General Fernando Alejandre, in an act in Toledo in December 2019, when he was Chief of the Defense Staff.Ángeles Visdómine (EFE)
August 17, 2017. The Chief of the Defense Staff (Jemad), Army General Fernando Alejandre Martínez, is spending his vacations in a rural house in Cáceres when he receives the first confusing news on radio and television about the attack on La Rambla, where a truck ran over the crowd, leaving a trail of 15 dead and more than a hundred injured.
Since a truck broke into the celebration of the National Holiday in Nice (France) in 2016, transport vehicles have been used as an instrument of terror in half a dozen European cities.
Everything points to the fact that it is the largest jihadist attack in Spain since 11 March 2004.
Alejandre receives a call from General Francisco Rosaleny, head of the Armed Forces Intelligence Center (CIFAS), who reports directly to him.
The director of the military CNI warns him of the alarm signals coming from Catalonia, not only because of the threat of terrorism, but also because of the independence referendum that the president of the Generalitat, Carles Puigdemont, has announced for next October 1.
The head of the military leadership asks Rosaleny to convey to Moncloa his willingness to move to Madrid as soon as the National Security Council is convened and orders him to keep him informed of any developments through the CIFAS liaison officer at the CITCO (Intelligence Center against Terrorism and Organized Crime), dependent on the Secretary of State for Security.
Hours later, the CIFAS general calls his boss to inform him that in Moncloa they have let him know that, given the delicate political situation in Catalonia, there is no plan to meet with the National Security Council, chaired by Mariano Rajoy.
Of course, they assure him that the Minister of the Interior, Juan Ignacio Zoido, is in permanent contact with the Minister of Defense, María Dolores de Cospedal, and that the CIFAS representative at CITCO will be "timely" informed of any developments.
It is clear to Alejandre that he does not count on the Armed Forces to face the challenge.
“The simple fact of thinking that nobody was going to summon the national security organs [...] confirmed my worst fears.
I was not only worried about the situation in Catalonia as a result of the attacks on the Ramblas, but what could happen in the almost immediate future.
We were less than 50 days away from something so public, but that nobody seemed to take very seriously, such as the call for an absolutely illegal referendum”, writes the then Jemad in his memoir
Rey served y patria honorada
(Ediciones Deusto, 2022 ), on which part of this reconstruction is based.
A person who then had responsibilities in the Moncloa recognizes that, if the attacks had occurred in another place other than Catalonia, the National Security Council would have met.
But if he had done so, he alleges, the debate on the adoption of exceptional measures in the autonomous community would have been opened, which he wanted to avoid at all costs.
Alejandre had been promoted to the top of the military chain of command just five months earlier.
Cospedal chose him after
casting
among generals, perhaps because of his direct treatment or his international experience, since he had developed part of his career in NATO and at that time was second in command of the Alliance Joint Force, in Brumsum (The Netherlands). ), although others considered him too impetuous, "as a good sapper parachutist".
After the disappointing response from Moncloa, the Jemad calls the Commander of the Operations Command (Cmops), Lieutenant General Fernando López del Pozo, and confesses his concern about what he perceives as the Government's lack of foresight in a situation that he considers very serious.
He asks you to review and, if necessary, update the contingency plans that the Armed Forces have for this type of situation.
As soon as he returned to Madrid, he summoned Lieutenant General Del Pozo, General Rosaleny and the head of the Strategy Division of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Juan José Leza, separately to his office on Vitrubio Street.
After giving instructions to each one, he summons them to a joint meeting.
It will be the only one to be held.
“Given the sensitivity of the situation and the need for all our plans to have an adequate level of reserve, I decided that I would be the only person with knowledge of the complete drawing and that I would dispatch specific aspects with my subordinates that would avoid any leak. of what we were going to plan and, in his case, execute as soon as he obtained authorization from Minister Cospedal”, writes Fernando Alejandre in his memoirs.
Felipe VI, together with the then President of the Government, Mariano Rajoy, on the left, and that of the Generalitat, Carles Puigdemont, at the demonstration against the attacks on La Rambla and Cambrirls, on August 26, 2017. Andreu Dalmau (EFE)
The Jemad dispatched with the Minister of Defense on August 26, after she returned from Barcelona, where she had participated in the act of rejection for the attacks on La Rambla and Cambrils.
According to Alejandre, Cospedal could not hide his "indignation and concern" at "that terrible demonstration in which Her Majesty [Her Majesty] was outraged and members of the Government and Spain were insulted."
In what many saw as a trap by the independence supporters, the King and Rajoy were greeted with whistles, boos and stellar flags.
Alejandre told Cospedal about the steps he had already taken and asked him to give him a political directive, an order to give legal cover to what he was doing and what he intended to do.
To avoid leaks, according to Alejandre, the minister asked the general to draft the directive himself, and he did so.
A couple of days later, he returned it signed.
"In addition to being a patriot, he was brave," writes Alejandre de Cospedal.
The directive, which has never been made public, was in the form of a letter and consisted of only a couple of paragraphs.
In the letter, the minister ordered the Jemad, in a generic way, to start planning and take the necessary measures in case the situation in Catalonia spilled over and the Armed Forces had to intervene within the framework of the legal system and the Constitution.
territorial integrity
Alejandre asked General Del Pozo (Cmops) to create a small planning team to draw up, based on current plans, a specific one for Catalonia.
The Cota de Malla was based on the contingency plan that provides for the support of the Armed Forces to the State Security Forces and Bodies (FCSE) in the fight against terrorism and to "preserve the security and well-being of citizens in cases of serious risk, catastrophe, calamity or other public needs”, according to the Organic Law of National Defense of 2005. It has been activated several times, on the occasion of the celebration in Spain of international events, such as the recent NATO summit, or after the attacks of 11-M.
This time, however, it was not about dealing with a terrorist threat or a problem of public order, but rather about tackling a risk to territorial integrity;
one of the tasks that the eighth article of the Constitution entrusts to the Armed Forces.
This is revealed by the name given to the operation: Romeo Sierra.
The letters RS correspond in the NATO phonetic alphabet to its real denomination: Recover Sovereignty.
It is the same name that was given to the operation to recover the islet of Perejil, occupied by Morocco in 2002. Something similar was involved in Catalonia, according to the plan's editors.
It was a scalable plan, which required political approval to ascend each rung.
The first phase, which began immediately, consisted of providing logistical support to the more than 5,000 members of the National Police Corps and the Civil Guard who traveled to Catalonia for the referendum.
The Army moved bunks, lockers, kitchens and showers to the Santa Eulalia barracks, in Sant Boi de Llobregat (Barcelona), to house the agents and police.
General Alejandre feared, as he acknowledges, that organized groups, such as the Defense Committees of the Republic (CDR), could break into a barracks and humiliate the Armed Forces with acts of outrage against the flag or access to sensitive facilities.
For this reason, he ordered to raise the alert level of the military units in Catalonia from Bravo (the second degree on a scale of four) to Bravo Plus (the second reinforced with elements of the third) and the personnel of some facilities was increased to cover shifts. reinforced guard posts, such as in the Barcelona Naval Command, near the emblematic statue of Columbus.
Heavy machinery was also moved to the Sant Boi barracks to clear access to the port of Barcelona, where the famous Piolín ship (one of the cruise ships chartered by the Interior to house civil guards and police) was moored, given the risk that the demonstrators They will block their exit with barricades.
The third phase of the plan assigned the Armed Forces the external protection of their facilities and included the substitution of police officers and civil guards for military personnel in the protection of critical infrastructures outside of Catalonia, which made it possible to free up members of the Security Forces if they had to. strengthen its presence in the autonomous community.
The last phase already involved the direct involvement of the Armed Forces in the restoration of public order.
The technique, tested by the Spanish military in the Balkans, was called
Green Box
in NATO terminology.
It consists of cordoning off the area where disturbances are taking place with military personnel to create a “safe box” in which the police have freedom of action (
Blue Box)
without fear of being surrounded by the rioters or receiving reinforcements from outside.
At the end of September, the Ministries of the Interior and Defense held a meeting at the highest level: the ministers Zoido and Cospedal, the Secretary of State for Security, José Antonio Nieto, the Jemad, the head of the Operations Command and the colonel of the Civil Guard Diego Pérez de los Cobos, responsible for coordinating the police device to prevent the 1-O referendum.
The meeting was "disappointing", in the words of Alejandre, because the Interior commanders, especially Pérez de los Cobos, were convinced that they had everything under control and trusted the loyalty of the Mossos de Esquadra, contrary to the information that the head of the military leadership.
Despite the fact that the Interior rejected the Armed Forces' offer of collaboration, Alejandre decided to sign, leaving the date blank, the order to activate Operation Romeo Sierra and from then on he always carried it with him.
Activating it would involve the transfer to Catalonia of up to a complete brigade of the Army, some 3,500 troops, with the aim of supporting the Security Forces.
Where would they come from?
After the summer, numerous military units were ordered to prepare for maneuvers, which forced them to enlist personnel (suspending permits), refuel vehicles and stock up.
At the last moment, the exercise was canceled and they did not get to leave the barracks, but they were ready if they were needed.
Some of them did rotate doing exercises in the San Gregorio Maneuver Field (Zaragoza), which registered an unusual activity that autumn, so that there was always a trained and fully operational unit just 300 kilometers from Barcelona.
It would be the spearhead if the plan was to be executed.
The public gathered before the Parlament on October 10, 2017, when Puigdemont declared the independence of Catalonia, on the left, and after he suspended it, right.
Ivan Alvarado (REUTERS)
When Puigdemont proclaimed the independence of Catalonia on October 10, Alejandre immediately called the Operations Command to order the activation of Operation Romeo Sierra, which meant sending military reinforcements to the autonomous community.
El Jemad had not spoken with Cospedal before taking that step but that was, Alejandre assured EL PAÍS, what both had agreed in case the situation reached that extreme.
After hanging up, he was about to call the minister to let her know.
He didn't have time.
In eight seconds (22, according to other measurements), Puigdemont put the newly proclaimed Catalan republic on hold and Alejandre again called the commander of the Operations Command to deactivate the machinery he had just started: “Stop!
stop!”
The distribution of the plan among the units that had to execute it was stopped before it was even started.
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