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René Barrientos
René Emilio Barrientos Ortuño (30 May 1919 – 27 April 1969) was a Bolivian military officer and politician who served as the 47th president of Bolivia from 1964 to 1965 and 1966 to 1969. During his first term, he shared power with Alfredo Ovando as co-president of a military junta and was the 30th vice president of Bolivia in 1964.
General Barrientos came to power after the 1964 Bolivian coup d'état which overthrew the government of President Victor Paz Estenssoro. During his three-year rule, Barrientos and the army suppressed leftist opposition to his regime, including a guerrilla group led by Che Guevara in 1967.
On 27 April 1969, Barrientos was killed in a helicopter crash near Arque, Bolivia. He may have been assassinated, but that has not been conclusively proven.
Barrientos was a native of Tarata, department of Cochabamba. His father was of Spanish ancestry while his mother was Quechua. After his father died when he was a child, Barrientos was sent to a Franciscan orphanage. He left the orphanage at 12 and attended a private high school while working odd jobs to pay the tuition. After graduating, he entered the military academy in La Paz. He was a career military officer, graduating from the military academy in 1943 and earning his pilot's license in 1945. Later in the 1940s, he gravitated toward the reformist Revolutionary Nationalist Movement (Movimiento Nacionalista Revolucionario, or MNR) party of Víctor Paz Estenssoro. Barrientos played a part in the Bolivian National Revolution of 1952, when the MNR toppled the established order and took power. In fact, he was given the task of flying out of the country to bring back the revolutionary leader Víctor Paz Estenssoro, then in exile, once the rebellion succeeded. In 1957, Barrientos was rewarded when he was named commander of the Bolivian Air Force.
Known as a rather obsequious, sycophantic supporter of the MNR, he slowly became famous throughout the country for his uncommon, and very public, feats of valor. In 1960, for example, a live parachute jump demonstration by Bolivian Air Force soldiers ended in disaster when their equipment failed and 3 of the 15 parachutists fell to their death before a large crowd assembled to view the event. Recriminations flew as to who should be held responsible for the carnage. Barrientos, as Air Force commander, decided to put on a demonstration of his own, and jumped from an airplane himself using one of the parachutes that had failed to open during the earlier debacle. His point was that there had been nothing wrong with the equipment or the training, simply bad luck; this incident cemented his popularity among certain sections of the population. Furthermore, the ruling MNR helped prop up his standing, as the MNR leadership constantly extolled General Barrientos' virtues, portraying him as a paragon of the new kind of military officer the revolution had fostered.
By the early 1960s, while the ruling MNR party had begun to fall apart due to personal and policy differences between its leading members, Barrientos' stock was clearly on the rise. In addition, President Paz Estenssoro (elected to a second term in 1960) was leaning more heavily on military support to restore order to various parts of the country where rival pro-MNR militias had turned against each other, often on behalf of specific MNR leaders. Disarming the militias (who had been allowed to keep their weapons since the 1952 Revolution) became a priority to Paz, and this enhanced the role the new armed forces played in the national arena. The most popular of these military leaders was, of course, the dashing Barrientos.
In 1961, Paz Estenssoro had the Bolivian Constitution amended in order to be allowed to run for consecutive re-election, feeling that only he had the standing to keep the crumbling MNR together. Traditionally, attempts such as these (known as "prorroguismo") have been strongly condemned by the Bolivian political elites, many of whose members may have been waiting for their turn to occupy the Presidential palace for years. This was no exception, and Paz's controversial move would soon prove harmful to him. Paz, surprisingly to some, chose General Barrientos as his running mate in that year's elections, and the two were sworn in on 6 August 1964. Just three months later, Barrientos — in tandem with the Army Commander Alfredo Ovando — toppled Paz in a violent coup d'état and installed himself as co-president in a Junta alongside General Ovando.
His idea all along was to capitalize on his popularity and run for elections, with the full support of the Bolivian military establishment now in control of the country. To this end, he resigned his co-presidency in early 1966 and registered himself as a candidate for president in the general elections that were held in July 1966. With the most important civilian leaders (Paz, Hernán Siles and Juan Lechín) in exile, Barrientos was easily elected, and was sworn in during August 1966.
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René Barrientos
René Emilio Barrientos Ortuño (30 May 1919 – 27 April 1969) was a Bolivian military officer and politician who served as the 47th president of Bolivia from 1964 to 1965 and 1966 to 1969. During his first term, he shared power with Alfredo Ovando as co-president of a military junta and was the 30th vice president of Bolivia in 1964.
General Barrientos came to power after the 1964 Bolivian coup d'état which overthrew the government of President Victor Paz Estenssoro. During his three-year rule, Barrientos and the army suppressed leftist opposition to his regime, including a guerrilla group led by Che Guevara in 1967.
On 27 April 1969, Barrientos was killed in a helicopter crash near Arque, Bolivia. He may have been assassinated, but that has not been conclusively proven.
Barrientos was a native of Tarata, department of Cochabamba. His father was of Spanish ancestry while his mother was Quechua. After his father died when he was a child, Barrientos was sent to a Franciscan orphanage. He left the orphanage at 12 and attended a private high school while working odd jobs to pay the tuition. After graduating, he entered the military academy in La Paz. He was a career military officer, graduating from the military academy in 1943 and earning his pilot's license in 1945. Later in the 1940s, he gravitated toward the reformist Revolutionary Nationalist Movement (Movimiento Nacionalista Revolucionario, or MNR) party of Víctor Paz Estenssoro. Barrientos played a part in the Bolivian National Revolution of 1952, when the MNR toppled the established order and took power. In fact, he was given the task of flying out of the country to bring back the revolutionary leader Víctor Paz Estenssoro, then in exile, once the rebellion succeeded. In 1957, Barrientos was rewarded when he was named commander of the Bolivian Air Force.
Known as a rather obsequious, sycophantic supporter of the MNR, he slowly became famous throughout the country for his uncommon, and very public, feats of valor. In 1960, for example, a live parachute jump demonstration by Bolivian Air Force soldiers ended in disaster when their equipment failed and 3 of the 15 parachutists fell to their death before a large crowd assembled to view the event. Recriminations flew as to who should be held responsible for the carnage. Barrientos, as Air Force commander, decided to put on a demonstration of his own, and jumped from an airplane himself using one of the parachutes that had failed to open during the earlier debacle. His point was that there had been nothing wrong with the equipment or the training, simply bad luck; this incident cemented his popularity among certain sections of the population. Furthermore, the ruling MNR helped prop up his standing, as the MNR leadership constantly extolled General Barrientos' virtues, portraying him as a paragon of the new kind of military officer the revolution had fostered.
By the early 1960s, while the ruling MNR party had begun to fall apart due to personal and policy differences between its leading members, Barrientos' stock was clearly on the rise. In addition, President Paz Estenssoro (elected to a second term in 1960) was leaning more heavily on military support to restore order to various parts of the country where rival pro-MNR militias had turned against each other, often on behalf of specific MNR leaders. Disarming the militias (who had been allowed to keep their weapons since the 1952 Revolution) became a priority to Paz, and this enhanced the role the new armed forces played in the national arena. The most popular of these military leaders was, of course, the dashing Barrientos.
In 1961, Paz Estenssoro had the Bolivian Constitution amended in order to be allowed to run for consecutive re-election, feeling that only he had the standing to keep the crumbling MNR together. Traditionally, attempts such as these (known as "prorroguismo") have been strongly condemned by the Bolivian political elites, many of whose members may have been waiting for their turn to occupy the Presidential palace for years. This was no exception, and Paz's controversial move would soon prove harmful to him. Paz, surprisingly to some, chose General Barrientos as his running mate in that year's elections, and the two were sworn in on 6 August 1964. Just three months later, Barrientos — in tandem with the Army Commander Alfredo Ovando — toppled Paz in a violent coup d'état and installed himself as co-president in a Junta alongside General Ovando.
His idea all along was to capitalize on his popularity and run for elections, with the full support of the Bolivian military establishment now in control of the country. To this end, he resigned his co-presidency in early 1966 and registered himself as a candidate for president in the general elections that were held in July 1966. With the most important civilian leaders (Paz, Hernán Siles and Juan Lechín) in exile, Barrientos was easily elected, and was sworn in during August 1966.