Revolt No. 8

In Syria, Egypt's Gamal Abdel Nasser was gone but not forgotten. And even though the Syrian army last fall broke the four-year-old union with Egypt and brought to power a civilian government, nobody in the army wanted to go back to the bad old days of government indifference to social problems.

The new government began eroding such measures of "Arab socialism" as land reform and nationalization. Fortnight ago, the Syrian officer corps overthrew the civilian government and threw the President and his top officials in jail on charges of "corruption and sabotage." But the army corps was not united on what next. Some just wanted a left-of-center government free of Egyptian domination. A younger group of officers, especially those in the Aleppo garrison in the north, wanted a rebirth of the union with Egypt as well as a return to Nasser's all-out socialist policies.

Pocket Money. Last week the army split broke out into the open. Commander in Chief General Abdel Karim Zahreddin, a middle-of-the-roader, tried to get the two factions together in the middle-of-the-road town of Horns. Up from ancient Damascus came the conservative, high-ranking officers who supported General Zahreddin; down from Aleppo in the north came hotheaded, pro-Nasser junior officers of Colonel Louis Atassi. After a nightlong acrimonious debate, the officers emerged smiling into the daylight to announce complete agreement.

On paper, it seemed a victory for the Nasserites. Colonel Abdel Karim Nahlawi, a ringleader of the original coup, and six of his more conservative associates were denounced for "seeking personal power" and exiled to Switzerland (each was consoled with $3,000 in expense money from the national treasury). The Damascus high command promised to rule the country with Nasser socialism, minus Nasser, and agreed to a national plebiscite on the question of reunion with Egypt and an eventual return to what was described as "clean democracy."

Road to Aleppo. Returning to Aleppo, the pro-Nasser officers were greeted by jubilant crowds of soldiers, students, police and workers singing Nasser songs and shouting Nasser slogans. Huge new color pictures of Nasser billowed from office buildings and military headquarters. Nasser partisans seized control of Aleppo radio and practically declared war on Damascus by announcing that "free officers" were in control of northern Syria and demanding instant union with Egypt. "We belong heart and soul to Nasser!" cried the announcer. "We are his lion cubs! Long live Arab unity!"

The word reached the capital of Damascus that 20 "moderate" Syrian military men had been murdered by Nasserite mobs. While he quietly made sure of the loyalty of other garrisons. General Zahreddin imposed martial law on Damascus, closed the nation's borders and airports, and sited batteries of recoilless guns on the road to Aleppo.

When preparations were complete, Zahreddin broadcast an ultimatum ordering "all officers and soldiers of the Aleppo garrison" to be confined to barracks. A Russian-made jet of the Syrian air force dropped two bombs in a futile attempt to knock out the Aleppo transmitter. The announcer hysterically broadcast news of the attack and begged Nasser to send Egyptian paratroops to save the situation. But Cairo replied only that Nasser "heard with grief-stricken heart the report of air operations by the Syrian air force against the people and army of the northern region." Damascus radio blasted the Aleppo officers as "traitors" who were taking orders from their "masters in Cairo." An armored column, spearheaded by 56 Russian T-54 tanks, drove northward toward Aleppo. Since it was clear that no help was coming from Cairo, the rebels hastily submitted, and, even before the armored column reached Aleppo's outskirts, the garrison humbly informed Damascus it was obeying orders and confining itself to barracks. Relatively bloodless though it was, the Aleppo revolt nevertheless made history of a sort--it was Syria's second in a week, its eighth in 13 years and, finally, the only military revolt in Syria that has ever failed.

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