In 1911, he went to Melilla, a historical Spanish stronghold in North Africa since 1497, and he joined his father, Colonel Francisco Gómez Jordana.

After 13 September 1923 coup d'état, led by General Miguel Primo de Rivera, Gómez-Jordana became a member of the Military Directory.

Primo de Rivera conferred upon him wide powers to deal with colonial initiatives in Africa, including the "peacemaking resorts" within the Spanish protectorate in Morocco.

The military actions led to the exile of the Rif independence leader Muhammad Ibn 'Abd al-Karim al-Khattabi, commonly known as Abd el-Krim, from Ajdir in the Berber area of Morocco, a locus of the resistance movement.

Broadly speaking, the XVIII and XIX Military Academies in Spain had been located traditionally at Toledo, Infantry, 1850, Segovia, Artillery, 1764, Alcalá de Henares, Engineers, 1803, Valladolid, Cavalry, 1852.

They banded together with members of other rather small liberal and regionalist republican parties and called for action to support modern civil liberties and progress in education.

A civil law notary, Manuel Azaña, and a professor of chemistry at the University of Salamanca, José Giral, were founders of the Republican Action Spain from the Pact of San Sebastián.