MOROCCO: Violence & Vacillation

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Across the Mediterranean to troubled North Africa poured the greatest flow of reinforcements since the days when Rommel's Afrika Korps held sway. The French cruiser Montcalm landed a battalion of French infantrymen at Casablanca, and a steamer brought 400 more; nine battalions started moving to Algeria, following the six from Germany that had already arrived; transport aircraft brought naval commandos. Back in France, 100,000 conscripts had their period of service lengthened indefinitely; 50,000 reservists were recalled to the colors. All told, the rapid build-up brought French strength in colonial North Africa to some 200,000 men —more than there are on the Rhine.

The politicians hoped that the French punitive expeditions had already broken the back of the Arab revolt; yet last week the killings went on. In Morocco, nationalist saboteurs burned French gasoline dumps; in Algeria, rebel bands fought a four-hour battle with the Foreign Legion, and 54 died. Even in relatively tranquil Tunisia, 23 rebels and eleven Frenchmen were killed in a sudden outbreak. Total casualties in North Africa since Aug. 20: close to 3,000 dead, thousands more wounded.

Angry Cabinet. Violence in North Africa was matched by unseemly vacillation in Paris. Fumbling for a political solution to Morocco's dynastic question, Premier Edgar Faure presided at a bitter twelve-hour Cabinet session—the longest anyone in Paris could remember. Faure asked the conservatives in his right-center coalition to accept the "double dismissal plan" he had worked out with Morocco's leaders (TIME, Sept. 5). The hardest man to convince was Faure's own Foreign Minister, Antoine Pinay, whose right-wing Independents are strongly influenced by the pro-colon lobby in the French National Assembly. As the long angry afternoon wore on, little groups of Ministers broke out of the chamber to cool off in the garden. Before the session ended, both Pinay and Faure had threatened to resign.

What probably saved the government was the knowledge that the resignation of Faure, a member of the moderate Left, might compel the right-wing parties to form their own government. This in turn would probably consolidate the non-Communist Left (Socialists, left-wing Catholics, some Radicals) against them in a coalition led by ex-Premier Pierre Mendès-France. Whatever happens in Morocco, or anywhere else, the right-wingers are determined to keep energetic little Mendès from climbing back to power. The right-wing game is to use Faure (a fellow Radical of Mendès, and once his Finance Minister) to hold off Mendès. Faure, of course, understanding their need, made them pay.

Pinay had the tough task of opposing Faure enough to satisfy his own conservative supporters, but. not enough to bring the government down. In the end, he shifted his position and accepted Faure's plan. Defense Minister Pierre Koenig went along, too, announcing with a martyred air: "I will suffer your solution."

Dynastic Desperation. The "solution" involved France in a desperate game of dynastic musical chairs. Premier Faure proposed to:

¶ Replace Sidi Mohammed ben Moulay Arafa, the puppet Sultan whom the French installed in Morocco two years ago, with a three-man regency council. Its senior member: El Mokri, 108, Morocco's feeble old Grand Vizier.