page_title: Venustiano Carranza
section_title: Primer Jefe of the Constitutionalist Army, 1913–1915
hierarchical_section_title: Venustiano Carranza / Career / Primer Jefe of the Constitutionalist Army, 1913–1915
caption_attribution_description: English: Cropped picture of Álvaro Obregón, former president of Mexico. Español: Fotografía recortada de Álvaro Obregón, ex presidente mexicano.
context_page_description: José Venustiano Carranza de la Garza was one of the main leaders of the Mexican Revolution, whose victorious northern revolutionary Constitutionalist Army defeated the counter-revolutionary regime of Victoriano Huerta and then defeated fellow revolutionaries after Huerta's ouster. He secured power in Mexico, serving as head of state from 1915 to 1917. With the promulgation of a new revolutionary Mexican Constitution of 1917, he was elected president, serving from 1917 to 1920.
  Known as the "Primer Jefe" or "First Chief" of the Constitutionalists, Carranza was a shrewd politician rather than a military man. He supported Francisco I. Madero's challenge to the Díaz regime in the 1910 elections and Madero's Plan de San Luis Potosí to nullify the elections and overthrow Díaz by force. He was appointed the governor of his home state of Coahuila by Madero. When Madero was murdered in February 1913, Carranza drew up the Plan de Guadalupe, a purely political plan to oust Huerta. Carranza became the leader of northern forces opposed to Huerta. He went on to lead the Constitutionalist faction to victory and become president of Mexico.
context_section_description: Venustiano Carranza was not a military man himself, but the Constitutionalist Army had brilliant military leaders, especially Álvaro Obregón, Pancho Villa, Felipe Ángeles, and Pablo González Garza. Initially, Carranza divided the country into seven operational zones, though his Revolution was really launched in only three: (1) the northeast, under the command of González Garza; (2) the center, under the command of Pánfilo Natera; and (3) the northwest, under the command of Obregón. The Revolution, launched in March 1913, initially did not go well, and Huerta's troops marched into Monclova, forcing Carranza to flee to the rebels' stronghold of Sonora in August 1913. However, Carranza's army would later grow remarkably. In March 1914, Carranza was informed of Pancho Villa's victories and of advances made by the forces under González Garza and Obregón. Carranza determined that it was safe to leave Sonora, and traveled to Ciudad Juárez, which served as his capital for the remainder of his struggle with Huerta.
  Although Pancho Villa was a skilled commander, his tactics throughout the 1913-14 campaign created a number of diplomatic incidents that were a major headache for Carranza in this period. Villa had confiscated the property of Spaniards in Chihuahua and had allowed his troops to murder an Englishman, Benton, and an American, Bauch. At one point, Villa arrested Manuel Chao, the Governor of Chihuahua, and Carranza had to personally travel to Chihuahua to order Villa to release Chao. In Tampico, nine U.S. Navy sailors were arrested by Mexican troops over a misunderstanding about fuel supplies. In response to the Tampico Affair, the United States government sent 2,300 Navy troops to occupy Veracruz, Veracruz. The fighting ended with 22 Navy troops and almost 200 Mexican soldiers being killed, and Veracruz taken. Carranza, in order to keep his nationalistic credentials, threatened war with the United States. In his spontaneous response to U.S. President Woodrow Wilson, Carranza asked "…that the president withdraw American troops from Mexico and take up its complaints against Huerta with the Constitutionalist government." The situation became so tense that war seemed imminent. On 22 April 1914, on the initiative of Felix A. Sommerfeld and Sherburne Hopkins, Pancho Villa traveled to Ciudad Juarez to calm fears along the border and asked President Wilson's emissary George Carothers to tell "Señor Wilson" that he had no problems with the American occupation of Veracruz. Carothers wrote to Secretary William Jennings Bryan: "As far as he was concerned we could keep Vera Cruz [sic] and hold it so tight that not even water could get into Huerta and …he could not feel any resentment." Whether trying to please the U.S. government or through the diplomatic efforts of Sommerfeld and Carothers, or maybe as a result of both, Villa stepped out from under Carranza's stated foreign policy.
  The uneasy alliance between Carranza, Obregón, Villa and Emiliano Zapata would eventually lead the rebels to victory. The fight against Huerta formally ended on 15 August 1914, when Álvaro Obregón signed a number of treaties in Teoloyucan in which the last of Huerta's forces surrendered to him and recognized the Constitutional government. On 20 August 1914, Carranza made a triumphal entry into Mexico City. Carranza (supported by Obregón) was now the strongest candidate to fill the power vacuum and set himself up as head of the new government. This government successfully printed money, passed laws, etc.
caption: General Alvaro Obregón, who remained loyal to Carranza until 1920
exif: {}