The Chief of Staff of the Navy, Admiral Antonio Martorell Lacave, during a ceremony December 22 in Madrid.
Admiral Antonio Martorell Lacave, chief of the naval staff, died in Madrid this Friday, the Defense Ministry confirmed. Martorell, 62, died at Gómez Ulla Military Hospital, where he was being treated for a serious illness. In July 2021, he was appointed Chief of the Navy, replacing General Admiral Teodoro López Calderón, who replaced General Miguel Ángel Villarroya as Chief of Defense Staff, who resigned as a result of the scandal surrounding his premature vaccination.
Born in Bilbao on August 22, 1960, he was the youngest and newest member of the current military leadership. He entered the Naval Academy of Marín (Pontevedra) in 1979 and was promoted to lieutenant in 1984. During his 39-year career, he was in command of the minesweeper Miño and the minesweeper Turia, and commanded the 1st Squadron of Countermine Measures (MCM), Permanent Group of Countermine Measures No. 2 of NATO and the amphibious assault ship Castilla.
Among his posts on land, he was Professor at the Escuela Superior de las Fuerzas Armadas, Head of the Torpedo Workshop at the Arsenal de Cartagena (Madrid) and was also posted three times to the General Staff of the Navy, heading the sector within the Ministry’s General Directorate of Defense Policy and the Exercise Department at the NATO Joint Headquarters in Naples. As a general staff diploma and specialist in submarine weapons, he has completed numerous courses both in Spain and in the EU and NATO.
Between March and October 2019, he led the EU Operation Atalanta to combat piracy in the Indian Ocean and subsequently assumed command of the High Readiness Maritime Headquarters. In May 2020 he was appointed Admiral of the Fleet. He holds the Great Cross of Merit of the Navy and that of the Royal and Military Order of San Hermenegildo, as well as twelve other national and foreign military decorations.
“It is a very sad day for the Department of Defense, the Navy and all armed forces,” said a defense spokeswoman, adding that Secretary Margarita Robles had already offered her condolences to the admiral’s family. The sudden death of the naval chief will force the minister to find a replacement for him and retouch a military leadership he intended to maintain until the end of the legislature.
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