Early military career, 1911–1913 (1882–1915), who fought with
Francisco I. Madero (1873–1913) in 1910, only to launch a rebellion against him in
Chihuahua in 1911. Obregón's first experience in the military was supporting pro-Madero forces under
Victoriano Huerta (1850–1916) against Orozco's rebellion. Obregón expressed little interest in the Anti-Reelectionist movement launched by
Francisco I. Madero in 1908–1909 in opposition to
President Porfirio Díaz. When Madero called for an uprising against Díaz following the fraudulent 1910 elections, in November 1910 by issuing his
Plan of San Luis Potosí, Obregón did not join the struggle against the Díaz regime. As a widowed parent of two small children and running a prosperous farm, Madero's call to arms was not urgent for him. In his memoir, he regretted the delay. Obregón became a supporter of Madero shortly after he won the presidential election of 1911. In March 1912,
Pascual Orozco, a general who had fought for Madero's cause to oust Díaz, launched a revolt against Madero after Madero ordered the fighters that toppled Díaz to disband, retaining the
Federal Army that they had defeated. This revolt started in
Chihuahua with the financial backing of
Luis Terrazas, a former
Governor of Chihuahua and the largest landowner in Mexico. Obregón's unit was the largest in the state, and volunteered to go wherever needed. This Battalion supported federal troops under the command of
Victoriano Huerta sent by Madero to crush Orozco's rebellion. Within weeks of joining the Battalion, Obregón displayed signs of military genius. Obregón disobeyed his superior's orders but won several battles by luring his enemies into traps, surprise assaults, and encircling maneuvers. Obregón had intended to return to civilian life in December 1912, but then in February 1913, the Madero regime was overthrown in a ''
coup d'état (known to Mexican history as La decena trágica'') orchestrated by
Victoriano Huerta,
Félix Díaz,
Bernardo Reyes, and
Henry Lane Wilson, the
United States Ambassador to Mexico. Madero and his vice president were forced to resign, and were then assassinated. Huerta assumed the presidency. In spite of his demotion, Ángeles formulated the rebel grand strategy of a three-prong attack south to
Mexico City: (1) Obregón would advance south along the western railroad, (2)
Pancho Villa would advance south along the central railroad, and (3)
Pablo González Garza would advance south along the eastern railroad. Obregón began his march south in April 1914. Whereas Pancho Villa preferred wild
cavalry charges, Obregón was again more cautious. Villa was soon at odds with Carranza, and in May 1914, Carranza instructed Obregón to increase the pace of his southern campaign to ensure that he beat Villa's troops to Mexico City. Obregón moved his troops from
Topolobampo, Sinaloa, to
blockade Mazatlán, and then to
Tepic, where Obregón cut off the railroad from
Guadalajara, Jalisco, to
Colima, thus leaving both of these ports isolated. In early July, Obregón moved south to Orendaín, Jalisco, where his troops defeated federal troops, leaving 8000 dead, and making it clear that the Huerta regime was defeated. Obregón was promoted to
major general. He continued his march south. Upon Obregón's arrival in
Teoloyucan, Mexico State, it was clear that Huerta was defeated, and, on 11 August, on the
mudguard of a car, Obregón signed the treaties that ended the Huerta regime. On 16 August 1914, Obregón and 18,000 of his troops marched triumphantly into
Mexico City. He was joined shortly by Carranza, who marched triumphantly into Mexico City on 20 August. He also believed that the rich had been pro-Huerta, and he therefore imposed special taxes on
capital, real estate,
mortgages, water,
pavement,
sewers,
carriages,
automobiles,
bicycles, etc. Special measures were also taken against foreigners. Some of these were deliberately humiliating: for example, he forced foreign businessmen to sweep the streets of Mexico City.
Relations with Villa, June–September 1914 Although tensions between the conservative Carranza and more radical Pancho Villa grew throughout 1914, Obregón attempted to mediate between the two to keep the revolutionary coalition intact. Villa had created a number of diplomatic incidents and Carranza was worried that would invite further U.S. intervention, whose forces already occupied Veracruz. On 8 July 1914, Villistas and Carrancistas signed the
Pact of Torreón, in which they agreed that after Huerta's forces were defeated, 150 generals of the Revolution would meet to determine the future shape of the country. Carranza was angered by Villa's insubordination, particularly ignoring the order not to take Zacatecas. For this reason Carranza refused to let Villa march into Mexico City in August. Villa had contacted Obregón following Villa's capture of Zacatecas in June 1914, suggesting the two successful revolutionary generals could cooperate against the civilian Carranza. Obregón was not willing to do that at this point, preferring to try to keep the revolutionary coalition intact as long as possible. Obregón understood the danger that Villa presented to the Constitutionalists if the coalition was to fracture; he made two trips to Chihuahua in August and September 1914 to see Villa in person to try to mediate the situation between Villa and Carranza. During this period, Obregón got to know both Carranza and Villa well, which informed his later relations with them. Both trips to Villa were extremely risky for Obregón, placing himself in danger of being assassinated by Villa. In September, Villa and Carranza formally split,
Convention of the Winners, 1914 (1881–1939), flanked by
Francisco "Pancho" Villa (1878–1923) and
Emiliano Zapata (1879–1919). Gutiérrez was appointed provisional President of Mexico by the
Convention of Aguascalientes, a move that
Venustiano Carranza (1859–1920) found intolerable. In the ensuing war, Obregón fought for Carranza against the convention. Despite the break that came between Villa and Carranza, revolutionary leaders still attempted to resolve their differences and meet to chart the way forward. The Convention that the Carrancistas and Villistas had agreed to in the Treaty of Torreón went ahead at
Aguascalientes on 5 October 1914. Carranza did not participate in the
Convention of Aguascalientes because he was not a general, but, as a general, Obregón participated. The Convention soon split into two major factions: (1) the Carrancistas, who insisted that the convention should follow the promise of the Plan of Guadalupe and restore the
1857 Constitution of Mexico; and (2) the Villistas, who sought more wide-ranging social reforms than set out in the Plan of Guadalupe. The Villistas were supported by
Emiliano Zapata, leader of the
Liberation Army of the South, who had issued his own
Plan of Ayala, which called for wide-ranging social reforms. For a month and a half, Obregón maintained neutrality between the two sides and tried to reach a middle ground that would avoid a civil war. Eventually, it became clear that the Villistas/Zapatistas had prevailed at the convention; Carranza, however, refused to accept the convention's preparations for a "pre-constitutional" regime, which Carranza believed was totally inadequate, and in late November, Carranza rejected the authority of the regime imposed by the convention. Forced to choose sides, Obregón sided with Carranza and left the convention to fight for the
Primer Jefe. He had made many friends amongst the Villistas and Zapatistas at the convention and was able to convince some of them to depart with him. On 12 December 1914, Carranza issued his Additions to the Plan of Guadalupe, which laid out an ambitious reform program, including Laws of Reform, in conscious imitation of
Benito Juárez's Laws of Reform. The armies of Obregón and Villa clashed in four battles, collectively known as the
Battle of Celaya, the largest military confrontation in
Latin American history before the
Falklands War of 1982. The first battle took place on 6 April and 7 April 1915 and ended with the withdrawal of the Villistas. The second, in
Celaya,
Guanajuato, took place between 13 April and 15 April, when Villa attacked the city of Celaya but was repulsed. The third was the prolonged position battle of Trinidad and Santa Ana del Conde between 29 April and 5 June, which was the definitive battle. Villa was again defeated by Obregón, who lost his right arm in the fight. Villa made a last attempt to stop Obregón's army in Aguascalientes on 10 July but without success. Obregón distinguished himself during the Battle of Celaya by being one of the first Mexicans to comprehend that the introduction of modern
field artillery, and especially
machine guns, had shifted the battlefield in favor of a defending force. In fact, while Obregón studied this shift and used it in his defense of Celaya, generals in the World War I trenches of Europe were still advocating bloody and mostly failing mass charges.
Obregón's arm in 1915. It earned him the nickname of
El Manco de Celaya ("the one-armed man of Celaya"). During the battles with Villa, Obregón had his right arm blown off. The blast nearly killed him, and he attempted to put himself out of his misery and fired his pistol to accomplish that. The aide de camp who had cleaned his gun had neglected to put bullets in the weapon. In a wry story he told about himself, he joined in the search for his missing arm. "I was helping them myself, because it's not so easy to abandon such a necessary thing as an arm." The searchers had no luck. A comrade reached into his pocket and raised a gold coin. Obregón concluded the story, saying "And then everyone saw a miracle: the arm came forth from who knows where, and come skipping up to where the gold
azteca [coin] was elevated; it reached up and grasped it in its fingerslovinglyThat was the only way to get my lost arm to appear." The arm was subsequently embalmed and then displayed in the monument to Obregón at the
Parque de la Bombilla, on the site of where he was assassinated in 1928. Obregón always wore clothing tailored to show that he had lost his arm in battle, a visible sign of his sacrifice to Mexico. == Early political career, 1915–1920 ==