolutionary success. This work shows conclusively, however, that the U.S. government neither killed Guevara nor ordered him killed.

FROM THE CRITICS

Washington Monthly