Txabi Etxebarrieta (14 October 1944 – 7 June 1968), also known as Xabier Etxebarrieta Ortiz, was a Basque nationalist and one of the founders of the armed pro-independence organization Euskadi ta Askatasuna (ETA). He was the perpetrator of the first assassination carried out by this group, and also the first ETA militant killed in a confrontation with the Civil Guard, for which he became an icon within the inner circle of the group and its supporters.
Early life
Txabi Etxebarrieta was the third of four brothers. From childhood he suffered from bronchitis that affected him all his life. One of his older brothers was José Antonio Etxebarrieta, a defense lawyer for Xabier Izko de la Iglesia in the Burgos Trials that took place in 1970. He graduated with an Economics degree in 1967, specializing in computing from the University of the Basque Country.
Fifth ETA assembly
In December 1966 and March 1967, he presided over the fifth assembly of ETA, which led to the first split within the organization. In the assembly, that took place over two sessions, tensions broke out between the workers’ faction, oriented more towards communism and further away from Basque nationalism, that at the time controlled the direction of ETA in the interior (i.e. Spain), and the other two factions, the so-called backward and race focused movements.
Etxebarrieta, his brother José Antonio and José María Eskubi from Navarre were the ones who headed the internal faction that expelled the more prominent members of the workers’ faction. The first part of the Assembly, held on the December 7th, 1966, in Gaztelu (Gipuzkoa), ratified the expulsion of the workers’ party member Patxi Iturrioz which was decided in advance by the Executive (leadership in exile), thus provoking the split of the workers’ faction into a new organization called ETA Berri (ETA nueva, in Spanish), later Komunistak, the embryo of what would later be the Communist Movement of Spain (MCE).
The rest of the militants automatically remained a part of what would be known as ETA Zaharra (old ETA) until 1968, until it became known as simply ETA again.
In the second part of the assembly, held in March 1967 in a house of prayer of the Jesuits of Guetaria, Txabi Etxebarrieta was elected a member of the Central Committee and the executive committee of the ETA. In that assembly, furthermore, the first steps began to be made towards the elaboration of their own revolutionary theory; Etxebarrieta originated the concept of a “Basque working nation”, used by the patriotic left of Basque nationalism since then. Likewise the activity of the organization was divided between four separate fronts: political, military, cultural, and workers’ concerns. In the latter, Etxebarrieta would have a prominent role.
Amongst others, Etxebarrieta incorporated Mario Onaindia in ETA, as Onaindia describes in his biography.
First ETA assassination
On June 7, 1968, the car in which Etxebarrieta and Iñaki Sarasketa were traveling was stopped at a Civil Guard checkpoint in Aduna (Guipúzcoa). Fearing that they were discovered, Txabi Etxebarrieta got out of the car and shot the officer from behind, José Pardines Arcay. It was the first assassination carried out by ETA. ETA had not yet made the decision to carry out an armed struggle and because of this his partner that day, Sarasketa, years after stated:“I guess that the civil guard officer noticed that the registration plate was false. At least, he suspected it. He asked us for the documentation and went around to check the car. Txabi told me “If he discovers it, I will kill him”...I answered him: “That’s not necessary, we will disarm him and leave”... We exited the car. The civil guard officer turned his back. He was squatting looking at the engine in the back… He muttered: “This doesn’t coincide…” Txabi took out the pistol and shot him. He fell face up. He shot him three or four more times in the chest. He had taken amphetamines and maybe that influenced it. In whatever case it was an ill-fated day. An error. He was an anonymous civil guard, a poor kid. There was no need for that man to die”.