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One reason is the fact that all "backward peoples" have begun to realize that poverty and inequality need not be their lot. Another reason lies in the burning sands of the Negeb desert, where in 1948 the Egyptian army was routed by the Israelis. The Egyptian troops were badly equipped, badly trained and badly led; but the defeat was taken as proof that Egypt's corrupt ruling class had emasculated the country. Egyptian officers, recalls Mohammed Naguib, "were filled with shame . . . We were bitter that our country should be kicked into the dust of the road." In 1950, the Palestine arms scandal broke, and the country learned that swindlers had piled up a fortune of $500,000 by selling the army dud ammunition which exploded prematurely, killing dozens of front-line soldiers. Calling themselves the "Free Officers," a group of young Palestine veterans joined in a national protest presented to the King by the opposition parties. But Farouk took no notice. "[His] ears were as of stone," says Naguib, "his eyes as of ice. He scorned these warnings and called their authors children."
The Free Officers decided on a coup d'état. They drew up elaborate plans and asked Naguib, the most popular and trusted senior officer, to take command. After much soul-searching, he agreed.
The Coup. Zero hour was at 1:30 a.m. on July 23. Special duty squads seized strong points at the approaches to Cairo; jeeploads of young officers roared into town, rapped at doors and windows, and rounded up eleven generals and a battalion of sleepy colonels, including Naguib's brother Aly, commander of the Cairo garrison. "Shall I personally inform General Aly's wife?" a young officer asked Naguib. "Do the same as you did with the others." Naguib ordered, and his brother was packed off to jail.*
Naguib's intention was to purge the army and the government of corruption and take Farouk down a peg. But the more extreme members of the officers' committee urged him to get rid of the King altogether. They were backed up by the Moslem Brotherhood, a fanatic, powerful secret society, 500,000 strong.
Even after the King was forced into exile, Naguib's instinct was to leave politics to the professionals. To run the country and clothe the army's decrees in decently legal dress, he chose Aly Maher, 69, a wealthy conservative with a good record as a reformer. Naguib went to great lengths to avoid the impression that he planned a personal dictatorship. He turned down the title "Farik" (Marshal), refused to move into the royal palace. Impressed by Naguib's modesty, a Briton who has lived in Cairo 20 years said last week: "It's incredible that out of all this corruption and hatred and hysteria there has come so good a man—a good man in every way."