page_title: Brazilian Armed Forces
section_title: Ministry of Defense
hierarchical_section_title: Brazilian Armed Forces / Ministry of Defense
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Das brasilianische Verteidigungsministerium an der Allee der Ministerien in der Hauptstadt Brasília. Português: O Ministério da Defesa do Brasil na Esplanada dos Ministérios em Brasília. English: The brazilian Ministry of Defense at the avenue of the ministries ("Esplanada dos Ministérios") in the capital Brasília.
context_page_description: The Brazilian Armed Forces is the unified military organization comprising the Brazilian Army, the Brazilian Navy and the Brazilian Air Force.
  Brazil's armed forces are the second largest in the Americas, after the United States, and the largest in Latin America by the level of military equipment, with 334,500 active-duty troops and officers. The armed forces are expanding their presence in the Amazon under the Northern Corridor program. In 1994 Brazilian troops joined United Nations peacekeeping forces in five countries. Brazilian soldiers were in Haiti from 2004 until 2017, leading the United Nations Stabilization Mission.
  The Brazilian military, especially the army, has become more involved in civic-action programs, education, health care, and constructing roads, bridges, and railroads across the nation. Although the 1988 constitution preserves the external and internal roles of the armed forces, it places the military under presidential authority. Thus, the new charter changed the manner in which the military could exercise its moderating power.
context_section_description: Today, few countries do not bring their Armed Forces under one defense agency, subordinate to the Head of the Executive. In Brazil, until 1999, the three Armed Forces remained in independent ministries. However, the quarrel over the creation of a single Ministry of Defense, integrating the Navy, the Army and the Aeronautics is old. The 1946 Constitution already cited the creation of just one Ministry, that resulted in the institution of the E.M.F.A, at the time called General staff. Ex-President of the Republic Castelo Branco, defended the thesis of the creation of a Ministry of the Defense. It signed Decree 200, of 25 February 1967, that the Ministry of the Armed Forces foresaw the promotion of studies to elaborate the law project creating. However, the proposal was abandoned. During the Constitutional conventional of 1988, the subject came back to the quarrel and one more time it was filed. Finally in 1992, President Fernando Henrique Cardoso, then candidate to the Presidency, declared that in its plan of government the quarrel for creation of the Ministry of Defense was foreseen.
  The President of the Republic still intended to create a Ministry in his first term. The idea was to optimize the system of national defense, to legalize one politics of sustainable defense and to integrate the three Forces, rationalizing their activities. But only on 10 June 1999, the Ministry of the Defense was officially created, the General staff of the Armed Forces abolished and the Aeronautics , Army, and Navy Ministries had been transformed into Service Commands. During the years of 1995/96 the EMFA, responsible for the studies on the Ministry of Defense, evidenced that, amongst 179 countries, only 23 did not have integrated Armed Forces. Of these 23, only three, amongst them Brazil, had dimensions politics to justify its creation, as for example, territorial extension and trained and structuralized Armed Forces. The Ministries of Defense of Germany, Argentina, Chile, Spain, USA, France, the United Kingdom, Italy and Portugal had been chosen for deepened analysis because they had some type of identification with Brazil, as territorial extension, population, cash of the Armed Forces, amongst others.
  To give continuity to the creation studies, President Fernando Henrique created the Inter-ministerial Work group that defined the lines of direction for implantation of the Ministry of Defense. Reelected, he nominated senator Élcio Álvares, Extraordinary minister of the Defense, on 1 January 1999. The former senator was the responsible one for the implementation of the agency. The three services are separate from each other, except in three areas: the Armed Forces General Staff (Estado-Maior das Forças Armadas-EMFA), the National Defense Council (Conselho de Defesa Nacional-CDN), and the Armed Forces High Command (Alto Comando das Forças Armadas-ACFA). The EMFA, which is involved in planning and coordination, interprets interservice views about policy and comes the closest to functioning as a ministry of defense. It is headed by a four-star general, and the chair rotates among the services. The ACFA is involved with more immediate, day-to-day problems. It is composed of the ministers of the three services, their chiefs of staff, and the EMFA chief.
  According to Article 91 of the constitution, the CDN is "the consultative body of the president of the republic in matters related to national sovereignty and the defense of the democratic state." The members of the CDN are the president, the vice president, the president of the Chamber of Deputies, the president of the Senate, the minister of justice, military ministers, the minister of foreign affairs, and the minister of planning. The CDN has authority to "express an opinion in instances of declaration of war and the celebration of peace" and to "express an opinion on the decreeing of a state of emergency, state of siege, or federal intervention." In addition, the CDN is authorized to "propose the criteria and conditions for the use of areas that are vital to the security of the national territ
caption: Ministry of Defense of Brazil
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