While sheiks gaped, burros reared and camels stopped chewing their cuds, over the long yellow ripples of the Syrian Desert at 65 m.p.h. last week whizzed a vehicle the like of which neither Iraq nor any other place in the world had ever seen. It was the world's first stainless-steel sleeper-trailer bus, built in Philadelphia by E. G. Budd Manufacturing Co. for the 600-mile run between Bagdad and Damascus. On this long trip with its one watering place—the oasis at Rutba Wells—the road is marked for only 200 miles.
Rest of the way...