Chapter 11, Part 11: Item One: The Iraqi Conspiracy

Item One: The Iraqi Conspiracy

Syria's revolt against the Western pacts, which Nuri al-Said's Iraq represented in the Arab region, remained a nightmare that kept Western politicians and Nuri al-Said's supporters awake at night. The subversive work against Syria, aimed at destroying its political system, took two directions:

The first: preparing the Syrian military men who had fled abroad, to Iraq in particular. The British author Patrick Seale states "that the number of Syrian officers exiled abroad as a result of the military coups was greater than their number in the Syrian army".[1]

The second: recruiting certain influential people at home to back a possible military move. The political world was taken by surprise by news of a carefully woven conspiracy, which the military judiciary took in hand.

Prime Minister Sabri al-Asali gave a detailed statement about it at a secret session of the Chamber of Deputies on 22 November 1956.[2]

This statement said the following:

1. The military apparatus in the two Iraqi embassies in Damascus and Beirut worked to weave a conspiracy to overthrow the Syrian regime.

The threads of this conspiracy began to be spun from March 1956 by the hands of two senior Iraqi military men, Major General Ghazi al-Daghestani and Colonel Salih Mahdi al-Samarra'i.

2. From April until July 1956 contact was made with Adib al-Shishakli in Switzerland, where al-Daghestani paid him the sum of thirty thousand dinars.

Al-Shishakli came to Beirut, and there the conspirators decided to assassinate a number of military men and civilians, headed by Akram al-Hourani, Khalid Bakdash and Abd al-Hamid al-Sarraj.. (These names were given by the Prime Minister.)

3. Among the pillars of the conspiracy was the "Free Syria Government" group formed by Colonel Muhammad Safa in Baghdad in al-Shishakli's days.

4. Britain and America knew of the planning of the conspiracy, and they agreed to prevent any Turkish or Israeli move at this stage.

5. Mikhail Ilyan argued over the hour for starting the actual operation and insisted that it be 30 October 1956.

6. The Syrian government seized several large vehicles loaded with arms coming from Iraq; they were seized in the eastern desert and in the province of Jabal al-Druze.

7. The Iraqi government took supporting measures in case the internal situation in Syria exploded, and it placed an army brigade on the Syrian Iraqi border.

The deputies were divided between those who believed without reservation that the conspiracy was real and those who doubted the statements of the Deuxième Bureau (that is, the secret security service).

Although I was a member of the cabinet, its head, al-Asali, did not wish to add anything to what he had said in the Chamber of Deputies. So there was nothing left for us but to wait for the military investigating judge's decision, so that the circumstances would come to light more clearly.

The indictment was issued on 22 December 1956, charging 47 people with the felony of conspiracy, among them thirteen members of the Chamber of Deputies.[3]

There was only one member of the People's Party among them, Dr. Adnan al-Atassi. He was known to us for his dislike of leftist tendencies and of Soviet policy, but we had never thought he could become involved in dangerous conspiracies.

The Prime Minister promptly submitted the government's resignation and formed it again on 31 December 1956.

The People's Party did not take part in the new cabinet.

Two years later I attended a meeting of the union's Council of Ministers in Cairo, after Sabri al-Asali had been removed from the post of Vice President of the Republic, at which Akram al-Hourani and the military ministers demanded that Sabri al-Asali be referred to the State Security Court on a charge of involvement in this conspiracy and of taking Iraqi money. This was what some of the Iraqi defendants had said, and their statements were broadcast on Radio Baghdad after the overthrow of the monarchy on 14 July 1958.

I listened to the discussion in a state of shock. Fortunately for me, no one asked for my opinion, contrary to what some of those who have written the history of that period have said..

In fairness, it was President Abdel Nasser who protected Sabri al-Asali and refused to have him tried, because "that has become the past.. Yesterday he was Vice President of the Republic, and today he is to be tried for treason.. That is unreasonable."

He insisted that he not be referred to the courts, but he removed him from the government.

Chance brought me together with Prime Minister al-Asali in Bloudan after he had left office, with Rushdi al-Kikhya and Rashad Barmada present at the gathering.. He began criticizing the union and denouncing President Abdel Nasser and the Egyptians for having "taken Syria's long-staple cotton and given us short-staple Egyptian cotton..". At that I explained to him how the President had protected him from trial.. and I set out for him the story of the cotton, which he knew well.. In short, Syria needed twisted steel bars of a certain size.. from Czechoslovakia. That country did not want short-staple cotton (which is what Syrian cotton is, contrary to what al-Asali said), so Egypt gave it long-staple cotton from its own fine crop and sold our cotton to Cuba and took the price.. So the deal was a clear gain for Syria, thanks to Egyptian cotton.

The defendants were tried before a military court presided over by Colonel Afif al-Bizri, with Major General Muhammad al-Jarrah as its public prosecutor.

On 27 February 1957 the court delivered its judgment in the case, sentencing 18 defendants to death.

But the death sentences were commuted to hard labor for life by a decision of the Minister of Defense.. One day in the days of the union, when I was carrying a personal message to him from President al-Atassi about his son Adnan, President Abdel Nasser told me that he had intervened personally with the Syrian government to prevent the death sentences from being carried out.

In fact, in the first days of the union he decided to move the convicted men to Cairo, treated them as political refugees and paid them monthly allowances.. This is a story worth pausing over for a moment.

In the early days of the union with Egypt, President al-Atassi asked me to visit him at the house of his imprisoned son.. I was Minister of Justice.. He charged me with carrying a message from him to President Abdel Nasser.

And indeed we were invited to a meeting of the Council of Ministers held in Cairo.. During the break I went in to the President in his room.. and delivered al-Atassi's message.. He asked me for my impressions of the trial as Minister of Justice.. I told him in all honesty.. it was a trial that lacked the legal guarantees that would satisfy the conscience.[4].. I told him that the people were overjoyed at this union, and that the families of these "politicians" had a right to rejoice too.. He did not hesitate to say: We will release them.. At this point Sabri al-Asali, who was Vice President of the Republic, came in and joined the conversation, but he proposed putting off the release for the time being.. It was a sad proposal. The President fell silent, reluctantly.

But the President did not forget his promise, and some time later he freed them by taking them to Cairo..

The Western foreign ministries have lifted the veil on some of the secret documents now that 25 to 30 years have passed since them.[5] But they still keep the most dangerous documents secret.

The documents relate that the intelligence man Kassen paid money to some Syrians to recruit them into the conspiracy. The names of Ma'mun al-Kuzbari, Lutfi al-Haffar, Mikhail Ilyan, Sabri al-Asali and Adnan al-Atassi appear, among others.

The book al-Masuniyya wal-Masuniyyun fil-Watan al-Arabi (Freemasonry and Freemasons in the Arab World) by Mr. Husayn Umar Hamada[6] contains the following:

Iraqi Ministry of Foreign Affairs

Exhibit No. 88, dated 29/8/1955

The military attaché in Beirut, in the presence of al-Jamali, handed over the following:

2546 dinars to His Excellency Mikhail Ilyan.

1000 dinars to Nadhir Fansa.

We heard a great deal about these exhibits, to our deep regret, on Radio Baghdad. They were presented to the military court presided over by Colonel Fadil Abbas al-Mahdawi.[7]

I quote the following from the book of Mr. Mohamed Hassanein Heikal, citing Western documents:

From a report submitted by Fadil al-Jamali to Nuri al-Said:

"Sabri al-Asali, Prime Minister of Syria, met me at the Hotel du Jabal in Broummana, Lebanon, together with Mr. Mikhail Ilyan, in the presence of Ahmad Mukhtar Pasha, and the meeting went on until one in the morning.. Here is my summary of the situation for Your Excellency:

We reviewed the possibility of using an Iraqi army, and found no possibility of doing so..

Nor can any Israeli aggression against Syria be exploited, because that might lead to an international conflict in which Israel would have the upper hand..

So we must work to win over the Syrian army and rally it to the side of "our friends". And a letter that John Foster Dulles submitted to President Eisenhower contains the following:

"The Middle East has lately become a principal target of communist ambitions. The Chinese communists and the Soviets have exploited every opportunity available to sow division and instability in the region.. We are following developments in Syria with concern, since they affect the peace, calm and prosperity of the region."

Dulles (the American Secretary of State) sent a telegram to the American ambassador in London, dated 21 August 1957, to inform the British government of his country's intentions, which said:

"We are deeply concerned at the events in Syria. There seems to be no hope of correction from within, and we must think of the outside possibilities, which lie in the deep concern felt by the Muslim states that share borders with Syria. We may need to be ready to accept a degree of serious risk in order to avoid greater risks and dangers later."

The United States ambassador passed on to his State Department a conversation in which Ben-Gurion had told him:

"It is impossible to distinguish between Syria and Russia. Israel is the final target of the arms flowing from the Soviet Union into Syria..

What is needed is a strong American move like the moves that stopped the Soviets in their tracks."

In response to this telegram, the State Department sent its envoy Loy Henderson to the region of the East.

President Abdel Nasser was troubled by this fierce campaign against Syria, and he explained his concern to the American ambassador, Raymond Hare, saying that he "could see no justification for this campaign against that country.. and that he feared there were plans to invade Syria on the pretext of international and local communism. He told him he could assure him that there was nothing to justify such claims.. "and that Egypt could not stand silent before these dangers surrounding Syria".[8]

The events of this conspiracy went hand in hand with the events of the Suez War.. to smooth the way for Israel and its two allies, France and England.. but it was strangled in its cradle.

Endnotes:

[1] The Struggle for Syria, p. 352. There is no doubt that this statement is a gross exaggeration, but there is equally no doubt that the succession of coups did harm to the armed forces.

[2] Naturally the Prime Minister would tell us in the Council of Ministers some of the news of the conspiracy, but he always deliberately kept it brief, on the grounds that the judiciary had the case in hand.

[3] The accused deputies were:
Adnan al-Atassi, Sami Kabbara, Mikhail Ilyan, Subhi al-Umari, Hayil al-Surur, Hasan al-Atrash, Faisal al-Asali, Farzat al-Mamluk, the poet Badawi al-Jabal (Muhammad Sulayman al-Ahmad), Nuri ibn Muhayd, Adil al-Ajlani, Fadlallah Jarbu' and Hamid Mansur. Among the accused civilians were Uthman al-A'idi and Adib al-Shishakli, and some exiled military men: Muhammad Maaruf, Muhammad Safa, Husayn al-Hakim and Salah al-Shishakli.

[4] The court admitted lawyers for a civil party claim, one of them Abd al-Fattah al-Zalt of Aleppo, although the legal rule is that such a claim is not admissible before exceptional military courts. And no one knows who this civil claimant was whose civil rights had been harmed. A famous lawyer came from Lebanon to defend the accused, as was their right, Dr. Edmond Rabbath, but he was insulted at the border and abused at the door of the court by unknown elements. After that he did not come back from Lebanon, and no self-respecting lawyer could accept a brief in this case, even though the law requires the presence of a lawyer.
I myself declined to act for Hayil al-Surur, because I felt that the legal guarantees were missing.

[5] The Saudi newspaper "al-Sharq al-Awsat" published a number of these documents in 1989. Mr. Mohamed Hassanein Heikal also published in his book "Sanawat al-Infijar" (The Years of the Explosion) an appendix containing a collection of important documents.. For example: document No. 20 (inciting Israel against Syria, dated 22/8/1957), document 2 (on the talks between Eisenhower's envoy Loy Henderson and Charles Malik on the situation in Syria, dated 28/8/1957), document 23 (Henderson's conversation with Camille Chamoun, President of Lebanon, dated 29/8/1957) and document No. 25 (a copy of the cheques Abd al-Hamid al-Sarraj received from King Saud to do away with Abdel Nasser). When I became Minister of the Treasury in the days of the union, I received the sum of one million nine hundred thousand pounds sterling as extraordinary revenue, with which the deficit of the state treasury was balanced, and the middlemen "swallowed" one hundred thousand of it, as Abd al-Hamid al-Sarraj told me when I asked him about the shortfall. This affair was a blessing and a godsend for the Syrian treasury.

[6] Printed in Damascus and Nicosia in 1986, p. 208.

[7] The proceedings of this trial were published in several volumes.

[8] Sanawat al-Ghalayan, pp. 235-256.