Eugene Rostow, former director of the US Central Intelligence Agency, once wrote in a testimony about Gamal Abdel Nasser: ‘Our real problem with Gamal Abdel Nasser is that he is without vice. This makes him, in practical terms, untouchable. No women, no alcohol, no drugs. He cannot be bought or intimidated. We hate him entirely, but we can do nothing about him. He is truly without vice and incorruptible.’
The two camps in Nasser’s legacy—those who despise his era, a group that continues to grow—often fall into the trap of conflating issues. They confuse the personal, embodied in his character, with the political, represented by the new system he imposed on the country. This keeps them squarely in the crosshairs of those defending the revolution, who continue to apply cosmetic touches to its image.
A reader of Egypt’s modern and contemporary history, particularly after the Second World War, might find that this revolution—essentially a simple military coup amplified by propaganda—was an almost inevitable development in a new global order rebalancing power dynamics. It was also a response to a weak local system that had humiliated itself with the farce of 1948 and complex political tensions that exposed the king’s apathy and his inability to control even his own household. His love for Egypt, as recently revealed in documents, was not enough to manage his kingdom.
Yes, it was a weak and fragile system destined to collapse. But we must not forget that those often called the oppressed of that era—peasants and others—had significant political power, despite their extreme poverty. Through the ballot box, they could overthrow the pasha who owned the estate they lived on, in elections that were nothing short of genuine and effective.
The Egyptian stock exchange was among the top five in the world, the cotton exchange was the first of its kind, the dollar was worth 17 piastres, and the British pound was worth 42 piastres. Egypt was a creditor to many great powers. It was, in fact, a free and successful capitalist system. Yet, it failed to provide the state with a sense of national identity and sovereignty in matters that could not be left to the whims of a lax royal government.
The inevitable revolution came, and everyone rose in celebration, welcoming the return of dignity and the state’s prestige. It redistributed wealth, regardless of the injustice of seizing it from most of its owners. Peasants gained their own land, factories sprang up here and there under a socialist system that seemed harsh but had an acceptable identity at the time, despite the shift from the dictatorship of the pashas to the dictatorship of institutional heads from the revolution’s leadership.
The comparison here is between two systems, neither of which came close to justice in its entirety. The first was a royal capitalist system with a reasonable civilian political life, which might have evolved over time into a comprehensive framework encompassing Egypt’s poor—peasants and workers—through unions and an active civil society, as seen in many countries committed to capitalism.
The second was an authoritarian socialist system that reinforced the state’s identity, restored its regional standing, and guaranteed its citizens the right to live without hunger or ignorance, albeit in the absence of an active political life that stripped it of its civil momentum. However, history later proved that this model, too, could have led to greater economic and political rights and freedoms over time, as seen in other countries. We must not simplistically dismiss socialism, as its enthusiasts often do. We should not forget that the Scandinavian countries, with their progress, individual wealth, and free systems, are classified as socialist.
The flaw is not necessarily in socialism or capitalism, as commitment to either often leads to some form of progress for the people. However, when modern capitalism transforms into the rule of businessmen, having previously been in the hands of the pashas and then the military, it becomes a union of the ugly against the people—a chaotic ‘will’ that blends capitalism and socialism, leading to nothing but more poverty, ignorance, and humiliation among nations.
This article is originally published by AlBorsa in Arabic and later AI-translated by South Push.