UNITED ARAB REPUBLIC: O My Brothers

The mixture of rocket-rattling boasts by Nikita Khrushchev and of policeman’s caution by his head cop, Ivan Serov, in the Nasser-Khrushchev huddle in the Kremlin a fortnight ago undoubtedly underlined for Gamal Abdel Nasser one fact: the U.S. arrival in the Middle East was a big new event that outweighs Moscow’s words.

The dictator of the Nile, after a triumphal pause in Damascus to greet the leaders of the Iraqi army coup, had returned to his capital for an occasion: the sixth anniversary of the army-led revolution that first raised him to power in Egypt.

Strapping in a well-tailored grey-blue suit, he swaggered into Cairo’s canopied Republic Square. Just two years earlier, getting ready to nationalize the Suez Canal Co., he had yelled: “Americans, may you choke to death in your fury.” Now the crowd of 100,000, assembled by trucks and bargain-rate excursion trains from all over Egypt, roared “Ya Gamal!” (O Gamal!). At length, the huge square stilled, and the President and his honor guests from Iraq waited briefly, during a reading from the Koran: “Those who oppose truth will die angry, but we will conquer.” Then, mopping the sweat off his face with a handkerchief, Nasser launched into his speech.

Help for Humanity. “When the July 14 revolution occurred in Baghdad,” he proclaimed, “the meeting of the Arab people, O my brothers, came as a natural process. The agreement between us was signed long ago in your hearts, by you the people in this republic and in the Iraqi republic. And, brethren, Beirut will attain its victory with God’s help, and Amman too, and so will Jerusalem and every fighting Arab city. The armed British aggression on Jordan shall be defeated, and the American armed aggression against Lebanon, but the free people of Jordan and Lebanon shall remain.”

Arab nationalism, Nasser insisted, is not belligerent. “When we nationalized the Suez Canal,” he shouted, “imperialism and its leaders rose and said that Egypt would close the canal. But did we close it? We left the canal to be an instrument of good for us and humanity. When your brethren in Iraq rose to demolish tyranny and oppression, the imperialists said that Iraq would stop the flow of oil, but the free and honest leaders of Iraq announced that they would adhere to their international and trade agreements.

“The Iraq revolution broke out,” said Nasser blandly, “while I was in Yugoslavia.” He pictured both Egypt and Tito’s Yugoslavia as lands that had rescued themselves from “oppressive forces” that “wanted to colonize them”—but in such an ambiguous way that he could always tell the Russians that the only oppressors he had in mind in Yugoslavia’s case were the old Austro-Hungarian empire or the Nazis.

When Nasser got down to the Dertinent topic of what his revolution had accomplished inside his own country, he touched with unexpected frankness on his troubles in exploiting his victorious annexation of “the northern region of Syria,” which was presumably a richer economy than Egypt’s. Confessed Nasser: “The past five months of union have not achieved the degree of production we had hoped for. I did not acquaint myself with the budget of the Syrian region before proclaiming unity. It seems there was a deficit in Syria’s budget. Syria’s reserve had all been spent. The task was very hard and complicated, but I hope we shall recover . . .”

Lust for Blood. By far the most untrammeled passages in Nasser’s speech were his attacks on Jordan’s Hussein, the fearless young Hashemite monarch who had expelled the British from his country in 1957, but turned openly against Nasser when the Egyptian tried to drive him off his throne. “Hussein,” said Nasser, “deviated and disavowed and deceived the people, and followed in the footsteps of his grandfather King Abdullah by inviting the British to occupy his country. Brothers, today there is treason, and another occupation, but it will end. The Arab homeland and people will eliminate the imperialist collaborators. Hussein is exactly like his grandfather Abdullah . . .”

This was about as explicit an invitation to assassination (which was Abdullah’s fate in 1951) as any Arab hothead or plotter needed.

For days thereafter the Cairo and Damascus radios blared Nasser’s invitation to assassination to the marketplaces of Jordan, two-thirds of whose people are Palestinian Arabs sympathetic to Nasser. Other bloodthirsty cries rent the Arab air.

Cried Iraqi’s Education Minister Jabir Ummar at Nasser’s “Revolution Day” rally: “Brothers, having wiped disgrace from its face and cleansed its defilement by agents with pieces of their bodies in Baghdad’s streets, we come to you with our new Arab Iraqi revolution.” The Baghdad radio called on Jordanians to “rise up and kill Hussein.” And the reply of Hussein’s Amman radio was to ask Iraqis: “Why have you not avenged the innocent blood shed in Baghdad? Would you leave the honor of revenge for others? What is the use of living if descendants of the Prophet are killed before your eyes? Take revenge, brothers. God is with you.”

Just Tired. Nasser’s own Cairo speech marched toward its end on a more muted note. He welcomed Khrushchev’s proposal for a summit meeting on the Middle East—even though in the first Russian proposal for five-power talks there was no mention of inviting any Arab country. Said Nasser: “At the same time that we maintain mobilization and carry arms, we also call for peace . . . We are tired of the cold war, we are tired of military groupings, we are tired of the division of the world into two camps . . . Indeed, we are tired of the daily threat of war . . .”

On this note, his speech trailed off. and almost as quickly as he had appeared, Gamal Abdel Nasser disappeared to a waiting black limousine.