Specter of Fratricide

For four days, Algeria reeled through the delirium of independence. When Premier Benyoussef Benkhedda of the F.L.N. Provisional Government arrived in Algiers, he was hailed by a half-million cheering Moslems waving green-white-and-red flags. Benkhedda was swept from his Jeep, borne shoulder-high through the ecstatic crowd, losing his habitual dark glasses on the way. But behind the cheers and the swirling flags lay a new threat to the tortured country. Now that the terror campaign waged by the Secret Army against the Moslems had at long last subsided, the Moslems began to fight among themselves, haunted by the familiar specter of all successful revolutions: fratricidal war between the moderate and extremist wings.

The Antagonists. The two opposing factions are headed by Premier Benkhedda and his Vice Premier, Mohammed ben Bella, two men as different in personality as in politics.

Benkhedda, 42, resembles his nickname, "M'sieu Tout le Monde" (Mr. Everybody). With a diffident manner and an emotionless voice, he is not the sort of charismatic figure usually found at the helm of revolutions. But he is a tough, machine-minded organization man who fought skillfully as a terrorist against the French, and is proving equally adept at intraparty warfare. His opponent, Ben Bella, 45, was one of the nine founders of the F.L.N. (only four others are alive today), a passionate orator and "activist," and still an authentic hero to millions of Algerians. In 1949 he held up the Oran central post office to get funds for the revolution, was later captured by the French, and escaped from jail. In 1956 Ben Bella and three other top leaders of the F.L.N. were arrested when their Moroccan plane was intercepted by the French, and he spent the next five years in French prisons. After France and the F.L.N. signed the Evian truce agreements, Ben Bella was released, and soon let it be known that he accepted neither the policy nor the authority of Benkhedda. Ben Bella may be no Communist, but he spouts the Marxist line and would work with the Communists if he thought that this could get him to power.

The men with whom Ben Bella has most in common are the top military lead ers of the F.L.N. army units stationed in Tunisia and Morocco. Unlike the 70,000 F.L.N. guerrillas inside Algeria--most of whom seemed loyal to Benkhedda--the Tunisian and Moroccan detachments have done little fighting against the French. They are uniformed and disciplined men. armed with Russian and Czech weapons, indoctrinated by Marxist commissars.

The Conspiracy. Ben Bella first tried to win power last May. Then, he claims, the National Revolutionary Council, the quasi-parliamentary body of F.L.N., backed him against Benkhedda, who simply ignored the council's wishes. Ben Bella was persuaded not to bring the fight out into the open until independence was gained. Meanwhile he joined with lean, tuberculous Colonel Houari Boumedienne, F.L.N. army commander outside Algeria, in working out a plot to seize power. On independence day, F.L.N. army detachments from Tunisia and Morocco were to cross into Algeria, declare the Provisional Government invalid, and call on Ben Bella to form a new government.

But Benkhedda has long anticipated such a move. Months ago, he began filtering loyal subordinates into Algeria. In Algiers, Benkhedda's agent ruled the Moslem population throughout the period of S.A.O. terror and was largely responsible for preventing indiscriminate reprisals against the Europeans. By independence day, he claimed effective control of four of the six Algerian wilayas (zones), and almost all the civilian F.L.N. apparatus.

From this position of strength, Benkhedda precipitated the crisis by firing Colonel Boumedienne and two of his top military aides, denouncing their "mad and criminal designs." This action threw the other conspirators off stride. Mohammed ben Bella had fled to Cairo, for help to his idol. Dictator Gamal Abdel Nasser. Uncertain just who was winning, Nasser discreetly asked both sides to patch up their differences.

At week's end Benkhedda found himself attacked by a new foe: neighboring Morocco, whose King Hassan II constantly supported Algerian nationalism. Moroccan troops swept into Algeria's western Sahara and occupied desert posts in a region to which Morocco has long laid claim. A student expressed the bitter disillusionment already felt by many Algerians: "If this is independence, why bother?"

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