According to the Barcelona Center for International Affairs (CIDOB), on August 18, 1971, Hugo Banzer entered Bolivia clandestinely, being arrested in Santa Cruz and later flown to the Carabineros barracks in La Paz.

Many took to the streets with this objective, including the socialist leader Marcelo Quiroga Santa Cruz along with other people and students, however, the lack of weapons and disorganization of these played against them.

U.S. ambassador Ernest V. Siracusa (who participated in the coup d'état against Jacobo Arbenz in Guatemala in 1954, then was expelled from Peru in 1968, accused of being a CIA man) ordered him to change his policy, threatening him with financial blockage.

[7] A week after the coup, The Washington Post published a report which claimed that U.S. Air Force Major Robert J. Lundin had advised the plotters and lent them a long-range radio.

[9][10] Brazilian Air Force planes dropped weapons, including ammunition, rifles, and machine guns, to the rebels in Santa Cruz de la Sierra.

Additionally, troops from the II Army, commanded by General Humberto Melo [pt], were deployed to Mato Grosso, ready to intervene if necessary.