Amaury Kruel (11 April 1901 – 23 August 1996) was a Brazilian military officer and politician who served as officer of the General Staff of the Brazilian Expeditionary Force (FEB) in 1944–1945, head of the Federal Office of Public Security (DFSP) in 1957–1959 and Minister of War in 1962–1963. Despite initially supporting president João Goulart, Kruel later switched sides and was one of the main participants in the 1964 coup d'état at the head of the 2nd Army, from 1963 to 1966. He reached the rank of army general, being promoted to marshal when he retired. He was then a federal deputy for Guanabara from 1967 to 1971.
A friend of Humberto de Alencar Castelo Branco since he was a teenager at the Military School of Porto Alegre, he participated in the Revolution of 1930 and fought in the FEB as head of the 2nd Section (information) of its General Staff. He broke his friendship with Castelo Branco (also an officer of the General Staff) at the end of 1944 due to disagreements in the Battle of Monte Castello. In the early 1950s, he supported the right in the political dispute at the Military Club and in 1954 he contributed to the downfall of João Goulart, then Minister of Labor under Getúlio Vargas, but in the following year they became personal friends. From 1957 to 1959, he was put in charge of the police forces in the capital (Rio de Janeiro) through the DFSP by president Juscelino Kubitschek. His anti-crime measures led to the first iteration of what would be called the "Death Squad". He had some diplomatic assignments in his career, almost being an ambassador in 1961. Kruel also owned land and worked in the business sector.
In 1961, he supported Goulart's inauguration as president of Brazil in the Legality Campaign. Until 1963, as head of the Military Cabinet and the Ministry of War, he was the president's strong man in the Brazilian Army, setting up a military apparatus to prevent a coup and apply political pressure. He was a right-wing figure in the government and conflicts with the left led to his fall from office. In his next command, the 2nd Army, responsible for São Paulo and Mato Grosso, Kruel was already in contact with the conspirators against the president. Even so, after the outbreak of the coup in 1964, he offered his support to Goulart if the president broke with the left. With the refusal, Kruel sent troops to Brasília, Paraná and the Paraíba Valley. His conference with general Armando de Moraes Ancora in Resende marked the end of loyalist resistance in the 1st Army.
After the coup, Kruel was a pre-candidate in the indirect election won by Castelo Branco, representing a tendency towards the center, associated with the deposed government. He was responsible for political repression under his authority during the military dictatorship. He participated in the conspiracy of São Paulo governor Ademar de Barros with various disgruntled sectors, including the Communist Party, for a "countercoup" against Castelo Branco, but it was unsuccessful. Ademar was removed without resisting in 1966 and Kruel went into reserve when the government wanted to transfer him from command. In his last years in public life he was an opposition federal deputy.
Family and possessions A descendant of German immigrants,, VII/10. Kruel was the son of farmer José Carlos Kruel and Ana Weber Kruel., KRUEL, Amauri. His brother Riograndino (1898–1989) and nephew Vinícius were also generals. Riograndino Kruel led the tenentist revolt in the 10th Independent Cavalry Regiment in Bela Vista, present-day Mato Grosso do Sul, at the time of the São Paulo Revolt of 1924, ending his career heading the Federal Police Department in 1964–1966., KRUEL, Riograndino. Vinícius Kruel was a major in 1964, serving at the 2nd Army HQ, and a brigadier general in 1981, when he accepted to lead the investigation into the Riocentro bombing on the condition that he would not accept pressure. The investigation did not stay with him and his career ended in that rank.
Amaury Kruel married Cândida Cezimbra Kruel, with whom he had a son (Nei Kruel); he later married Maria Helena Kruel. When Jango (João Goulart) was president, he got a job at Lloyd Brasileiro in New Orleans for Kruel's son. According to statements by Ernesto Geisel and general Rubens Restell to journalist Elio Gaspari, Jango also managed to obtain public funding for a coffee farm in Espírito Santo. Kruel owned the Piraquê farm in Linhares, on the banks of the Doce River, where he planted cacao. In 2014, his heirs compensated a worker held in conditions analogous to slavery on the farm from 1949 to 1963, when the lawsuit was filed. The lawsuit dragged on for 50 years. Kruel would also have two farms in Bahia. He worked in the business sector, as part of the company Eletrônica Kruel S.A.
Career
1910s–1930s
Kruel studied at the Military School of Porto Alegre beginning when he was around 11–12 years old. Amaury and Riograndino were among Humberto Castelo Branco's best friends at the school, where they also met Artur da Costa e Silva. Castelo and the Kruel brothers were on the board of the Sociedade Cívica Literária, a student association that promoted soirées and a moralizing political tendency, contrary to the corrupt practices associated with the Borges de Medeiros government. On breaks, Amaury and Castelo attended the Legislative Assembly of Rio Grande do Sul, where they booed government supporters and applauded the opposition. In the streets, they joined the protests of workers and students, in one of which Kruel was shot in the leg by the Military Brigade, leaving a scar for the rest of his life.
Both went on to the Military School of Realengo, in Rio de Janeiro, in 1918, and Kruel remained Castelo's best friend. They were in the same class as other officers of great relevance in Brazil in the following decades, such as Olímpio Mourão Filho. Cadet Kruel joined the cavalry branch, ranking 18th among his peers. He left as an officer candidate in 1921.
In 1923, when he was first lieutenant in the 7th Cavalry Regiment, in Santana do Livramento, he participated with other soldiers in demonstrations in support of the Federalist Revolution, condemning the fifth consecutive re-election of Borges de Medeiros. During the Revolution of 1930 he was still a lieutenant, serving as aide-de-camp to the deputy chief of staff of the General Staff of the Army in Rio de Janeiro. In this position, he participated in the coup that brought Getúlio Vargas to power. He later joined the Clube 3 de Outubro, an organization of tenentists who defended the reforms instituted by the revolution. In 1931–1933 Kruel attended the General Staff School. In 1936–1937, already as a major, he commanded the Municipal Police of Rio de Janeiro.
Second World War
Brazil entered World War II in 1942 and began preparing the Brazilian Expeditionary Force. Kruel was one of eleven Brazilian officers sent in 1943 to a three-month internship at Fort Leavenworth, in the United States. While abroad, he was promoted to lieutenant colonel. Brazilians learned to replace French doctrine with American maneuver warfare, and Kruel also participated in debates with American agents on police reform.
General Mascarenhas de Morais, commander of the 1st Expeditionary Infantry Division (1st DIE), designated the members of his General Staff (EM) to participate in the Italian campaign: Aguinaldo José Sena Campos to the 1st Section (personnel), Kruel to the 2nd (information), Castelo Branco in the 3rd (operations) and Thales Ribeiro da Costa in the 4th (logistics). The head of EM was colonel Floriano de Lima Brayner. Landing in Italy in 1944, Kruel took part in the offensive against the Gothic Line. The first attacks at the Battle of Monte Castello, from November to December, were costly defeats. The operation, planned by Castelo, had previously been criticized by Brayner and Kruel. Based on testimonies by German prisoners, the Information Section had warned about enemy fortifications, but Castelo managed to convince Mascarenhas to proceed. The plan used an estimate of the enemy reaction made by the Operations Section, not the Intelligence Section; Kruel attacked Castelo for going beyond his attributions, and Castelo responded that Kruel had failed to make the estimate.
The war ended his thirty-year friendship with Castelo. Kruel was further offended when the Operations Section overstepped his authority to send a telegram to Brazil, lying about tranquility at the front. Much to his frustration, Castelo became Mascarenhas' right-hand man. According to Flávio Tavares, Kruel was also offended when Castelo associated him with the enemy for descending from German immigrants. Lira Neto cited such association as made privately between Castelo and Mascarenhas. With the end of the campaign in 1945, Kruel was praised by Mascarenhas de Morais and decorated by Mark W. Clark, commander of the American 5th Army.
1940s–1950s
After the war, Kruel served as a military attaché in London until his promotion to colonel in 1947. The position of attaché was a prestigious one and offered a more cosmopolitan life, isolated from barracks and bureaucracy. In diplomacy, Kruel was also Brazil's military advisor at the United Nations in 1960. In 1958 he was awarded the Grand Cross of the Military Order of Aviz of Portugal.
In January 1949 he was responsible for the 2nd Section of the 1st Deputy Chief of Staff of the Army, when he took a special information course and was in charge of an inquiry into communist activities in the Brazilian Army. Nelson Werneck Sodré accused Kruel to be one of the officers who abused their positions in the election of the Military Club's directorate in 1952, persecuting supporters of the Yellow ticket. Kruel supported the Blue ticket, from the military right (the "Democratic Crusade"), against the self-styled "nationalists". In July one of the prosecutors, Amador Cisneiros de Amaral, protested that prisoners were being held into solitary confinement for longer than the legal maximum period of three days. Kruel called Amaral a communist and ordered his arrest, a decision reversed by judge Adalberto Barreto. Some of the prisoners were FEB veterans, and their prestige could have strengthened the "nationalist" side. Many of the officers were acquitted in July, but their careers were ruined and the internationalists of the "Democratic Crusade" gained dominance of the army.
In February 1954, when commanding the 1st Guard Cavalry Regiment (Independence Dragoons) in Rio de Janeiro, Kruel was the first of 82 signatories of the "Manifesto dos Coronéis" and was responsible for delivering it to the Minister of War. The document criticized the administration of Getúlio Vargas, the lack of resources for the army, the living conditions in which the soldiers were left in, and the 100% increase in the minimum wage proposed by Minister of Labor João Goulart. The minister fell. However, shortly afterwards Kruel and Goulart became friends in São Borja, Rio Grande do Sul. Kruel had become the youngest brigadier general in March, commanding the Divisional Artillery of the 1st DI, the 1st Cavalry Division and, after July 1955, the Chief of Staff of the Southern Military Zone. It was during this period that he met Goulart. In October, the person responsible for forging the "Brandi letter", with which journalist Carlos Lacerda accused Goulart of smuggling weapons, confessed his responsibility to Kruel in Rio Grande do Sul. The general was godfather to João Vicente, the son of Goulart born in 1956.
Public security (1957–1959)