While in power, Torres sought to unify the working classes, teachers and students. He aligned with Salvador Allende and negotiated for Bolivian access to the sea through Chile. He reclaimed plantations and mines from US control, and called for the closure of US military bases.
In response, the US cut Bolivia off from international finance and planned a coup. Declassified documents include the transcript of a conversation between Nixon and Kissinger, where they explicitly discuss the coup (history.state.gov/historicaldo...),
and a record of the transference of funds to the coup-makers (history.state.gov/historicaldo...). The dictatorship, led by Hugo Banzer, banned all left-leaning political parties and arrested, tortured and/or killed thousands of political opponents.
Torres was forced into exile, and later kidnapped and assassinated in 1976 as part of US-backed Operation Condor. Operation Condor mobilized right-wing death squads to kill 80,000 leftist figures across Latin America.