Former heads of the Brazilian Army and Air Force confirm that Bolsonaro proposed to them to carry out a coup

Two of the three members of Brazil's military leadership whom then-president Jair Bolsonaro tried to convince at the end of 2022 to accompany him in a coup d'état refused.

Both General Marco Antonio Freire Gomes, who was the commander of the Army, and Carlos Baptista, head of the Air Force, confirmed in police interrogations carried out in recent weeks that the far-right politician summoned them on several occasions and proposed different formulas. legal measures that were intended to serve as a guarantee to block the path of the winner of the elections, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, leader of the Brazilian left, from returning to the Presidency.

The testimonies of both soldiers were known this Friday when the investigating judge in the case against Bolsonaro for coup plotting lifted the secrecy of part of the summary.

Both generals have been interrogated in recent weeks as part of the investigation into the people who plotted the assault on the institutional heart of the country, in Brasilia, on January 8, 2023, a week after Lula took office as president.

Last February, the Federal Police accused the former president of writing a decree to annul the elections.

And the judge prohibited him from leaving the country and confiscated his passport after searching the summer house where Bolsonaro was with his family.

The Army and Aeronautics commanders told their interrogators how they opposed Bolsonaro's plans.

The first of them even told the then head of state that he would arrest him if he continued with his plans to “attack the democratic regime.”

Instead, the head of the Navy embraced the far-right attempt.

The testimony of Generals Freire Gomes and Baptista corroborates the confession of Bolsonaro's private secretary, another soldier, Lieutenant Mauro Cid, who is the fundamental piece in this case.

He was the one who pointed out his former boss and about 30 of his collaborators, including several generals and former ministers.

The former head of the Army told the agents who interrogated him that Bolsonaro, in his capacity as president, presented to the entire military leadership and to the Minister of Defense, another soldier, several legal instruments prepared in order to prevent Lula's inauguration as president. president.

The leftist took office on January 1, 2023 after an electoral campaign marked by Bolsonaro's systematic attacks on the security of electronic ballot boxes.

After Bolsonaro's defeat, thousands of Bolsonaro supporters camped outside barracks throughout Brazil to demand military intervention, convinced (falsely) that their leader had been robbed of victory at the polls.

Although there was not a single indication that pointed in that direction.

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