Thirty years ago, on October 8, 1967, gunfire echoed through a steep ravine of the Andes Mountains in southern Bolivia. The guerrilla band led by Ernesto "Che" Guevara – a chief lieutenant in the Sierra Maestra, author of a book on guerilla tactics, one-time president of Cuba’s National Bank and later Minister of Industries under Castro, and who renounced his Cuban citizenship and set off to devote his services to the revolutionary cause in other lands – was …showed first 75 words of 1721 total…

…showed last 75 words of 1721 total…Santa Cruz Department. By late July 1967, three well-trained and well-equipped Bolivian Ranger battalions were ready for action. The army's increased capabilities and its decisive defeat of the legendary Cuban guerrilla leader enhanced its prestige. The fact that Barrientos' vice president, Luis Adolfo Siles Salines, a conservative civilian, had to request permission from the military high command to assume his mandate after Barrientos' death in April 1969 indicated how powerful the army had become as an institution.