Jose Bono

José Bono Martínez (Salobre, Albacete, December 14, 1950) is a Spanish lawyer, businessman and politician of the Spanish Socialist Workers Party (PSOE). He was president of the Junta de Comunidades de Castilla-La Mancha between 1983 and 2004, Minister of Defense of the Government of Spain between 2004 and 2006 and president of the Congress of Deputies between 2008 and 2011.

He presided over Castilla-La Mancha for twenty-one years and six consecutive legislatures, always winning by an absolute majority. Considered one of the heavyweights of the socialist party, in 2000 he lost the elections for the General Secretariat of the PSOE against José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero by nine votes. In 2004 he was appointed by the latter as Minister of Defense of the Government, thus ceasing to be president of the autonomy.

In 2008 he was elected president of the Congress of Deputies for the IX Legislature, being the third highest authority of the State until 2011. In 2004 he received the Gold Medal of Castilla-La Mancha. He has also been recognized with the Grand Cross of Military Merit with a white badge in 2004, the Grand Cross of the Order of Carlos III in 2006 and the Grand Cross of the Order of Civil Merit in 2016.

Childhood and youth (1950-1970)

He was born in the Albacete town of Salobre on December 14, 1950 into a wealthy family. His father was the Francoist mayor of his hometown during the Franco dictatorship; his mother was descended from a family of landowners and died when Bono was a child. He studied the elementary level in Alcaraz and then the baccalaureate and pre-university (1960-1967) at the Colegio Inmaculada, of the Jesuits of Alicante. Subsequently, he entered ICADE (at that time dependent on the University of Deusto), to graduate in Law and Economics.

Professional beginnings (1970-1983)

Bono, who joined the Socialist Interior Party (PSI, later the Popular Socialist Party or PSP) in 1969, graduated in 1970 from the University of Deusto. He began working as a labor lawyer. Since 1972, He was also a professor of Political Law at the Complutense University of Madrid. In 1977 he acted as a lawyer for one of the victims, Luis Javier Benavides, in the trial for the 1977 Atocha massacre. Between 1979, the year the PSP joined the PSOE, and 1983 he was a deputy to the Cortes for Albacete.

Autonomous President (1983-2004)

He held the post of president of the autonomous community of Castilla-La Mancha for six consecutive legislatures (1983-2004), always winning by absolute majority.

Informally, he was then considered one of the three barons of the PSOE, along with Juan Carlos Rodríguez Ibarra and Manuel Chaves, also regional presidents. In the last elections for the General Secretariat of the PSOE, he lost to José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero by nine votes. During the 2004 general elections, Zapatero assured that José Bono would occupy the Ministry of the Interior, although he finally occupied the Ministry of Defense.

Government Minister (2004-2006)

He was Defense Minister (2004-2006) in the government led by José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero.

Withdrawal of troops from Iraq

His first task in office was to carry out the withdrawal of the Spanish troops from Iraq, which was carried out in an orderly manner and without serious setbacks, except for a specific attack in which the Spanish forces had to respond with live ammunition, killing one of the soldiers. insurgents. For this withdrawal, the Council of Ministers awarded him a medal weeks later. The concession was highly contested, since Bono himself was a minister, and he renounced the medal, stating that his son had asked him to.

Yak-42 casualties

Subsequently, he focused on compensating the victims of the Yakovlev 42 crash as promised. In the first place, he tried to properly clarify the identity of the 62 deceased soldiers. The repetition of the DNA analyzes insistently requested by many of the relatives to the previous Minister of Defense without his taking any notice revealed that the bodies had not been correctly identified and were mixed up.

Helicopter crash in Afghanistan

Spanish military forces had increased their presence in Afghanistan. In August 2005, seventeen Spanish soldiers died while on patrol in Puma helicopters 20 kilometers south of Herat.

Sales of frigates to Venezuela

He began the procedures for the sale of several frigates for coastal surveillance to Venezuela, a decision that the United States opposed, denying Spain permission to implant US technology equipment on the same frigates.

Manifestation of the AVT and "Bono case"

In January 2005, he reported having been attacked at a demonstration by the Association of Victims of Terrorism and three days later two Popular Party militants, who were identified in photographs from the newspaper El País, were detained for a few hours. Finally, criminal court No. 42 in Madrid closed the case. However, later and due to a complaint filed by the PP, the Madrid Court sentenced the police officers responsible for illegal detention, for falsifying the police report and for coercion, considering it proven that the minister did not suffer any aggression. The Government Delegate in Madrid resigned after hearing said sentence, which was finally annulled by the Supreme Court on June 29, 2007.

Removal of José Mena

In January 2006, he dismissed Lieutenant General José Mena Aguado for speaking out politically about the inconveniences that the approval of the project for the Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia would have for the Army, and about the possibility of the Army intervening, on its own, in case the new Statute does not respect, according to José Mena, the Spanish Constitution.

Resignation

On April 7, 2006, his decision to leave his position for personal reasons was made public, occupying his portfolio the until then Minister of the Interior, José Antonio Alonso. At the time of leaving office, he was the fourth highest rated minister.

In October 2006, his name was considered as a candidate for mayor of Madrid and, although in principle he did not reject such an offer ("No one is bitter about a sweet", he said on this occasion), he later declined it, when some already took such a candidacy for granted.

In March 2015, he acknowledged that he left the Government due to his disagreement with the approval of the 2006 Statute of Autonomy for Catalonia.

President of the Congress of Deputies (2008-2011)

On April 1, 2008, he was elected president of the Congress of Deputies for the IX Legislature with 170 votes in favor, his last public office, being the first president of the democracy elected by simple majority in the second round, and not by absolute majority.

Acknowledgments

• Grand Cross of the Military Merit with white distinctive (2004)
• Castile-La Mancha Gold Medal (2004)
• Grand Cross of the Order of Charles III (2006)
• Grand Cross of the Order of Civil Merit (2016)

Ideology and beliefs

Throughout his career, José Bono has belonged to the most conservative wing of the PSOE, characterized by his moderation as well as Christian socialism. He is a practicing Catholic.

Criticism

Regarding the strictly military sphere, his decisions have received criticism and praise.

• The purchase of the Tomahawk missiles was presented as a case of confidence gained to the United States, something that not even Israel had achieved, in addition to defending its need for being a very powerful and sufficiently proven weapon, ideal for the new F100 frigates and the future S80 submarines. However, the detractors criticized the contract clauses in which he was responsible for the guided and maintenance of the United States missiles, thus retaining the power to use them or not.

• The choice to place the Tigre helicopter assembly factory in Albacete received criticisms of favoritism and political motives, especially by Getafe City Council, which was one of the strongest candidates to lift the factory. Accusing the Minister of having opted for an anti-economic solution. However, the Albacete Town Hall and the Castilla-La Mancha Community Board praised the decision; as well as several Albaceteños, the case of Francisco Vidal Monteagudo (2005, p. 4), who recalled the political and non-economic decision behind the division of the EADS factories in Europe.

• The decision to apply the Aeronavigability Regulations forced the grounding of all helicopters that had not obtained the relevant certificates of aircraftability, not even for bureaucratic or administrative matters, as the Minister himself would declare at a press conference after the accident in Afghanistan. This decision left the FAMET under minimums with the H1-H fleet and heavy helicopters standing, only the Cougars could fly. But finally the events gave him the reason when an apparatus of this last model crashed in Afghanistan and the minister showed, holding the certificates in his appearance, that the apparatuses were in perfect condition of maintenance.

• The purchase of a hundred NH90 helicopters was undoubtedly the great surprise given by José Bono to the military and the media. Although the Earth Army saw it with good eyes, the Air Army was surprised and the Navy was not pleased. Bono decided this purchase without prior existence of the report of operational requirements, nor the Justifying Memory of Acquisition, nor any other document on the part of any of the three Armies. But with this decision the Albacete factory made sense and was economically viable.

In March 2010, the newspaper La Gaceta, belonging to the conservative group Intereconomía, published a series of articles on the assets of José Bono and his family, accusing him of having obtained part of it through illicit This publication was followed by a controversy encouraged by the Popular Party. In April of that year, the PP sent a letter to the State Attorney General's Office providing the publications of La Gaceta as evidence, so that it could decide whether an investigation was necessary. On June 2, the Popular Party filed a complaint accusing José Bono of "crimes against the Public Treasury and against the Public Administration". him and his wife—, the prosecutor's office filed the complaint. At the same time, on June 15, 2010, the Commission for the Statute of the congressional deputy, after receiving the documentation provided by José Bono, declared itself incompetent for said investigation with the abstention of the People's Party.

Private life

José Bono was married to Guatemalan Ana María Albina Rodríguez Mosquera for thirty years, the mother of his four children. On July 19, 2010, the couple made their divorce official.

Since October 2020, he has an honorary dual Dominican nationality.

His daughter Ana founded a law firm in 2015. She left the project after it failed in January 2016 and went on to join Iberdrola as an advisor.