[10] He completed his bachelor's degree in military administration from the Higher School of War in 1978 and graduated as an officer of the General Staff of the Mexican Army.

He was appointed as the head of the Plans Subsection of the 4th Section of the General Staff of National Defense on 16 August 1980, serving in the position till 28 February 1982.

[10] He was appointed as an associate professor of the Logistics and Services section at his alma mater of Higher School of War on 16 June 1983, serving in that position till 31 August.

[10] On 1 January 1984, Cienfuegos was appointed as the professor of the General Staff section at the Higher School of War and stayed there till 31 August.

[10] He was deployed as a military and air attaché to the Mexican embassies of Japan and South Korea from 1 November 1988 to 31 October 1990, while being based in Tokyo.

Although he regretted the killing, he stated that the behavior of the parents of the victim in initiating legal proceedings over it was not manly, but that of snitches, and asked other cadets to not talk about it to anyone.

[10] He was promoted to the rank of brigade general in 1997, and upon receiving it was also appointed as the director of his alma mater Heroic Military College, remaining in the position till the year 2000.

[23][24] Anabel Hernández alleges in her book México en Llamas that Sergio Villarreal Barragán, lieutenant of the Beltrán-Leyva Cartel, appointed him to protect the organization in 2005.

[28] He coordinated with the Secretary of Public Security Genaro García Luna in the war on drugs, though the journalist J. Jesús Lemus alleges that this was just a show.

Lemus alleges that this allowed the H-2 Cartel led by Juan Francisco Patrón Sánchez or "El H2", to expand its activities into the states of Chiapas and Tabasco.

[29] Cienfuegos stated in April 2011 that the Mexican Army faced a bigger problem from the organized crime in Chiapas, rather than the EZLN.

Cienfuegos relinquished the charge after being appointed as the senior officer for the Secretariat of National Defense on 17 January 2012 in place of General Miranda, who had announced his retirement.

[41][42] In an interview with El Universal in June 2015, he criticized the 2014 reform by the Congress of the Union, subjecting the army to prosecution by civilian courts for crimes and stated that it made the force vulnerable.

[43] After the publication of a video showing soldiers torturing a young woman in Ajuchitlán del Progreso in 2015 however, Cienfuegos apologized for the incident on 16 April 2016 unlike past instances, while urging people to report about any abuses they were aware of.

He also called for a debate on the Internal Security Law [es], which allowed the armed forces to take over the responsibility of police organizations failing to control crime, something he opposed.

[47] On 20 November 2017 however he called on President Nieto to have the Internal Security Law passed by the Congress, stating that the army required a legal framework to define its role.

[48] Cienfuegos stringently opposed presidential candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador's statement about pardoning cartel bosses in December 2017, while terming it electoral propaganda.

[50] The University of Sciences and Arts of Chiapas intended to give an honorary doctorate to Cienfuegos, but suspended its decision in February 2018 after outcry from the staff and students who pointed at the controversies the military had been involved in.

[39] After Obrador's victory in the 2018 Mexican general election, he held discussions with Cienfuegos to choose his successor, something he had not decided upon quickly unlike other positions.

[64] Media outlets reported that the charges had been dropped under pressure from the Mexican federal government, which had threatened to expel DEA agents from the country.

[62] Secretary of Foreign Affairs Marcelo Ebrard said that the changes were all about reciprocity and stated that they were "not asking for anything which isn't expected of a Mexican diplomatic agent abroad.

[28][68] He was arrested for running over an agent at the intersection of Calle Maestro Antonio Caso and Manuel María Contreras streets in Mexico City in May 1980.