A week after the overthrow of Iraq's Dictator Abdul Karim Kassem. the crack of rifle fire still echoed in Baghdad's Liberation Square. Tanks and armored cars kept stern vigil at every important intersection. Scurrying everywhere were the little squads of men wearing green armbands—ferrets who sought to find and to crush the last remaining opposition to Rebel President Abdul Salam Aref and his mysterious revolutionary backers.
Who were these new rulers? In the modern mode, Aref, 41, gritted his teeth and presented himself at the Baghdad Hotel for the inevitable press conference with the swarm of foreign correspondents, an ordeal he seemed to regard as in some ways worse than the historic night of the coup itself. More than a hundred shouting reporters and photographers pushed aside his tommy-gun-waving guard and crowded around Iraq's boss to hear Aref speak freely about the aims and purposes of the new government. He said something about an end to one-man rule, friendship with all Arab states, and the "overcoming of all the difficulties facing the Iraqi people." But he was mysteriously silent about the size or membership of the all-powerful National Council of the Revolutionary Command, which organized and led the revolt against Kassem.
No Personalities. Said Aref: "This is a secret which must remain a secret for many reasons.'' Asked why. English-speaking Aref replied volubly in Arabic. Pressed again for an answer, Aref suddenly announced, "The conference is closed," and departed, surrounded by his guards.
The reason for such secrecy seems to be a general revulsion against the self-glorification of Kassem's four-year dictatorship. "We revolted against the cult of personality,'I explained new Foreign Minister Talib Hussein Shabib. 32. To the key question of who is boss of the new Iraq, the answer seems to be: at the moment, no one man. President Aref cannot make major decisions without the concurrence of the mysterious National Council.
But highly visible was the new 21-man Cabinet, and most Western observers liked what they saw. Said one: "In general, they're a topnotch bunch of responsible, eager, exceptionally well-educated people." Many of the ministers have lived or have been educated in the West, ranging from Foreign Minister Shabib, who graduated from London University and is married to an Englishwoman, to Finance Minister Salih Kubba, who attended the University of California and has an international reputation as an economist. Seven of the new Cabinet ministers were in Kassem's concentration camp at Rashid military base until the rebels broke down the gates during the coup.