Egyptian communists and the free officers: 1950–54

Abstract

In January 1950, the Wafd was returned to power in the last truly free general election in Egypt's modern political history. After Mustafa al-Nahhas released numerous political prisoners from the jails and camps in whlich they were held, he welcomed a more open political atmosphere than that which existed under his predecessors. Once again, conditions became ripe for a renewal of political activity.' The nationalist and anti-colonialist movement, quiescent for several years, was reactivated, the university campuses were alive with political militancy, workers' strikes multiplied through the country, the peace movement rallied, and the Communist movement was again building up its forces. When al-Nahhas repudiated the Anglo-Egyptian Treaty in October 1951 and insisted on the total and immediate evacuation of the British from Egyptian soil, the nationalist opposition responded by staging demonstrations and engaging in a guerrilla war against the British. After news of the massacre of the Buluk Nizam troops reached Cairo on 26 January 1952, great crowds massed in the streets of the city denouncing both the domestic political hierarchy and the British occupation. Meanwhile a crisis of governing existed: from January to July 1952 four Cabinets succeeded one another. Some speculated that it was the Communists or the Muslim Brothers who appeared to be the natural heirs to political power in Egypt. Each was organized, politically conscious and gaining in popularity.2 Yet both groups were unable to capture the moment. Instead, a small, secretive, politically diverse military group overthrew the royalist regime on 23 July 1952. The Free Officers, who actually carried the day, were not the military, nor the army as such, but a political movement within the military, and this is a very important distinction. The Free Officers' movement was a kind of national front within the military in which all the opposition trends were represented Communists, Muslim Brothers and Wafdists. The genius of Gamal Abdul Nasser was that he was able to gather around himself a group of officers who agreed on a limited number of principles for the reshaping of Egypt. Through this representative military opposition, Nasser ultimately took control of the country. Nasser required all those who worked with him to discipline their relations with their own political organizations to avoid security leakages. He did not ask his collaborators to give up their ideology, only to veil organizational ties behind allegiance to the Free Officers' group. The unity of the Free Officers was the combined result of a shared past, school ties, combat experience and their common hatred of the status quo. Having their social roots in the petty bourgeoisie, for the most part, meant that there was a certain cohesion to their group and an aversion to the traditional political parties from which they felt excluded and by which they