Princess Leonor begins her three years of military training this Thursday that will prepare her after passing through the academies of the Army, the Air and Space Force and the Navy to become in the future, once she is Queen, the Captain General of the Armed Forces, as dictated by the Constitution.
The heiress to the crown, who will follow in the footsteps of her father, Felipe VI, and will first attend military training before completing her university studies, is facing this new stage in her “happy” training, as she recently acknowledged during the delivery of the Princess of Girona Awards.
“This is an important moment in my life and I feel very excited and convinced to continue learning and giving my best spirit to strengthen the values ​​with which I have grown,” she said, citing among them “respect for others, effort, excellence, search for knowledge, temperance, discipline, perseverance”.
The Princess of Asturias will join the General Academy of the Army of Zaragoza this Thursday, but this will not be the first time that she has come to the centre, since she had the opportunity to see the facilities on July 7 when she accompanied the King to the ceremony of delivery of the diplomas to the new lieutenants.
Their arrival at ‘la General’, as it is popularly known, must take place between 10:00 a.m. and 12:00 p.m., according to the schedule set by the director of the academy, General Manuel Pérez López, for students aspiring to the Army General Corps.
Like her companions, the Princess can be accompanied by up to four family members, who are scheduled to be offered a one-and-a-half-hour tour of the Academy to see the facilities. Although it is practically taken for granted that the King and Queen will accompany their daughter on this important day, from Zarzuela they have not wanted to confirm her presence, since they have framed the date of this Thursday in the private agenda of the Royal Family.
In accordance with the planned calendar, a first phase of reception, orientation and adaptation will take place until August 30 for the 612 new students, of whom 140 are women. During it, the cadets will acquire basic knowledge about military legislation and regulations and will take an English test to determine their level according to NATO standards and thus be able to classify the class groups.
After that, Princess Leonor and the rest of the classmates will undergo a level exam between August 31 and September 1. Then, until September 10, the instruction and training phase will take place.
During these two weeks, different activities are carried out such as marches, topographical tours, shooting exercises with assault rifles and pistols in a simulator or live fire exercises with various individual and collective weapons, as explained by the Academy on its website, all of this both in day as night and regardless of the weather conditions at the time.
The first semester will start on September 11 and on September 19 the act of delivery of sabres is scheduled, which symbolises obtaining the title of lady cadet in the case of the Princess and in which a second-year cadet makes delivery of this weapon to one of the first. The next day, the course will officially start.
The first great day of her military career will arrive for the eldest daughter of the King and Queen on October 7, when the pledge of allegiance to the new cadets and, predictably, to the Princess of Asturias, will take place. However, it should be remembered that her father, then still Prince of Asturias, swore the flag alone in an act held in October 1985 and chaired by Juan Carlos I.
With her kiss to the ensign, Princess Leonor will materialise her oath or promise to defend Spain, even with her life, and in her case she will also put an end to her studies in the first year.
The heiress to the throne will receive military training expressly prepared for her by the Government with the approval of the Kings. For this, the five years of studies have been condensed into three, hence, after passing through Zaragoza, the second year she will continue with military training at the MarÃn Naval School, in Pontevedra, where she will embark on the Juan Sebastián Elcano training ship. Finally, the third year she will study at the General Air and Space Academy in San Javier (Murcia).
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