Salvador Cienfuegos
Division General Salvador Cienfuegos Zepeda (born 14 June 1948) is a retired Mexican Army officer. He served as the Secretary of National Defense in the government of President Enrique Peña Nieto from 2012 to 2018. Early life. Salvador was born on 14 June 1948 in Mexico City to a seamstress and a father who was a lieutenant colonel in the Mexican Army. His father died of a heart attack when he was two years old. Salvador enrolled at Williams College in Mixcoac during the second year of his primary schooling. Due to the tuition fees being high, he  pursued a federal scholarship which he struggled to maintain due to his average grades. After finishing schooling, Salavdor was admitted into the Heroic Military College on 23 January 1964, at the young age of fifteen, due to a special exemption granted to him by the college authorities. He was also enlisted in the Mexican Army at the same time. He graduated in 1967 and became a second lieutenant-in-arms. Military career. As a military officer, Salvador Cienfuegos experienced the actions of the Mexican Army during the students' movement and the Mexican Dirty War. From 1 November 1967 to 15  December 1967, he served in the 6th Infantry Battalion in the Michoacán state and was the Section Commander. Later he served in the 3rd Infantry Battalion in Mexico City from 16 December 1967 to 31 August 1975 and was the commander of Company and Section departments. He was promoted to the rank of lieutenant on 1 November 1969, second captain on 20 November 1973 and first captain on 20 November 1976. He completed his bachelor's degree in military administration from Higher School of War in 1978 and graduated as an officer of the General Staff of the Mexican Army . From 16 August 1978 to 15 August 1980, he served in the 27th Military Zone in the state of Guerrero and was the head of the First Section of the General Staff. On 20 November 1979, Salvador was promoted to the rank of major. He was appointed as the head of the Plans Subsection of the 4th Section of the General Staff of National Defense on 16 August 1980, serving in the position till 28 February 1982. He was appointed as an associate professor of the Logistics and Services section at his alma mater of Higher School of War on  16 June 1983, serving in that position till 31 August. From 1 September 1983 to 31 December 1984, he was the professor in the Tactics and Engineering section. He was also promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel on 20 November 1983. On 1 January 1984, Salvador was appointed as the professor of the General Staff section at Higher School of War and stayed there till 31 August. On 1 August, he was made a professor of the subject of Logistics and Services and also the head of the Group of the Pedagogical Area of Logistics and Services, in the  Superior Course of Weapons and Services. He remained in those positions till 30 June 1985. He was also the head of the Head of the Technical Section of Research and Development from 1 March to 30 June 1985. He was transferred as the head of the Pedagogical Section of Heroic Military College on 1 July 1985, staying in the position till 15 January 1986. From 16 January 1986 to 31 October 1988, he was the head of the 3rd Section (Operations) of the General Staff of National Defense. He was appointed as the Secretariat of National Defense's representative to  the Advisory Council of the and the titular representative to the Planning Committee for the Development of the Federal District. In March 1987, he attended a military conference of various nations at Fort Benning in the United States. Salvador addressed the topic of the role of the Mexican Army and the Air Force against drug trafficking. He was promoted to the rank of colonel on 20 November 1987. He was deployed as a military and air attaché to the Mexican embassies of Japan and South Korea from 1 November 1988 to 31 October 1990, while being based in Tokyo. Later  he served as the commander of the 14th Infantry Battalion, headquartered in Jalisco state, from 16 January to 30 September 1991. On 1 October 1991, Salvador became the commander of the Cadet Corps of the Heroic Military College, retaining that position till 15 July 1994. On 20 November 1993, he achieved the rank of general brigadier. A cadet enrolled at Heroic Military College during his tenure as commander of the Cadet Corps, told "Reporte Indigo" that Cienfuegos had defended seniors who murdered a younger cadet in September 1993. Although the commander regretted the killing, he stated that the behavior of  the victim's parents in initiating legal proceedings over it was not manly, but that of snitches, and asked other cadets to not talk about it to anyone. He also told the outlet that Salvador participated in drug-fueled parties on the campus, despite exhorting others about discipline. Salvador earned a master's degree in Military Administration for Homeland Security and Defense from College of National Defense in 1995. From 1 August 1995 to 30 August 1996 he was the Deputy Director General of the Federal Register of Firearms and Explosives Control and later director of the Center for Mexican  Army and Air Force Studies from 1 September 1996 to 15 November 1997. He was promoted to the rank of brigade general in 1997, and upon receiving it was also appointed as the director of his alma mater Heroic Military College, remaining in the position till the year 2000. He was also the Deputy Chief of the Military Doctrine of the General Staff of National Defense from 1 December 2000 to 15 January 2004. From 19 September to 9 November 2001, he was also the commander of the Fourth Training Group "2001" at the National Training Center in Chihuahua state . He was made the commander of the 15th Military Zone, headquartered in Jalisco state, in March 2004. He retained the position till 2005. and was promoted to the rank of division general on 20 November 2004 by President Vicente Fox. In February 2005, Salvador was appointed as the commander of the Vth Military Region, also headquartered in Jalisco. Anabel Hernández alleges in her book "México en Llamas" that the Beltrán-Leyva Cartel's lieutenant Sergio Villarreal Barragán appointed him to protect the organization in 2005. Salvador commanded the IXth Military Military Region, headquartered in Acapulco, Guerrero, from June 2005 to  January 2007. During this period according to Hernández, he and the protected the Sinaloa Cartel and Beltrán-Leyva Cartel, which controlled the Guerrero region. She also accuses the Army of inaction against the Beltrán-Leyva. Both the Sinaloa and Beltrán-Leyva cartels became stronger while he was serving as the head of the military region. Salvador later served as the head of the Ist Military Region, headquartered in Mexico City, from January 2007 to December 2009. Hernández states that the activities of the two cartels intensified in Mexico City during this period. During this time period, he also developed a  friendship with Enrique Peña Nieto, who was serving as the Governor of the State of Mexico. He coordinated with Secretary of Public Security Genaro García Luna in the war on drugs, though the journalist J. Jesús Lemus alleges this was just a show. Although he didn't participate in Operation Chihuahua, some of the soldiers taking part in it were under his command and implicated in human right abuses by . Salvador was transferred to the VIIth Military Region by President Felipe Calderón in January 2010, serving in that position till May 2011. J. Jesús Lemus alleges that this allowed the  H-2 Cartel led by Juan Francisco Patrón Sánchez or "El H2", to expand its activities into Chiapas and Tabasco states. Salvador stated in April 2011 that the Mexican Army faced a bigger problem from the organized crime in Chiapas, rather than the EZLN. During his tenure, the Mexican Army was accused of perpetrating four incidents of tortures and executions in the region by the National Human Rights Commission. He was appointed as the Inspector and Comptroller General of the Army and Air Force on 1 May 2011 after General Roberto Miranda Sánchez was appointed to replace the recently deceased General  Jorge Juárez Loera. Salvador relinquished the charge after being appointed as the senior officer for Secretariat of National Defense on 17 January 2012 in place of General Miranda, who had announced his retirement. General Mario Marco Antonio González Barreda was appointed as the Inspector and Comptroller General in Salvador's place. He has also participated in diplomatic visits in the United States, Chile, the People's Republic of China, and Cuba. He accompanied the military to Nicaragua, Cuba, Brazil and Costa Rica in 1980. Among the military decorations in the Long Service field he has received in are 5th Class , 4th Class, 3rd Class, 2nd Class, 1st Class, Special, Extraordinary, Institutional and Service for the Fatherland. In addition, he has received the 1st and 2nd class optional merits and the Legion of Honor. Secretary of National Defense. Salvador Cienfuegos was appointed as the Secretary of National Defense on 1 December 2012 under President Enrique Peña Nieto. His tenure saw the Secretariat of National Defense become involved in corruption scandals. The army also received new facilities under his tenure in states affected by organized crime. In 2013, he oversaw the operations of self-defense groups against the Knights Templar Cartel in  Michoacán state. He opposed private persons arming themselves, threatening to arrest them, though he added that he understood that they wanted to protect their communities. Armed forces and the federal police were deployed to the state, with the military operations being overseen by him. He gained notoriety for preventing the police investigators from interviewing Mexican soldiers over the kidnapping of 43 students in Iguala and defending the soldiers accused of massacring 22 suspects in Tlatlaya in 2014. In an interview with "El Universal" in June 2015, he criticized the 2014 reform by the Congress of the Union, subjecting the Army  to prosecution by civilian courts for crimes and said it made the force vulnerable. After the publication of a video showing soldiers torturing a young woman in Ajuchitlán del Progreso in 2015, Salvador however apologized for the incident on 16 April 2016 unlike past instances, while urging people to report about any abuses they were aware of. He also stated that those committing such acts had no place in the armed forces. Salvador was made a distinguished university teacher by the University of Colima on 7 December 2016. He referred to the conflict against drug cartels on the following day , saying that "violence cannot be solved with bullets", while also expressing that he wanted the Army off the streets. At the same time, he called for a legal framework to support the armed forces and not persecute them for specific acts. He also called for a debate on the , which allowed the armed forces to take over the responsibility of police organizations failing to control crime, something he opposed. On 20 November 2017 he however called on President Nieto to have the Internal Security Law passed by the Congress, stating that the Army required a legal framework to define  its role. Salvador stringently opposed presidential candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador's statement about pardoning cartel bosses in December 2017, while terming it electoral propaganda. Even if Obrador proceeded with such a move, Salvador stated that the civil society, especially the victims, must be consulted first. Obrador in response accused the military members of being ordered to speak out against him and reasoned that violence could not solve violence. The University of Sciences and Arts of Chiapas intended to give an honorary doctorate to Salvador, but suspended its decision in February 2018 after outcry from staff and students who pointed  at the controversies the military had been involved in. He was awarded the William J. Perry Award by the William J. Perry Center for Hemispheric Defense Studies in September 2018, in recognition for promoting education, research and exchanging of security and defense knowledge in the Western Hemisphere. In October 2018, he voiced support for legalizing opium for medicinal purposes in order to reduce crime, especially in Gurrero state. After Obrador's victory in the 2018 Mexican general election, he held discussions with Salvador to choose his successor, something he had not decided upon quickly unlike other positions. Salvador was awarded  the Legion of Merit, authorized by the United States Department of Defense and the President of the United States Donald Trump, on 16 November 2018 for his work, leading to enhancement of cooperation between the militaries of Mexico and the United States. He stepped down on 30 November 2018 before Obrador's swearing-in, and also retired from the Army, which he announced a day earlier. General Luis Cresencio Sandoval replaced Salvador as the Secretary of National Defense under Obrador, but he automatically continues to remain employed by the federal government as laid down by the Constitution of Mexico, becoming  an advisor to Sandoval, a position he has retained even after his arrest by the United States. Arrest and diplomatic controversy. Salvador was arrested by U.S. officials on 15 October 2020 at the Los Angeles International Airport on drug and "money-laundering" charges. The United States alleged he used the alias "El Padrino" ("The Godfather") while working with the H-2 Cartel. General Cienfuegos's arrest reportedly infuriated Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who appeared particularly riled that Mexican officials had not been informed about the investigation into the general. The Mexican government warned the US it would review security  agreements because it was not given advance notice of the arrest. On 18 November 2020, American authorities dropped charges against Salvador, who had already been imprisoned in the US for over a month and agreed to send him back to Mexico. Media outlets reported that the charges had been dropped under pressure from the Mexican federal government, which had threatened to expel DEA agents from the country. However, it was acknowledged that in exchange for the U.S. government's agreement to drop criminal charges against him, Mexican prosecutors opened their own investigation into him. On 16 December 2020, Mexico's  Chamber of Deputies passed changes to a security law which tighten the rules governing foreign law enforcement agents. Under new regulations backed by the President of Mexico, foreign agents must share information they gather with Mexican officials. As well, foreign agents will no longer have immunity. United States Attorney General William Barr warned Mexico that by passing this law, it would make it hard for the US to cooperate with Mexico. Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard said the changes were all about reciprocity. "We're not asking for anything which isn't expected of a Mexican diplomatic agent abroad." Salvador was  cleared of all charges on 14 January 2021, and the Mexican President said that the accusations against him were politically motivated. The United States Department of Justice threatened to re-start its prosecution if Mexico didn't prosecute him. After the publishing of the evidence against Cienfuegos by the Mexican government, the United States Department of Justice expressed disappointment at him being cleared and stated the release of evidence "violated" the Treaty on Mutual Legal Assistance between the countries, questioning whether the United States could still share "secret information" with Mexico. Personal life. Salvador met and married Bertha Lucía Gutiérrez , who is from Cuautla, at a young age. The couple are parents to four daughters and have six grandchildren. He is the only child of his parents. He was arrested for running over an agent at the intersection of Calle Maestro Antonio Caso and Manuel María Contreras streets in Mexico City in May 1980. He was arrested again in 1999 due to indiscipline in the Cadet Corps under him and injury caused to a cadet because of discharge of a weapon by another. His mother died in January 2020. In 2014, he opened an investment bank account containing 3.5 million  pesos. This amount however increased to 13.865 million pesos by the end of his tenure as Defense of National Secretary, a great increase from 5.6 million pesos in 2017. In 2013, he reported owning a Chevrolet Silverado and a Chevrolet Suburban, the latter was sold in June 2013. He was gifted a Hummer H1 in May 2017, and also acquired an Audi Q5 on loan in October 2018. He also reported having four houses in 2013, three bought by him and one taken on loan, though he sold two of them in 2018.