Barracks of Light Artillery Regiment No. 1 (RAL 1, later RALIS)

On 25 April 1974, Light Artillery Regiment No. 1, at the entrance to the Autoestrada do Norte motorway, was not one of the Movement’s units: most of its officers had not joined, and the barracks had been reinforced by elements from Lanceiros 2, with two M-47 tanks. The MFA officer, Captain Rosário Simões, had the task of neutralising it, and the day before the guns had been sabotaged. Officers of the Movement had been held prisoner here since the Caldas uprising of 16 March; they were freed late in the afternoon, when Captains Rui Rodrigues and Albuquerque, of the Infantry Practical School, arrived from the airport.⁸

On 11 March 1975, the barracks was the main target of the attempted coup by members of the military linked to General António de Spínola. At around 11:45, aircraft from Air Base No. 3 attacked the unit; at midday, paratroopers from the Parachute Light Infantry Regiment at Tancos, under the command of Major Mensurado, surrounded it. The soldier Joaquim Carvalho Luís was killed, 15 people were wounded and there was a great deal of damage.² The RAL 1 soldiers, commanded by Captain Diniz de Almeida, occupied the buildings opposite and defended the barracks from inside. Members of the public rushed there, mobilised by the Intersindical and by workers’ and residents’ committees, and weapons were even handed out to some of them.⁴

Once the ceasefire had been negotiated, Diniz de Almeida spoke outside with the paratrooper captain Sebastião Martins, in front of the RTP cameras: “Our commanders gave us opposite orders… You to attack… me to defend myself” (Os nossos chefes deram-nos ordens contrárias… A si de atacar… a mim de me defender). The conversation showed how badly informed the attackers were.²⁴ At around 14:40, the paratroopers lifted the siege, and soldiers and civilians fraternised; in the evening there was a popular demonstration outside the barracks.² Spínola and 15 officers fled by helicopter to the Talavera la Real air base, in Spain.³

11 March radicalised the revolution: Constitutional Law No. 5/75 of 14 March created the Council of the Revolution and the MFA Assembly, and on the same day the commercial banks were nationalised.⁵⁶ Months later, the unit was renamed RALIS, the Lisbon Artillery Regiment.² On 25 November 1975, its forces took up positions on the approaches to the Autoestrada do Norte, Portela airport and Beirolas, where the war matériel depot was.⁹