A PERSONAL APPRAISAL OF HASSAN'S REGIME

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP80R01731R002300070008-6
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: C
• Document Page Count: 10
• Document Creation Date: December 15, 2016
• Document Release Date: October 14, 2003
• Sequence Number: 8
• Publication Date: November 29, 1973
• Content Type: TELEGRAM

Original to be Fled in Decentralized Files.
CONFIDENTIAL
Department of State
SUGGESTED DISTRIBUTION
The attached memorandum, "A Personal Appraisal of
Hassan`s Regime, " was prepared by FSO Laurence Pope
in response to 3. request that he sum up his impressions of
the Moroccan political scene prior to his transfer after a
year in Rabat. We commend it as a thoughtful analysis.
NEUMANN
/i
INFO CASABLANCA, TANGIER, ALGIERS, PARIS, TUNIS,
I RIYOLI, NOUAKCHOTT, MADRID, CINCEUR,
COMNAVTRACOM, COMNAVSTA, USCINCNAVEUR
E.O.11652: GDS
TAGS : TINT PF OR MO PINS
F
Amemb.3ssy RABAT
DATE:November 29, 1973
,.
SUBJECT : A Personal Appraisal of Hassan's Regime
w
110
State Department review completed
FORM
to -5a DS -323
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CleoronceS:
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11/28/73 233
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A Personal Appraisal of Hassan's Regime
Introduction and Summary
In the fall of 1970 widely divergent estimates of thklpo political sieuGenn in
Morocco were made by the Embassy in Rabat and
in Casablanca. For the Embassy, it was a time of optimism. aThe King
had ended the "state of exception" in force since 1965, held
constitutional referendum which gave Morocco its third conetitution i1
ten years, and parliamentary elections had resulted in the formation of
a legislature. It might be, said the Embassy, that the summer of 1970
would be a ''historical turning point" marking the beginning of an effort
bytthe King to engage thy: Moroccan people in development. On the other a
stly hand, for the Consulate General iomsnousn tiYip dangertof the Kin g'sFP
sources, the political horizon was assassination remained, and the military was likely to play a critical
role. It is easy, being wise after the event, to see who was more
nearly right. (The reports are numbered Casablanca A-37 and Rabat A-167.
Two coup attempts later, the winds of optimism about Hassan's regime
are blowing again. It is frequently said that the King's position has been
much improved by the popular enthusiasm generated by Morocco's
participation in the recent. Mideast fighting, and that the natural tendency
to rally around a leader in time of crisis has strengthened Hassan's
hold on power. His appearances in public since the summer of 1973,
when he began to venture out of the confines of his palaces again, and
the enthusiastic crowds which greeted him, are seen as proof that his
personal popularity has risen. One journalist has spoken of "Hassan's
comeback. "
This memorandum. takes a somewhat different view. It takes a quick
look at various factors, and concludes that the King has not improved
his political position, and that he has not taken any effective domestic
measures of reform. What he has done in the aftermath of two coup
attempts is to gather the reins of power more tig it y in his own hands,
cont euni repressive means to destroy institutions inde endent of the
palace, a-n-d-i-n-E.-e-n-eral rreturn Morocco to a less Western, and more
traditional Moorish, style of des otism. Among his Maghreb neighbors r we
r he is isolated. This hat the cycle
auof violence andurepression whiche,
and probably mrieans t
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has characterized recent Moroccan history will continue. The U. S.
should only decide to enter into closer relations with King Hassan with
this firmly in mind.
The SettingConsolidation of Roval Power, and Two Failed Coups
Like other developing countries. and maybe more than most, Morocco
is a-country of enormous contrasts between rich and poor where in
some rural areas farmers still use wooden plows, while in the modern
industrial sector young technocrats are familiar with the latest
techniques of "management. " Morocco is also one of the youngest
countries in the world where half the population is now under 20, to
cite just one striking statistic. To say these things is to restate the
obvious, but it is just as well not to forget them. The gulf between
rich and poor, which most observers say is growing, and the runaway
population growth, are portents of instability and change which any
Moroccan regime will have to reckon with. Thus, the only real question
is when will change come, and what forms will it take, and the present
regime has not created the institutions through which change can come
about gradually. In fact, in the years since Moroccan independence,
such institutions have not prospered, and many have been suppressed
altogether.
In 1956 there were at least two important political forces outside the
palace--the Istiglal Party, and the militant nationalists who had led
the fight in the Sultan's name against the French occupier, the Army
of Liberation. The French had also left behind some embryo
institutions, which fell outside royal power, like the UMT (Union
Marocaine du Travail), a lively press, and a certain conception of
the rule of law. Since 1.956, by a clever and ruthless combination of
reward and punishment, and with the knowledge that the forty-four
years of French occupation had only been a brief interruption in
300 years of Alaouite rule, the palace has almost atavistically set
about reconsolidating its power. Its allies in this, the Fassi elite
and the Army, have in return for this allegiance been allowed to divide
the considerable spoils which a 20th century state provides.
The result is that the dominant fact in Morocco today, even more than
in the past, is royal power and control. The Istiqlal Party has split
like an amoeba into left and right wings. The party which still bears
the name is a compliant shadow of its former self, while the party
which is the iia.l inheritor of its militant nationalist tradition, the
UNFP, is split and partially outlawed. The UMT is still in being,
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but it is dormant as a political factor for reasons which probably relate
to the palace connections of its leaders. The vestiges of modern,
ministerial administration in the European tradition are still observed,
but the Prime Minister is the King's brother-in-law, and ministers are
in reality little more than senior clerks for the King with little power
of decision, and no political standing of their own. An independent press
still publishes, a oar association still convenes, a university still holds
classes, and political parties still hold meetings, but this is increasingly
a shadow-play empty of substance, with the principals going through 'tfie
motions. Two coup attempts have exposed t:he vulnerability of the regime,
and the dangers inherent in this growing concentration of royal power,
which as destroyed the framework t rough which the social and
economic pressures which are building in the country can be released.
At times the King, at least in the European half of his mind, has seemed
aware of the problem. Most people took his post-Skhirat reference to
"changing something in my way of governing" to be a reference to the
necessity for sharing power, and the King did take certain steps in that
direction in the fall of 1971. by undertaking negotiations with tl}e parties
of the opposition, mainly the istiglal and the UNFP. The negotiations
with the opposition, however, which had taken a hopeful turn at the
beginning, broke down on the central issue of royal power, and it became
clear that Hassan was not prepared to change the rules of the game.
Again, in the aftermath of the attempt to shoot downy his plane by some
Air Force officers in August, 1972, the King opened negotiations with
the opposition, and again negotiations broke down for much the same
reasons. Rumors circulated at the time that he was considering
abdication, and. "The Moroccan Monarchy at Bat" was the title of an
article in "Le Monde Diplornatique" in December, 1972.
At this point, his enemies abroad, remnants of the Army of Liberation
and elements of the UNFP which had preferred exile to legal opposition
within Morocco, after apparently deciding in early 1973 that the time
had come to take up arms against the King and give him the last push,
launched armed attacks against government outposts in the traditional
areas of Berber dissidence, prematurely announcing (through Radio
Libya) that the "popular revolution had come. " A popular joke was
that greeting cards were being marked "p. p? h. , " for "passera pas
l'hiver" (he won't last the winter),
Hassan's "Comeback"
From this point on, things seemed to break the King's way. The
"popular revolution" was quickly crushed by an efficient security
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apparatus, and a more confident Hassan began to leave the palace, where
he had shut himself up since August 16, and appear in public. In the winter
of 1972 and spring of 1973 he had unilaterally extended Morocco's fishing
limit to 70 miles, agitated Moroccan claims to the Spanish Sahara, and
announced that he was sending a contingent of Moroccan troops to the
Golan Heights, where, he said, the Israelis were likely to attack. He
also announced in public speeches measures nationalizing the remaining
foreign agricultural land, and requiring certain categories of foreign-
owned businesses to cede majority control to Moroccans. All of these, ,
measures were accompanied with blasts of propaganda lnin the increasingly
Islamic
sycophantic government media, which trumpeted slogans
Socialism" and "The Revolution of King and People" (echoing the Shah's
"White Revolution" in Iran).
Whatever finally comes of these initiatives (not much so far), it is worth
noting in passing that all of the measures announced by the King had
foreign interests as their targets. Spain suffered most from the extension
of the fishing limit and the Saharan claims, while France bore the brunt
of Moroccanization and land recovery, and the sending of troops to Syria
naturally aimed at the Zionist enemy. Their effect on the living conditions
land recovery has not
of most of the population was limited. So far,
changed anything for the agricultural peasantry which makes up some
70 per cent of the population. The land was not redistributed, and a
government-owned company merely took the place of the big landowners.
"Moroccanization" required the foreign owners of certain categories of
businesses to turn over a majority share in their operations to
Moroccan entrepreneurs who seem to be coming exclusively from the
same segment of the population, the shorthand for which is "the Fassi
elite, " which has always controlled the economy. In fact, it is
probably fair to say that the people who took the Kings s"reforms"
the most seriously were the foreigners affected. Moroccans realised
that the rules of the game, and the winners, remained the same.
The Mideast War
The Mideast war, and Moroccan participation in it, is often said to have
been another factor in improving the King' s position and increasing
his popularity, and there is no doubt that his foresight in sending troops
to the- front at a time when most people discounted the possibility of
fighting has been admired. Domestic troubles have been submerged
while attention was centered on the battle and the King, exploiting his
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position as Minister of Defense and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed
Forces, has made the fighting in which Moroccan troops reportedly
suffered heavy losses into a personal political victory.
In the longer term, however, and as the war fever wears off, a much
more important consequence of Morocco's participation in the Mideast
fighting will be its effect on the Royal Armed Forces, which are, of
course, the key to the King's remaining in power. An army exists to
fight, and few things are so important to it as the lessons it draws
from its experience in the wars it is sent to fight in. The Moroccan
expeditionary force in Syria reportedly suffered heavy losses--
estimates range between 150-700 killed out of a total force of 3, 000
men, and if the ratio of wounded to killed was 5/1, casualties must
have been very heavy indeed. In addition, there have been reports
that the troops were unfamiliar with the weapons they were asked to
use; and that their coordination with the Syrian command under which
they fought was less than perfect. It should be borne in mind that the
total control over decisions relating to the Armed Forces which the King
has assumed is a two-edged sword. It allows him to manipulate the Army,
but it also makes him directly responsible for failures.
On the domestic political front, the Mideast war gave the King an
occasion to demonstrate his iron control over the country. To many
observers, it seemed likely at the outbreak of hostilities that U.S.
interests in Morocco would not escape unscathed, particularly after
the announcement of U. S. resapply of Israel, and many expected that
popular feeling would find expression in demonstrations in which the
U. S. would be a target. The precedent of the 1967 Mideast war, when
there were scattered incidents of violence, and cars were burned, was
present in many minds. The J ewish community in Casablanca was
nervous. That there were no major incidents of the kind we feared
during the recent war is doubtless partly due to initial Arab successes,
but it may also be an indication of the difference between the Morocco
of 1967 and 1973, and tighter control exercised by the security services
and the palace. Although the movements of the Sixth Fleet were widely
publicized in the local. press, the latter was never allowed even to hint
at a connection between the communications facilities at Kenitra,
Sidi Yahya, and Bouknadel, and the Fleet.
Isolation in the Maghreb
While some Western observers have seen an improvement in King
Hassan's position, his relations with his neighbors in the Maghreb
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have taken a sharp turn for the worse. A Moroccan-Algerian-Mauritanian
summit held in Agadir in July, which was supposed to result in a common
position on the Spanish Sahara, was a complete and public failure.
Relations with Libya have been bad at least since Libyan radio hailed
the Skhirat coup attempt, and relations with Algeria, Tunisia, and
Mauritania have also worsened. The King evidently believes that
Algeria abetted the rebels who were behind the attacks in March, and
there is considerable evidence to support this conclusion. The hard-
headed Algerians seem to have decided not to put all of their money on
Hassan. For reasons which appear to be essentially subjective and
personal, Morocco's relations with fellow moderate Tunisia have also
been bad. During the non-aligned summit in September, which Hassan'
embarrassingly failed at the last minute to atend, Bourguiba launched
a proposal for Maghrebian unity which deliberately excluded Morocco,
Tunis has withdrawn its Ambassador from Rabat, and Rabat has not
yet replaced its envoy to Tunis. Mauritania, increasingly in the
Algerian camp, and irritated by differences with Morocco over Spanish
Sahara, currently does not have an Ambassador in Rabat either.
These differences with Maghreb neighbors, and particularly the quarrel
with Algeria, increase the possibility that further subversion could find
a base from which to launch attacks against Hassan's regime. They also
are indications that the Kingis neighbors, who are in a good position to
know the realities of the Moroccan situation, may be taking a dim view
of his prospects.
Re res slop
In a Morocco where power is increasingly centered in the palace, and
where independent institutions have become progressively enfeebled,
it has become difficult to maintain the fiction of domestic "liberalism"
with which the King has in the past been identified in the West. In the
past, outrageous examples of ruthlessness like the Ben Barka
kidnapping have always been balanced by the image of a Western-
oriented enlightened monarch who was admired by moderate socialists
like Jean Lacouture (who is no longer persona grata in Morocco).
Throughout the 1960's, General Oufkir was the bad guy, and he drew
off some of the blame for conduct of which Westerners disapproved.
Now, however, Hassan's regime seems to be increasingly dropping
the veils of constitutionalism, parliamentary forms, and the rule
of law.
A good example of this tendency toward increased authoritarianism
was the Kenitra court martial of the summer of 1973. The palace
used the prosecution of the rebels who had been implicated in the
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March attacks in the Middle Atlas, and urban terrorists who had been
active about the same time, to attack the UNFP, whose leaders were
accused of complicity with the subversives. Some semblance of
legality was retained in the beginning. Although the trial was a
military one, the tribunal was presided over by a civilian magistrate,
and over 100 defense lawyers, including many of the country's
prominent opposition politicians, were allowed to plead and to cross-
examine witnesses, and almost verbatim accounts of testimony were
published in the daily press. The testimony itself, however, presented
a picture of unchecked police rep ression. Virtually all of those who
testified said that they had been tortured, and forced to sign false
confessions which they had never been allowed to read. Typical of
the testimony was that of one UNFP leader, a Kenitra surgeon named
Omar Khattabi. Khattabi showed his scars to the court, and told how
the police, after compelling him to sign a false statement under torture,
had given him a revolver, and suggested he use it on himself. When he
pulled the trigger, he said, the revolver turned out to be empty.
As the trial went on, it became clear that although the prosecution had
a tight case against certain rebels who had been arrested with weapons,
they failed completely to prove that the UNFP intellectuals on trial had
been involved in the violence, and the verdict, handed down on
August 30, reflected this. Sixteen of the Middle Atlas rebels and urban
terrorists were sentenced to death, others got long jail sentences,
while the UNFP members were all acquitted, and ordered released.
Instead of being released, however, the some 80 persons involved
(including Dr. Khattabi) were loaded into police vans and taken off to
unknown destinations, where they remain at this writing, almost three
months later. A laconic statement by the police announced that they
had been arrested in connection with another "investigation, " but
there has been no move to put them on trial again. Later, the King
did carry out another part of the Kenitra verdict, executing on
November 1 fifteen of the sixteen men condemned to death.
An Air of "Ancien Regime"
A few words need to be said about the social background against which
these developments are taking place.
There is an ambience of excess in the Moroccan bourgeoisie which is
impossible to define, but which cannot be ignored. The houses of the
Fassi elite in the chic suburbs of Rabat and Casablanca continue to be
built and furnished in the richest way imaginable. In these suburbs
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a Spanish-style house stands next to a model of an English country house,
while inside the high wd.ls, past the guard house and the dogs, one can
see landscaped gardens. Architects v-,-ho are restrained by no
considerations of money or taste are. given free rein; building goes on
over long years, with results that :advertise the costs involved. One
of the most visible houses of this sort has recently been completed on
the outskirts of Rabat by the leader of the Istiglal., Allal Al Fas si,
furnished in the best Syrian Louis XV style, no expense spared.
The tone for these excesses of conspicuous consumption is set at the
highest level, in the palace. King Hassan's life style, which is that of
a traditional Sultan of Morocco with the added element of almost limitless
wealth, ks well enough known, and needs no underlining here.
When the King, who is understandably wary of planes after August 16, 1,972,
wanted to go to the recent Arab summit in Algiers, he rented a French
passenger ship to take him. He has put up over $100, 000 in prize money
alone for a golf tournament he is sponsoring in Rabat. in December.
Examples of this kind could be i Multiplied. '
The Politics of Baraka
The concentration of power in the palace, the destruction of Westernized
institutions as political facts, and the increase in the level of repression
of which the conduct of the Kenitra trial is one example, have given the
regime more and more the look of the traditional Moorish theocracy it
has essentially been. all along. There are few libertarian impulses in
the Moroccan character. Moroccans look to government not to balance
competing interests, as in the West, but to establish order and
hierarchy, and their best hope is that government will not demand
too much of them. The throne is a symbol of legitimacy, and the King
is held in awe as the inheritor of a great dynasty and as the mystical
incarnation of national sovereignty. His very presence is thought to
bring blessing, baraka, and his narrow escapes from death first from
over a thousand men, and then from jet fighters, is seen as proof of
divine favor. He fascinates his countrymen, and he can be expected
to make the most of this in the future.
Meanwhile, Western-style politics will not flourish. Thanks to the
Kinges efficient mixture of corruption with favors and punishment with
torture and imprisonment, there are few politicians of stature left in
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Morocco, and their conditions for sharing power would be unacceptable
to him. While he still could attract some party politicians to ministries,
and might even hold elections of a kind, these would be transparent
facades under present circumstances. Political and economic stagnation
seems to be the more likely prospect, with the consequence that the
sterile cycle of violence and repression which has characterised recent
Moroccan history will continue. King Hassan may indeed be at the
".summit of his reign, " as one well-placed observer has recently said,
but from the summit it is all downhill.
Consequences for the U. S.
We should, in analyzing the political situation, be hard-headed enough
not to confuse the current improvement in bilateral relations with an
improvement in Hassan's political prospects. His anxious desire to
have us for a friend may be a sign of weaknesss rather than of strength.
The attitude of the Army in the wake of the Mideast fighting may be
crucial. We should remain alert for signs of trouble, and not be misled
by the vestiges of Western-style institutions which still manage to
carry on into thinking of the regime as a "liberal" one, as it is
sometimes portrayed. Increasingly it resembles the traditional,
despotic "makhzen" of Moroccan history.
Also, in view of recent Moroccan history, and the inherent fragility of
a one-man regime, we should think twice about becoming inextricably
identified with Has san in a way which might expose us to the reprisals
of a successor regime. Our military aid in particular should be as
discreet as possible, and we should under no circumstances become
involved in advising the King on "counterinsurgency" or-the like.
Laurence Pope /gyp
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