All King's men

Aquella mañana de marzo de 1963 en que Juan Carlos de Borbón subió de dos brincos los siete escalones de piedra que dan acceso al palacio de la Zarzuela vestido con un impecable traje a medida cortado por su sastre de siempre, Antonio Collado, cuyo importe había satisfecho (como era también habitual) su hombre de confianza, el marqués de Mondéjar, y cruzó el umbral de su nueva residencia, era un don nadie. No tenía rango, prestigio, fortuna ni ocupación. Estaba solo. De prestado. Apenas rodeado por un puñado de viejos militares preconciliares con título y de algunos, muy pocos, jóvenes oficiales con los que había convivido en las academias y a los que había conquistado siendo uno más entre ellos. Unos y otros serían los primeros hombres del rey. El embrión de su Casa. Algunos le servirían con lealtad monacal durante décadas y llegado el momento abandonarían el palacio sin hacer ruido. Siempre es así. Pero en 1963, Juan Carlos era aún para los españoles un príncipe nacido en el extranjero y recién casado con una princesa griega; primogénito del titular de los derechos históricos de la Corona; guapo, silencioso y de escasas luces, al que el artero generalísimo Franco estaba moldeando sin clarearse sobre el objetivo final de sus intenciones. ¿Llegaría Juan Carlos de Borbón a ser rey?

La Zarzuela, a palace built in the seventeenth century on the outskirts of Madrid as a hunting pavilion of the Bourbons, lost in the 16.000 hermetic hectares from Mount of El Pardo, ten minutes from the dictator's residence, he was going to become his home.The first place worth receiving that name since he descended from a steam train with ten years from Estoril (the drowns Portuguese Villa where his father, Don Juan de Borbón, remained in exile since 1946), as an anointed Dickensian orphan forbe educated by Franco and lead a wandering life of monk-widowed between priests, swords, monarchists that called him Lord, palaces assigned and military schools.Hear, see and, above all, shut up.Thus his childhood and youth passed.A severe learning.Those who know him say that in the depths of his personality, the king, beyond the championship that he handles with a mastery, is a lonely tendent to melancholy.Others add that the hardness of that situation endowed him with an intelligence and political cunning much superior to those of the politicians of his generation (which he retains at 74).

Surrounded by holm oaks, deer and wild boars, 120 species of flora and 200 fauna, the then called Palacete de la Zarzuela was an isolated stone and slate house that the dictator had decided was the residence of the young marriage.A kind of house-lourtapher (below, the administrative part; above, the house), which Franco's wife, Carmen Polo, had decorated, charged to the national heritage, based on a relied style of the wealthy families of Madrid of MadridThe time.An air that today retains, with its sifted lights, cream tones, heavy tapestries and carpets, embedded shelves with leather bound books that nobody leaves and profusion of watches, photographs and pictures.In La Zarzuela, one is never certain of whether the object he contemplates is good or bad;A work of art inventoried by the National Heritage (the owner of the Palace and of all the historical assets that at a time constituted the heritage of the kings of Spain and that depends on the Ministry of the Presidency) or the gift Made in China of a City Council ofDeep Spain.

The zarzuela was a beautiful and raw place.Near and far from Madrid.In that natural space no one lived than them;He worked a minimum service in charge of the Civil Guard (from writers to chefs), a couple of inspectors such as escort, a couple of ramshackled cars assigned by presidency as transport, a janter of the national heritage dressed in corduroy and carabiner on the shoulder in the onlyentrance control (later they put a telephone that answered prince Juan Carlos) and his wife and daughter as a cook and maiden.Few ventured to visit the princes, it wasn't well seen.

However, this isolation and media scarcity facilitated the couple to live as a normal family and give up a palatial court.There was no place.Nor more funds than those delivered by Admiral Carrero Blanco in hand in sepia envelopes.And in addition, intimacy was the obsession of Doña Sofía, refractory to having the house full of chamberlanes, assistants and company ladies.And even less for anyone (nobody) to interfere inside their marriage, the education of their children and the organization of their home (a philosophy that keeps Machamartillo and is the first commandment for any signing that reaches the zarzuela).

They were difficult years.Everything was uncertainty.They felt guarded.There were rumors that the dictatorship had installed microphones in the property taking advantage of the reconstruction works (the building had been destroyed during the war) that had been carried out between April and October 1960.The princes learned to be discreet.The crown was at stake.And, above all, the dream that Juan Carlos had inherited from his father and was his political program in the shadow: fighting for reconciliation and being a day "the king of all of the Spaniards".

Above the political intrigues, the zarzuela was their home.That first night of March 1963 the four windows of the first floor of the palace illuminated.From time to time, they can still be seen on behind the curtains when the afternoon falls.They are family rooms.One of the first things that Juan Carlos and Sofia did was plant cedars, elms and firs around the stark landscape and try to give the place a bourgeois air with the bicycles of the children supported on the facade, duckling floats in the pool, dogs and a football.Here their three children would grow.

The palace would also grow.Step by step, as the prince's political position was strengthened, new buildings whose construction rhythm would be accelerated after his arrival at the throne in 1975 would be created.Today, the zarzuela as a whole is a complex puzzle in which constructions have been overwhelming the slopes of the land.Juancarlist buildings are perfectly integrated in the natural environment of El Pardo to the point of being invisible to the visitor.Some are half -fed and covered with vegetation.In La Zarzuela, the only protagonist is the king;He is the head of the State, the Crown and the Family.And its residence, the old Palacio de la Zarzuela, the only building that stands out.On his roof waves the blue banner with his coat of arms.It is a symbol.

In 1965 they built the hermitage.Then, as of 1972, two wings would be added to the original palace, one for the use of the family (the private pavilion), and at the other end, the official pavilion, to which in the zarzuela they call Gate of Cristales, where, distributedOn two floors, there are the offices of the kings and the princes and their respective secretariats.Later, taking advantage of the stone pergola that surrounded the pool, a sports zone that houses a gym and a covered pool would be built.The facilities would continue to multiply with a service pavilion, a garden pavilion, a sophisticated Communications Center (the CECOM), an access of visitors along the El Pardo road (Somontes), a construction for the security service with gallery ofShot, a body of guard to house the sentinels of the Royal Guard, a helipad with two tracks, a picture with blocks, dog, a solar plant, a dining room for employees (whose menu, in charge of a confidence contract,is paid in charge of the house budget) and, finally, the prince's residence, a property with 1.771 useful meters that cost the national heritage 4.23 million euros in 2002.The initiates also mention a bunker, an armored chamber and several tunnels that communicate the set.

To that infrastructure of the King's house could be added a wing of the Palace of the East, in the center of Madrid, which hosts the structure of the auditor of the house (Óscar Moreno, 76 years old) and the military room (which the lieutenant commandsGeneral Antonio de la Court, 62).Already in the brown, the three barracks of the Royal Guard are at the King, with 1.700 men and women and an annual budget of 45 million;The San Quintín Barracks of the Civil Guard, the head of the security of the house (whose extension has cost 18 million euros to the Ministry of Interior) and the National Heritage Delegation (communicated with the zarzuela on interior roads) in charge of maintenance andthe conservation.

That same growth experienced Juan Carlos de Borbón's team.At Franco's death, seven people were part of his hard core;All were noble, conservative and military, with the exception of the diplomat José Joaquín Puig de la Bellacasa;It was the Marqués de Mondéjar and the Armed General (sentenced in 1983 to 30 years for his participation in 23-F), chief and secretary, respectively;Manuel Dávila, field assistant;Juan Bautista Sánchez Bilbao, Security Manager;the Duke of Victoria, responsible for the agenda, and Rafael Valenzuela, of the correspondence.To this bud were added three military and half dozen administrative assistants of the Civil Guard.Today, no less than 500 people work in the zarzuela organized in seven units led by officials with a category of general director;Above them, the head of the house, the general secretary and the head of the military room.The military organization is under the command of a civilian: the head of the house, although military customs and customs continue to dominate the zarzuela.

In November 1975, Juan Carlos de Borbón, the tenant of that austere palace to which no one visited for more than a decade, became king of Spain;his residence, at the headquarters of the State Headquarters, and that time of innocence, in an unknown chapter of our history.36 years have passed.The biography of King Juan Carlos is that of success.Since the promulgation of the 1978 Constitution, which stated in its first article: "The political form of the Spanish State is the parliamentary monarchy", has been a democratic monarch specimen that reigns but does not govern.A referee and a moderator.A symbol.The king of all.They say that when the constitutional pact was closed, he issued with his usual Gracejo: "They have legalized me".That day, the Constitution became its travel partner.In his support and his shield.He granted, for example, total independence in the management of his home, through a couple of forceful statements.The first: "The King receives from the State Budgets a global amount for the support of his family and home, and freely distributes it".The second: "The King freely names and relieves the civil and military members of his house".In 1982, a new National Heritage Law reinforced its position in the zarzuela and the other real sites (such as the Marivent Palace, in Mallorca), in their first article: “They have the legal qualification of national assets of the national heritage those of ownership of the ownership of the ownership of the ownership of the ownership of the ownership of the ownership of the ownershipState affected to the use and service of the king and the members of the Royal Family for the exercise of the high representation that the Constitution and the laws attribute to them ”.

With the 1978 Constitution, Juan Carlos de Borbón renounced the absolute powers that Franco had read (the incarnation of national sovereignty, the effective command of the Armed Forces, the active participation in the Councils of Ministers, the direct appointment of positionsof the State, the veto to the laws or the possibility of issuing decrees laws) and achieved in return the referendum and support of citizens and parliament in a country that was not monarchical.The combination of both is the key to the subsistence of a modern parliamentary monarchy, according to a study entitled Monarchies as Corporate Brands, by the British professor John M.T.Balmer, who recommended Princess Letizia while thousands of people pounced on her and the prince at the inauguration of Fitur.According to Professor Balmer, to lose one of two support, that of the citizens or that of the Legislative, as a result of a deterioration in the reputation and prestige of the monarchical institution, the crown would be lost.Therefore, the first work of the house must be to preserve the prestige of the institution;that citizens consider it useful;that nothing tarnishes your image.

The King's popularity is still very high, and its prestige abroad, unquestionable.Throughout these years, the king has developed an impressive network of contacts that provide him, according to his intimate, "the best agenda on the planet".“The king receives many people in the zarzuela on the margin of his official audiences.Not only do the president and ministers see week (especially those of Foreign and Defense), which provide all the information before anyone;You can also find yourself down the staircase of your office to the president of a large bank, the director of the CNI or the director of a newspaper.He has met all the presidents of the United States and maintains a direct and almost familiar line with all the Arab and European monarchies and with all the presidents of Latin America.The King opens doors.His intervention has been definitive for Spain to get the high-speed train contract La Meche-Medina.That does not succeed by Sarkozy ".

His role in the birth and consolidation of democracy has been crucial.He did not bring it alone, but without his determination, his impulse and smell (which, as he presumes, is suggest political tool) would not have been possible to transit in such a quick and irreversible way."Democratic legitimacy is its great asset, and in that nobody has doubts," explains a person close to the house.“In that sense, the king has maintained a pact of complicity with politicians and the media for many years.Todos marchaban por el mismo camino con el objetivo de consolidar la democracia.And in that scenario they were not going to get anything that could harm the crown because it could become against democracy.That ended.Democracy was consolidated.And the ban was opened.And in La Zarzuela it has not reacted enough quickly to the new times.They have to learn to manage the crown as a modern institution of the state and update it, but without loading the magic that surrounds it.It is the square of the circle ".

All these events parade through my head while the official car of La Zarzuela travels the five kilometers that separate Somontes security control from the palace.On this narrow and winding road, in which at the time of Berrea you can find a deer, the first civilian that accessed the professional environment of Prince Juan Carlos was killed in August 1971.His name was Jacobo Cano, he was his friend, his age, an intelligent professional of a civilized right who was destined to create the modern infrastructure of the future king.It was a lost occasion to demilitarize the king's environment.Years later, life also lost a driver of the house.The driver who have sent me does not believe in the curses judging by the speed at which he drives.

Days before my first visit to the guts of La Zarzuela, a former executive of the house warned me that the State Headquarters looks more “to the Vatican than to the White House;It is more baroque;There is a great inertia;decisions dilate;The decade is the unit of measure of time;The relationships of the people inside are based on faithfulness and discretion.Tienes que renunciar a todo protagonismo.The work of the people of the house is to support the king, but never star in, and even less politics or express opinions.The Zarzuela official is afraid, because those from outside see in him someone who, due to his proximity to the King, is talking in his name and, except in the case of the head of the house when the king takes care of him, it is not so.That leads you to secretism, to be zarzuelizo.Do not share what you see and hear or your family.Therefore, those who suffer what I define as a Stockholm syndrome ”.

Another former member of the Staff continues: “As we are all officials, who call us to work with the king is the greatest honor we can receive.You can't deny.No one says no, even if you charge half that in an embassy or in the private company.How many?In La Zarzuela, a general director wins 90.000 euros a year.But as you are educated in the hierarchy and public service, work for the State Headquarters is the greatest compliment that you can receive.It means being close to the king.And being with the king means being part of a unique observatory;be in relation to all the powers and leaders of the world, from Obama to the Pope.You are respected among the senior state officials.You arrive anywhere with the king and take command, whether for protocol or in security;nobody giving up.People throw years.Todo es muy endogámico: el número dos de cada unidad hereda la silla del número uno.It is very rare for people from outside.The problem comes when you leave;You can't tell the king to leave him even if you are fed up or tired, it would be a desert;You don't go until they throw you, and when they throw you, you feel fatal because you think: ‘Will I have disappointed them?’.Some have the feeling that they have squeezed them and then thrown into the paper ”.

The Palacio de la Zarzuela is a peculiar place.Another key to its nature is provided by a source close to its gear: “Zarzuela not only welcomes the State Headquarters, but also a family.Todo bajo el mismo techo.Do not forget that the squad of the zarzuela works by law for the head of state, for the monarchical institution and for the family ”.Another former member of the house affects that idea: “When you work there you have to know how to differentiate what is the head of the state of what the family is;They are two worlds that cross, and your ability is to intuit and understand that division.And, of course, it is more complicated to serve the family than the State Headquarters.In a republic, the son -in -law of the president does not paint anything;But here is a family that provides Spain with heads of state to take care and support.In La Zarzuela, institutional issues and family issues coexist.And if you don't know.It should not cross the invisible border that separates the headquarters from the family of the family ”.

Actually, the border is clear.The first building that arises between the trees as we approach the palace is the residence of Prince Felipe, high on a promontory, one kilometer from the palace and with its own security perimeter.Tras cruzar el puente de piedra sobre el arroyoTrofa, vigilado por un pelotón de guardias reales que se cuadran mecánicamente, se sube por un camino asfaltado que se bifurca.The one who ascends, ends at the palace;In the sanctorum.On the other way, the Magnolias building is accessed, a long and narrow property of a red brick where the bulk of the advice and support team to the king is concentrated.

In 1987, when the zarzuela burst by its seams, the greatest expansion works began.Taking advantage of a slope of the land in the rear of the Palace, in the ancient orchards, the headquarters of the head of the Kings since 1976, Manuel del Río, projected this construction that has a plant of 2.600 square meters and a basement of 1.500.His works cost the heritage six million euros of the time.It is the west wing of the king.Here are the people who deal with their relationship with the powers of the State, their international representation, their public projection, their speeches and the planning, coordination and realization of the total of 400 acts to which the king and the prince attended in 2011.

The 11 people who occupy the key positions in the State Headquarters are men and with an average age of 60 years;Most have more than 15 next to the monarch;All are career officials (except for the director of Communication, the journalist Javier Ayuso).Five are military (of them, four generals), three diplomats, a state lawyer and another state controller.

The Magnolias building is nothing from the other world, but from the moment when a young white jacket guard opens the door of the car with a ceremony and you enter that wide, silent, ceremonious and impeccable atmosphere., in which everything shines and the scarce presences are silhouettes of impeccable dark suit that speak in a half voice, you realize that it is a different place.The building has two wings, functional, eighties and painted in cream tones.The basement houses the archive of the house and part of the protocol unit.There are a couple of meeting rooms;In the largest the directors meet with the head of the house once a week.In the wing on the right, the first office is that of the boss, Rafael Spottorno;It is the most ceremonious, a scale copy of the king's office.Next, those of the protocol unit (which Cándido Creis, 46, a elusive diplomat as an eel who already worked at the house between 1996 and 2001 and has just returned to the house) and the communication unit;They are clean, ordered spaces, full of papers and with an office furniture that refers to tell me.In communication, every machine is worked in the creation of the new website 2.0, paid by the Ministry of the Presidency, with which they intend that the house has an interactive contact with the citizens.An official of that unit takes care of the monitoring of social networks (another of the fronts that most worry and less control in the zarzuela).The hall concludes in some Liliputian bathrooms.If you want a coffee, there is a coin machine.

The other wing houses the office of the secretary general of the house, number two, Alfonso Sanz Portolés, a 57 -year -old diplomat who has been in the zarzuela and takes care that everything works;and then the offices of the strategic coordination and planning cabinet, which controls, among other things, the agenda.In front is the General of the Civil Guard Domingo Martínez Palomo, 54;An affable, bald and robust guy, a law graduate and with a master's degree from the IESE, which is the organizational brain of the house.He is the only director who attends the monthly meeting of the family (the kings, the princes and the infantas) with the chief and the general secretary, in a space next to the king's office, to decide, among other things, to which actsHe leaves and who of the family goes.Palomo arrived at La Zarzuela being a young escort officer;He was part of Prince Felipe's protection team;Since 1996 he is head of the Cabinet.The only two women who occupy positions at the following levels of the organization chart are diplomatic;One is the number two of Palomo, María Sáenz de Heredia;The other, Ángeles García Loza, attached to the Protocol Headquarters.

The Magnolias building, narrow and excavated in the rock, communicates with the noble zone of the Palacio de la Zarzuela through a long white, disturbing and clean tunnel like a patena, which the king has decorated with a hundred cartoons that have made himDuring these years (and of which he feels especially proud);On the other side he has placed his beautiful collection of vintage ship models. El ambiente se completa con regalos que ha recibido de deportistas, desde una camiseta dedicada de Pau Gasol y otra firmada por los jugadores del Mundial de fútbol hasta recuerdos de la Copa Davis o los cascos autografiados de Jorge Lorenzo,Toni Elías y Marc Márquez.

Two other directors of the House, the head of the Prince's Secretariat, the state lawyer Jaime Alfonsín, 55, who began working with the heir in 1995, when he completed his studies in the United States, and the head of theSecretariat of the Queen, Lieutenant General José Cabrera, 68, who arrived at La Zarzuela in 1987 and is next to Doña Sofía since 1991, have their offices next to those of the heir and the queen, in the building attached to the palace.There is also the office of the King and Prince's field assistants.The king has nine, and the prince, four.The head of the Administration, Infrastructure and Services Unit, the Colonel of Engineers Isaiah Peral, 58, who has been for the house for 25 years, has his office in the vital communications center (the king demands to be communicated and informedWhere is it), and the Head of Security, the Infantry General Manuel Barrós, 57, in the opaque building of his service adjacent to the previous.

Barrós is the most allergic zarzuela employee to the photos;A grim Galician, leaning and with a hound.Your handshake is deadly.For 10 years he was the attachment of the previous security chief, General Guillermo (Willy) Quintana Lacaci (son of the general who stopped 23-F in Madrid and was killed by ETA).Tras la marcha de este en 1999, fue nombrado responsable del servicio.

The King's Security Service is one of the great state secrets.Nor the high spheres of the Ministry of Interior know its operation.It is formed by around 300 people in command of 10 attachments of General Barrós.His second is a 51 -year -old infantry colonel.The military have always controlled the King's security.Below is a commissioner, three civil guard leaders assigned to the Prince (they carry their entire career by their side) and another colonel of the armed institute as responsible for the security of the Queen.

Above its human and material means, the power of the house security service resides (by law) in its ability to request as many State Security Forces as necessary to protect the king.It is explained by a former person in charge: “The Chief of Security of the House has all the State Security Springs;He may require them, coordinate and is the operating director on the ground.You can ask for a helicopter, cut a neighborhood, record sewers or request a pair of mobile UVI.The safety of the house was easy until the children became older.Then, each one began to make their lives, to go, to travel;They married and had children.Being today for security is to submit to a permanent nerve state ”.

The only ‘lord’ of the entire zarzuela network is the king.There are no number two here, not even the prince, although handling all the information and participates in decision making.The king commands.His men know him as the boss;his children, like the employer.Control every step that takes place in the zarzuela.He is not a complacent boss.Tiene un carácter temible."Sometimes it is not so much the anger that throws you as that royal look of reproach," explains a former member of the house.A bad temper that has sharpened in recent times after three surgical operations and tsunami urdangarin."He pissed off, although then solves him with a joke and a hug that melts you".

The king is the veteran of the place.The oldest.His accomplices of the early days of the zarzuela retired years ago.It has been left alone.Surrounded by younger people.Keep sending.Todos tienen claro que morirá con las botas puestas.What will be the king until the end.That is why it was not a surprise that at the end of last year he called his side as responsible for the house to Rafael Spottorno, 67, a diplomat who already worked in the zarzuela as number two between 1993 and 2002;a man of the king, of his generation and style;Without political profile, Florentino, intelligent, resolutive and with the enormous advantage that he has been out of the zarzuela, in the private company (he was director of the Caja Madrid Foundation)."Rafa has ventilated outside and returns with new ideas," says a nearby.

Spottorno is the shadow of the king, his advisor, his lightning rod;The man who signed and signs the contracts, coordinates the request for information to the ministries, prepares his speeches and agreed to his relationship with the presidency of the Government."That function is vertebral in the functioning of the crown, since both the king and the president have their legitimacy and have to live without entering the territory of the other," explains a member of the house.“The role of this depends on the role of this in public life.It is not just that they get better or worse, it is that the president can erase the king from the map or, on the contrary, give him a relevant role, especially internationally.And the same goes for your speeches.And in that lace of bobillos la Moncloa-La Zarzuela is essential the work of the head of the house ”.

At the end of August, the King summoned Spottorno in Marivent to tell him that he was going to name him head of his house.Spottorno had clear ideas.Its government program was based on the modernization, professionalization and informative transparency of the State Headquarters;His management as another institution and the reinforcement of the political role and public presence of the prince.In addition, three other initiatives that had already been contemplated in the mandate of their predecessor, Alberto Aza, and Sine Die had flown: the breakdown of the house expenses budget (8.4 million euros), the concretion of aCode of conduct on the gifts received in the zarzuela and the gradual disappearance of the infantas of the state ceremonies.A person close to the house explains that last initiative: “It seemed logical that they were departing in the background taking into account the precedent of the King's sisters, the infantas Pilar and Margarita, who lead a private and absent life of the Head of the State;The normal thing is that with Felipe VI be the same on his day when he arrives on the throne, and it was time to start.As for the accounts, there was a demand among citizens that had to be satisfied.And the king and the prince were satisfied in doing so ”.

Spottorno took possession on September 30;His presentation in Society was in the October 12 parade;Two days later, on Friday 14, he met with all the directors in Magnolias, explained his road map and encouraged to participate in a storm of ideas about the potential and weaknesses of the crown.He announced that he wanted to make the accounts public.At the end of the meeting it was decided to study when and how.It was going to be before what they imagined.Tres semanas más tarde estallaba el caso Urdangarin, con el registro judicial de la sede en Barcelona del Instituto Nóos, que había presidido el yerno del Rey.From that November 8, the media launched themselves to inform the irregularities of the husband of Infanta Cristina.The matter overflowed.He had been launching for six years.I was damaging the prestige of the crown.Something had to be done.The King and the Prince met with Spottorno, and the new Chief sentenced that the time had come to recover the initiative being transparent with the accounts and critic with the businesses of Urdangarin.The king and the prince accepted."The house sought to cause two effects: one, demonstrate that they were adapting to the times, and another, that Urdangarin had never received money from the house," explains someone who knew the process.On December 12, Spottorno summoned the media in the Magnolias Meeting Room and gave a blow of effect announcing that the accounts would be made public immediately;He went further, disqualified Urdangarin, defining his behavior as "little exemplary" and excluding him from the Zarzuela agenda.He even went much further by stating that in terms of Infanta, "it would be seen".On December 28 the accounts were presented.After 30 years of gloom, public opinion was finally aware of what the king won: 292.752 euros a year;The prince, half, and the women of the house (the queen, the princess and the infantas), 375.000 euros to be distributed.The King, the Prince and Spottorno had managed to contain the first focus of the fire.The future will say if they were embedded.