On the day the Nicaraguan Military announced the death of its founder, retired General Humberto Ortega Saavedra, they published a one-paragraph press release. In it, they identified him by name, without mentioning his military rank; a 77-year-old patient who had suffered a cardiac arrest.
The second chief of the military medical corps and director of the Doctor Alejandro Dávila Bolaños Military School Hospital in Managua, Colonel Noel Vladimir Turcios, managed to affix his stamp to the official statement, which recorded the death at 2:30 a.m. on Monday, September 30.
It wasn’t until 12 hours after the death that the regime and the Army issued individual statements acknowledging the “contribution” of the military leader and his trajectory.
Thus ended the life of the man who led the military institution with an iron fist from 1979 to 1995.
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He had an intense political life, both during the fight to overthrow Somoza’s dictatorship and in his role at the helm of the Sandinista military power. These experiences, at the very least, could be the script for a series full of intrigue with many ingredients: ambition, power, war, human rights violations, conspiracy, a new tyranny, a police state, a general speaking on behalf of the so-called “historical Sandinism” and rivaling with his sister-in-law, as well as an audio sent to the digital newspaper Confidencial, where he declared himself a “political prisoner” of his brother’s regime, just before he passed away.
He was a symbol of corruption and repression in Nicaragua, as sociologist Javier Meléndez wrote for La Prensa. When he led the troops in the 1980s, Nicaragua bled in a civil war between the peasants of the U.S.-backed Nicaraguan Resistance and the Sandinistas aligned with the Soviet Union. And serious human rights abuses by the state, as well as authoritarianism in the FSLN Collective Directorate, were evident.
The military leader also played a role in the transition to democracy until he handed over the command in 1995, two years after former President Violeta Barrios de Chamorro surprised everyone with her retirement. From military leader, he transitioned to “entrepreneur,” and from there, he “came down to earth” to offer political comments that occasionally irritated his brother.
His ashes were buried on October 1 in a private ceremony attended by his executioner brother. In a way, they also buried the remains of that institutional idea planted in the years leading to the 1990s democratic transition. That army was characterized by military turnover every five years, as well as by non-interference in political affairs. They broke this promise publicly when they supported constitutional reforms in 2013 and 2014, which allowed the dictator to be re-elected indefinitely.
Former guerrilla and historian Mónica Baltodano laments from exile the institutional drift of the Army and Police. She describes them as institutions subservient to the dictatorship and recalls the original concept when the military institution was formed in 1979. They had just overthrown the Somoza dictatorship, and thinking of attacking the population was contradictory to their vision.
The contradiction of pointing rifles at the people
“The problem is that with the revolution we conceived the armed forces as a national instrument to guarantee peace and that the rifles would no longer point at the people. Sandinism left Nicaragua with an army that was no one’s property, that ended up being national, a very respected institution. What Ortega and Murillo are doing now is annihilating that precondition for peace. This is a very deep regression,” analyzes Baltodano, author of the four-volume series Memoria de la Lucha Sandinista.
Baltodano states that they have reconfigured the military institution into something that is “closer to the praetorian guard we destroyed,” referring to the Somoza National Guard. She views this transformation as the most dangerous thing that has happened since Ortega came to power in 2007.
Meanwhile, she calls the current command’s attitude of silence “cowardly,” because they did not speak out during the “four months of suffering” of Humberto. One month of that time, the deceased general spent at home, and the rest was spent in the Military Hospital, where he finally passed away. He had been under state custody since May 21. That day, the Police announced the installation of a “specialized medical unit” at the retired general’s home to treat his ailments.
In reality, it was an “executive strike” to silence him. This happened two days after he publicly expressed doubts, in an interview with journalist Fabián Medina for Infobae, about the succession of the current ruling family if his brother were to die. The move to the hospital occurred in June after his health worsened. He was then placed in total isolation from his family, according to Baltodano. “Not even the children were allowed to visit. They never issued a report on his condition, as they should have,” she stated.
For the former guerrilla and scholar, the actions of the government against Humberto Ortega are “processed within the consciousness” of the generals, colonels, and the rest of the members of the institution.
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Azahálea Solís, a feminist and former member of the Military Audit, recalls how paramilitaries moved freely through the streets of Managua and Masaya during the 2018 repression. At least 355 people were killed, and more than 2,000 were wounded in those turbulent days that marked a before and after in the country’s recent history.
As Solís sees it today, the army transitioned from professionalism to “a red-and-black subordination,” referring to the colors of the ruling party’s flag. Like Baltodano, she did not expect any reaction from the command headed by General Julio César Avilés.
“With the crisis, the army tried to appear neutral, but in practice—with their leader (Avilés)—they’ve shown that they accept the command, outside the law. They’re not acting in submission to the Constitution, but to dictatorial power,” explained Solís, also in exile.
Pillar of the Ortega-Murillo dictatorship
The Army has become a strong pillar of the dictatorship, even as the international community has demanded accountability for human rights abuses. The military has remained silent regarding the 2018 massacre and continues to hold a monolithic stance, despite Avilés being sanctioned by the United States, his chief of staff, and the head of the financial arm managing military pensions.
They support the discourse of sovereignty, a concept manipulated by Ortega to justify internal repression. The elite around Avilés also remained silent regarding the circumstances of Brigadier General Hugo Torres Jiménez’s death, who passed away in February 2022 as a political prisoner under police custody. Critics of the military view this as explicit complicity with the dictator and his wife Rosario Murillo.
Before the totalitarian regime’s installation, the military institution had been implicated in executions of peasant insurgents in northern Nicaragua and in actively collecting intelligence for the alleged “sovereign security” of the state, as even established in local legislation since 2015.
All of this has occurred under Avilés’s command. In all military facilities, the portrait of the 68-year-old general from Jinotepe is omnipresent. He has led the armed forces for 14 years, the second-longest period in the institution’s history as commander-in-chief, only surpassed by the 16 years of its recently deceased founder.
According to official data, Avilés commands a collective of 15,705 members, of which 10,235 are soldiers. He manages a budget that the Executive has increased to $95.7 million in 2023. But he leads the institution without the historical authority of those who commanded the revolt against Somoza. According to his professional profile, by the late 1980s, he held the rank of lieutenant colonel.
Experts agree that the institutional co-optation process by the current dictator began in 2007, when the leader reminded them of their Sandinista roots. He appointed Avilés as military chief in 2010, and a year later, his predecessor, General Omar Halleslevens, became vice president. Both Avilés and Halleslevens came from military intelligence and counterintelligence, representing a faction of spies who overtook the “tropistas,” with whom they have had historical power rivalries.
To win them over, the Sandinista caudillo deployed various strategies: sponsoring institutional businesses, hiring former military personnel in the state, and establishing direct dealings between the military leadership and the ruler while removing civilian controls. There were also budget increases. Ultimately, Ortega re-elected the commander-in-chief, who has now been in office for 14 years, when he was originally meant to serve only five.
Under the state and FSLN, the ruler exercises power through an instrumental relationship with the armed forces, viewing them as a factor of strength and power. This was explained by security expert Elvira Cuadra in the book El Régimen de Ortega, published in October 2016, where she emphasizes that the military maintains a “self-interested subordination.”
Three “Commanders” tailored to fit
To support Avilés, the ruler made further changes within the military leadership: he redesigned the command structure, which includes the Chief of Staff and the Inspector General. Ortega has changed these positions three times since the FSLN came to power. This was unthinkable between 1995 and 2007 when the Chief of Staff would become the Commander-in-Chief when the number one position became vacant.
In 2013, Major General Óscar Balladares Cardoza, second in command, was in line for succession. Ortega retired him to make way for Avilés’ re-election. As compensation for this radical change, Ortega appointed him as a presidential advisor. A year before, Ortega removed the Inspector General, Major General Denis Membreño Rivas — the third in line — and placed him in charge of the Financial Analysis Unit. The replacement for this position was Major General Adolfo Zepeda, another hard-liner.
In December 2013, the dictator appointed the new Chief of Staff: Óscar Mojica Obregón, who had led the military’s financial arm, the Military Social Security Institute (IPSM). In this way, Ortega reorganized the command after dismantling the unwritten succession mechanism that had worked well for 18 years (1995-2013). Ortega began his own military reengineering, tailored to his interests, where fulfilling Avilés’ ambitions ultimately meant ensuring his loyalty.
In addition to the military chief, the current command structure has included since May 11, 2017, the Chief of Staff Bayardo Rodríguez and Inspector General Marvin Corrales. Critics claim that this setup has created an institutional bottleneck, preventing natural promotions within the military, which now depend on the ruler’s will. The real impact of these measures on the troops is unclear, though some suggest a sense of discontent.
Meanwhile, Ortega has fostered good relations with Avilés and the rest of the General Staff. An example is Martha Ruiz Sevilla, wife of Major General Rodríguez, who served as Defense Minister from 2014 until 2019, when she was appointed as an advisor until her dismissal in July.
“The military has shown great submission to partisan interests, particularly through Avilés’ speeches and actions. This confusion between party and institution has often been evident, such as in the case of Hugo Torres, and now with the actions surrounding Humberto Ortega’s imprisonment,” stated Mónica Baltodano.
32 active generals and the decapitation of the DID
According to a registry of generals appointed by the ruler since 2007, compiled by Divergentes, the dictator has promoted 46 officers to general since he came to power: 32 are active, nine are retired, three have unknown roles, one has died, and another is on a service commission. Others have moved into the network of businesses created under the umbrella of the oil agreement with Venezuela. In recent months, Ortega has conducted a general purge in the state, aided by the Police, and also made changes to the Defense Intelligence Directorate (DID), the main military espionage body.
This aligns with a logic where the state attributes responsibility to this agency for internal desertions from the FSLN and the possible leakage of information to independent media and U.S. authorities, explained an anonymous analyst.
Since August 2024, the new head of the DID is Álvaro Peña Núñez. This officer has traveled with Laureano Ortega, the dictator’s son and representative for Russian, Chinese, and Iranian affairs. Peña has traveled alongside Zhukov Serrano, the new Deputy Director of Investigations in the Police, shaped to fit the interests of the presidential family, representing a new generation of officers loyal to the Ortega-Murillo regime.
The new Deputy Head of the DID is Francisco Noel Jarquín López, who was promoted to Brigadier General in September, during the 45th anniversary ceremony of the institution.
“This reveals an identification with the ruling couple among the promoted officers. These military officers only see Humberto Ortega as a reference from the past. This is a different military, loyal to the dictatorship, in which one of the main goals is the transition of power into Rosario Murillo’s hands. That’s why she is building her own steel core,” the source explained.
According to this analyst, the regime maintains “surveillance over the surveillant,” gathering local intelligence through Cuban and Russian services, with which they have historical ties. In other words, Ortega does not trust even the servility demonstrated by much of the high command in the General Staff and military council.
In September, Ortega made two decisions that reflected the familial nature of the institution. He promoted Alma Celeste Avilés — the sister of the Commander-in-Chief — to Colonel, and his son-in-law Marco Antonio Salas, head of the military medical corps and father of Camila Ortega Murillo’s husband, to Brigadier General.
The Secretary-General of the FSLN has had a similar experience in the Police. The current director is Francisco Díaz Madriz, a senior officer and Ortega’s relative by marriage, and represents an institution that has been implicated in massive human rights violations against Nicaraguans.
On the day of his sister’s promotion, Avilés thanked the ruler for the support given to “dignify the military career” and, without any shame, pledged loyalty to the ruling couple as he has done convincingly in recent years.
“President, count on the firm determination of all of us in the Nicaraguan Army to continue advancing on the path to consolidate a free, dignified, just, and prosperous Nicaragua that we all deserve. Thank you, President,” Avilés said in his speech, which was broadcasted by official media.
According to the current legal framework, the ruler is the supreme commander of both the Army and the Police. The military anniversary event, therefore, became a day of mutual praise between Avilés and Ortega. The dictator responded to the general by congratulating him on delivering a historical summary of the military’s formation in his speech.
However, Ortega’s political instincts quickly shifted to attacking his adversaries, once again invoking the 2018 protests as a central theme in his speech. That ghost continues to haunt him.
In the official narrative, Ortega vehemently accuses priests of “hating” him. He again mentioned the barricades, the obligation to clear the roadblocks when his opponents believed they were defeated. Much blood was shed, but the dictatorship has survived for the past six years, in part because the military leadership allowed it.
“As Mao Tse-tung said, ‘Power comes from the barrel of a gun.’ Those of us who suffered under the Somoza military dictatorship know this well and had to confront it with weapons,” former guerrilla fighter Mónica Baltodano adds.
This report was created as part of the “Workshop and Master Classes” project by Divergentes with support from the German Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the German Embassy in Costa Rica.