Completely contrary to forms and modeseven those who put it into practice President-elect Claudia Sheinbaum to name his cabinetthe designation most important of his government, the Secretary of National Defensewhich defines his six-year term, did so in a bulletin -next to the one next secretary of the Navy– on social media on Friday afternoon accompanying the President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador on a tour in the Mayan Train. It wasn’t a Saturday what he did Sheinbaumbut it was not a smooth movement, as was expected to be the relief of the Armed forces.
The designation of the General Ricardo Trevilla as next head of the National Defenseand of the Admiral Raymundo Pedro Morales For the Navy, they were a reverse for the current secretaries, the General Luis Cresencio Sandovaland the Admiral Rafael Ojedawho were betting on two close to them. Also It was a coupalthough soft and subtle by Sheinbaum in Lomas de Sotelo, against Sandoval’s bet that promoted General Gabriel García Rincón with the endorsement of the presidentand his interest in promoting -unduly- Admiral José Luis Vergara in the Navy, although the favorite of Ojeda and the team of the president-elect, Admiral Alfredo Hernández Suárez, was not elected either.
The appointments, three weeks from the shift of powerwill bring about what they did not want to do and were taking care of, like the predecessors of Sheinbaum they did, generate a dual military commandFor practical purposes, the heads of the Armed Forces will become a kind of lame duck, an Anglo-Saxon political concept whose translation makes no sense, which means that although they keep the position, they were stripped of power. It will not be seen as much in the Navy, but in Defense it will be very noticeable, because this month is of great prominence for the head, who heads the commemoration of the heroic deed of the Boy Heroes of Chapultepec Castle in 1847 on September 13, and presides together with López Obrador the parade on September 16.
We will never know what the president-elect’s reasons were for making the appointments so early, knowing what it would generate within the Armed Forces. What had come to light was that there was a strong dispute within the Armed Forces, mainly in the Army, over the position of secretary. But equally, during the meetings with the transition team, the treatment was very harsh, sometimes arrogant and haughty with the representatives of Sheinbaum, with whom Sandoval does not have a good relationship, which is reciprocal.
Trevilla was part of the list of candidates that General Sandoval presented to the president-elect, which included Generals García Rincón and Fernando Aguirre O. Sunza, who was being carefully looked after by Sheinbaum’s team to promote him to the position. García Rincón began to get closer to Omar García Harfuch, who will be the next Secretary of Public Security, which bothered Sandoval, although not enough to change his successor. Trevilla was close to Sandoval, who made him head of the Joint Staff of the National Defense, but the bet that the secretary and his unconditional private secretary, General Javier Montejano Andrade, also a friend of his, made for García Rincón made him distance himself from them.
The current head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the National Defense had, however, the protection of an important group of generals, active and retired, among which General Salvador Cienfuegos, former Secretary of National Defense, stands out, who had already shown his strength when he was arrested by the DEA in 2020.
López Obrador, with General Sandoval remaining silent, defined the arrest as “an unequivocal sign of the decomposition of the regime, of how the public service was degraded during the neoliberal period.” His statement, as published at the time in this space, provoked a rebellion within the Army.
Nineteen active and retired generals demanded that Sandoval come to Cienfuegos’ defense, instead of remaining silent in the face of the president’s frivolous and irresponsible statements – the accusation against Cienfuegos was absurd and illogical – which forced the secretary to present to López Obrador what was happening in Lomas de Sotelo, who became so frightened that he backed down and turned 180 degrees.
But Sandoval was damaged and definitively lost the internal consensus that had been deteriorating due to the way he agreed to the president’s proposals to turn the Army into a builder and its members into bricklayers, vaccinators, cruise police officers, administrators of ports and airports, trains and airlines, stripping them of their functions and handing over half of their operational force to the National Guard, a paramilitary body that has not solved the problem of insecurity or violence.
The appointment of General Trevilla will not change this state of affairs. In fact, the next Secretary of Defense supervised the head of the National Guard since it was created and was the one who called him to task for his mistakes. Sandoval, in the final stretch of the succession, wanted to burn him by allowing Trevilla to admit in a morning press conference in July that the failure of security in Guerrero was his responsibility. The National Guard will remain in Defense and the next Secretary of Security will not be able to speak directly with his boss, but rather through Trevilla.
Within the Defense Department, the appointment should end the internal conflict. Trevilla was the natural replacement, based on merit and seniority, in the institution, because García Rincón, who belongs to Sandoval’s, meant eliminating once again an entire generation of generals with aspirations, as López Obrador did when he chose Sandoval over 21 generals with more experience and careers, causing divisions and discontent in Lomas de Sotelo.
But the most important thing is the appointment that Sheinbaum finally achieved, the most important of her administration because of what the Army represents today in the public life of Mexico, cutting off an extension of power for her mentor over the course of his term.
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