The Flight of the British
We’d all heard the tale of the Auxiliary Territorial Service girl who was stabbed in the back by a silent killer as she walked to meet her boyfriend in Gezira; then there was the WAAF girl who was shot dead as she walked hand-in-hand with her beau. There were countless stories of British men and women being butchered in Moascar Garrison at Ismailia; and lone soldiers who were slaughtered in the streets, their body parts thrown into the filthy waters. Day after day British corpses were fished out as they floated by, murdered by the same race of people whose liberties they’d fought to defend. I for one knew all too well what the Nazis would have done in retribution, had they succeeded in invading, but Britain was too soft; by doing nothing her sons and daughters continued to suffer at the hands of mad men.
Yet for Marjorie and I, all was well with the world. The doctor had just told us my wife was expecting our first child. In a few months I was to be a father, and I couldn’t have been happier.
One day we were both invited by Abdel Moneim Ragheb Bey to join him and various other Egyptian, British and American dignitaries for a tour of one of the presidential buildings in the Garden City. We were taken to see the Egyptian printing press that was housed on the ground floor. As we wandered around, watching the men at work, I came across a large wooden table. On it I saw what looked like designs for postage stamps. I casually glimpsed down at them and noticed they were all to commemorate the evacuation of the British, not just from the Nile Delta, but the whole of Egypt and the Middle East. One showed a picture of dishevelled-looking British troops marching out of the Sudan, as a black cloud rose from over the land. Another depicted victorious Egyptian troops chasing the British out of the Canal area.
I glanced around me. The other members of my party were standing a few paces ahead, chatting to one of the workers as he pointed out a new, state-of-the-art printing machine.
‘Taylor,’ I hissed at my American friend, who was carrying a camera round his neck. ‘Take a quick shot of these.’
I pointed at the designs and attempted to shield him from view, but that was when my luck ran out. One of the Egyptians spotted us and pushed the camera down, snatching the designs from sight. There was a heated exchange of words between the Egyptian officials, which I managed to catch a few words of.
‘These are secret,’ I heard one of them say in Arabic, ‘and shouldn’t have been seen by the English. Lock them away somewhere safe.’
I’d have loved to have got that photograph, and would have taken great delight in handing it over to the British Ambassador, who I felt was completely oblivious to what was really going on in this country.
Dark clouds were gathering all over the East, not least in Palestine, where Jewish and Arabic blood was being spilt in abundance as cultures clashed and violence escalated, all for the ownership of land. The Haganah groups, underground Jewish defence forces, were proving tough nuts for the Arabs to crack. Raid after raid, ambush after ambush; this was the order of the day, every single day. Explosions were erupting all over the place and the King David Hotel in Jerusalem was obliterated, taking many human lives with it. In Egypt, things fared little better, as riots rippled across the nation. This time, however, the protesters were directing their anger towards the Egyptian Government in a desperate plea for change. The American administration troops were fast pulling out of Cairo and I had a feeling it wouldn’t be long before the British followed suit.
Christmas was approaching, but festive cheer was in short supply. It was at this time when it was finally announced, after some seventy years of occupation, that the familiar sight of the British soldier was to disappear forever from Cairo and Alexandria. Though our troops were withdrawing to the Canal Zone, the British Military Mission was staying behind, and I was instructed to remain in Cairo with the Egyptians and carry on my day-to-day work as normal.
For the countless thousands of Egyptian men who earned their daily bread by working for the British Army, the evacuation was a crushing misfortune. In some regions of these two major cities, more or less every other family was headed by a dhobi or similar employee, and the choice for them was grim: either follow the troops to the Canal Zone in the hope of finding work, or remain and starve. For many, that choice had already been made, as the British Army simply couldn’t take all those citizens with them. The 40,000 or so workers who were lucky and found work at the new army base had a hard job finding accommodation. To those who did, it came at a high price. The army took a kindly interest and put some chaps up, for a small charge, but this didn’t satisfy many and discontentment began to grow.
On the morning the British forces began to pull out, I went along to see them off with some other military advisers who were also staying behind. It was an abhorrent sight. Gangs of rag-clad youths were spitting and hurling stones at the departing troops. None of our lads did anything to stop them, for I think they all knew these urchins had been hired by the newly formed ‘Nile Valley Liberation’ gangs that were too cowardly to do their own dirty work.
As the last of the troops rolled away in their sand-coloured trucks, I walked down the main street of Cairo with my companions. I can’t recall any other time in my life when I’d seen so many sad faces. The laughing, carefree Egyptian was no more. A deathly silence had descended over the cities that once lived off the troops. The shops and businesses that thrived not so long since, especially during the war days, were shuttered and silent. This once great city was dead.
That evening, the barefooted rabble was whipped up again as quickly as if somebody was handing out money by the bucket-load, so that the world would think the city was rejoicing. What did Nasser’s middle-class friends know about the starvation and unemployment that was to follow? Little did they care, it seemed, as they congregated at the club and celebrated well into the night.
It was 3.00 am on a cool March morning in 1947. While the rest of Cairo was still sleeping, our taxi raced through the lamplit streets to the Anglo-American Hospital. We got there in good time, and I handed my heavily pregnant wife into the capable hands of the doctor. Being told there was nothing more required of me that morning, I made my way back home on foot, feeling anxious and exhausted. After snatching a few hours of sleep, I awoke at first light and telephoned the matron, who informed me I was the father of a healthy baby boy.
I was a father.
I dashed straight back to the hospital and blinked back the tears when I saw Terence Michael Rochford for the first time.
Nothing was too much trouble for the staff, who afforded Marjorie the same care and attention as even the British Ambassador’s wife, Lady Lampson, had received when her baby was born.
That afternoon I went for a game of cricket in the hospital sports ground, and brought along Rex, the other new addition to our family. He was my faithful Alsatian Wolfhound, who’d been given to me by the Royal Military Police Dog School just before the pull-out from Cairo. Old Rex was almost the size of a small donkey. He was black with a lovely temperament, and enjoyed nothing more than chasing a ball across a cricket field. It was a beautiful afternoon, so Marjorie was allowed outside to sit in the sun and watch the game for a little while.
The days that followed were pleasant and fruitful. Marjorie and Terence were discharged from hospital, and life at the Egyptian school went on much the same. Trouble was always flaring up, but my little family and I would take our usual trips to the native market and never ran into any harm; yet hatred lurked down every snicket, infiltrating the hearts of any man who embraced it. One afternoon, while meandering through the marketplace, I was hailed by our local butcher who’d spotted us passing by.
‘Hey, Paddy Pasha!’ he called. ‘I need a word. Can you sell me a gun?’
‘Whatever for?’ I replied.
‘I want to kill all the Jews!’
I hadn’t expected that response. I told him exactly what I thought of his morbid fantasy, and advised it’d be better for him to keep his head down, sell his meat and stay out of other people’s messy business.
Over in Palestine, trouble was reaching its peak and the British were pulling out in quick order. The whole area and its surroundings were fraught with danger. Neighbouring countries, including Syria, Iraq, Jordan, Saudi-Arabia and even Egypt, were gathering arms in an attempt to push the Jews from out of what is now Israel, but the Jews were fighting back. The powder keg was about to ignite.
One evening our friends from the BOAC invited Marjorie and me to the cinema in Heliopolis. There was a good film on so we told them we’d be delighted, but at the last minute we couldn’t make it. Little Terence had developed a fever and wouldn’t settle, so we had to stay at home to look after him. It was just as well. A crude homemade bomb had been planted in the row where we’d reserved our seats. It exploded, killing four people and wounding thirty-eight more. Our friends were unharmed, but their little girl was splashed with blood and a chap’s severed arm hit her in the side of the head as it was torn from his body. The murderers were never caught, but it was well known which militant group was responsible. To inform meant instant death, so those who valued their lives held their tongues.
By this time, any collaboration between the Egyptians and English was over, and the military advisers were called to GHQ and informed by our chief, Major General Arbuthnott, that the days of the Mission were numbered. Our final date in Cairo was confirmed as New Year’s Eve 1947, but the Egyptian Army authorities had asked for the advisers to be left behind so they could carry on their work with the Egyptian Government under contract. Unfortunately, the War Office was not in agreement, and my colleagues were all to be withdrawn to the Canal Zone as soon as postings and married quarters could be found.
I, on the other hand, had been summoned to the hirings office in Cairo, the remaining building for British ‘other details’, the name given to the few personnel who were to remain in Cairo and Alexandria for clearing up and other such duties. Brigadier Hayes, the director of hirings and fixed assets, had heard about my good work with the Egyptians at the school and requested I was to be appointed hirings officer for the Cairo district. I was thrilled to be offered such a position: in spite of all the low points, I’d grown to love working in Cairo.
‘We’re very pleased to have you,’ the brigadier said, shaking me warmly by the hand when I arrived for my first day.
He told me my job was to reconnoitre the old places the British forces had occupied and arrange to hand them back to their Egyptian owners. My first task was to arrange the dismantling of the Brew Up Café outside Cairo Station. After a last hot cup of char, I packed up the memorial stone, a sight so familiar to all the troops who passed by that way, and sent it to the new headquarters of British troops at Fâyid.
From there, I travelled to what used to be Qasr el-Nil Barracks, where I was stationed during the war, and couldn’t believe my eyes. This once iconic fortress had been home to crack regiments of the British Army since 1885. Now it lay in ruins before my eyes, and looked as if it had been subjected to a long artillery barrage. All that remained were piles of rubble and roofless buildings. The woodwork, glass, doors and rafters had all been removed, and no doubt would have last been spotted fleeing the site on the back of a donkey. Looters had taken every single item of value away.
I recalled the melodious notes of the martial music and the calls of the bugle that used to drift around the barracks, as the tramping of heavy feet threatened to drown out the roars of the regimental sergeant major. All that was gone; it was just an echo from yesteryear. I closed my eyes that sunny morning, feeling a slight breeze on my cheeks, and saw what I’d once seen with open eyes: the little chapel where military weddings and subsequent christenings took place; the jolly tradesmen who’d grown up in the service of the army; the smart, well-groomed officers, and the snow-white gowns of the dhobies who’d sit by the gate and tell a soldier off if his uniform was soiled.
I opened my eyes. I was standing alone, finding it hard to believe that once upon a time these proud barracks were a landmark of Egypt. Even the church had been pulled down, and the altar site was being used as a parking place for buses. The barrack square and sports grounds were being used as public urinals. High up above the ground now flew the Egyptian flag, dirty and tattered.
When my job was done, I moved on to the next site: the general headquarters of the Signals Regiment, from where the so-called ‘Monty trick’, the greatest hoax of the war, was conducted, and I found it particularly emotional to hand this place back to the Egyptians. Back in 1942 the German secret agent Johannes Eppler and his companion, Peter Monkaster, were captured in Cairo while trying to ferret out the secrets of the Eighth Army, the Allied fighting force in the Western Desert. These two spies had been relaying their discoveries to Rommel using a secret code, which the British were trying to decipher. Our plan was to crack the code and send misleading information to Rommel, hence laying a false scent for the Fox’s cold nose to follow, which would lead him straight into our snare. Eventually, our shrewd chaps of the Signals Regiment deciphered the mysterious enigma, after finding a copy of Daphne du Maurier’s novel Rebecca in Eppler’s possession, despite the agent not being able to read a word of English. This book was the key to unlocking the riddle, for the code had been secreted between the pages. A false message was thus sent to Rommel from the headquarters where I now stood. The Fox took the bait and became convinced the Eighth Army was to attack at a place called Alam Halfa, a spot in the middle of the desert just south of El Alamein. Rommel’s greatest mistake was believing this falsehood, which ultimately led to his downfall. With the greatest artillery bombardment, our own fighting hero, Lieutenant General Bernard Montgomery, moved in at El Alamein and struck an almighty blow that sent the Huns staggering backwards.
All this ran through my mind as I finished my sad task and prepared to move on to the next location: the prison administration site, where I bumped into an old comrade of mine from the Small Arms School. Lewa Haidar Pasha had recently been appointed governor of Tura Prison, a maximum-security detention centre just outside Cairo, and he invited me there for a coffee at the end of the day. We made our way over to that soulless fortress and as I entered through the great archway, I felt a cold chill pass over me. Away to my left a chain gang was coming in from the stone quarries where they’d been toiling from the crack of dawn in the boiling hot conditions, under the watchful eyes of their guards who were armed to their teeth with whips and rifles. These, I was sure, were used all too freely on those wretched legions of the lost.
The interior of the jail was just as desolate as the outside. I drank my coffee in Haidar Pasha’s office, where I was able to discern each and every cry and groan that drifted from the cells and down the long corridor.
‘Do not be sorry for these barbarians,’ said the governor, clearly spotting the look of unease in my eyes. ‘Nobody forced them to commit their crimes. They came in of their own accord and will probably die in here.’
‘What happens to them in here?’ I asked.
He looked thoughtfully at me before answering. ‘Well, they have fetters fitted to their limbs upon arrival. A heavy ball is attached for the first few years, but this is replaced by a lighter one as the sentence is served.’
There was a pause while I sipped my coffee and tried to blot out the screams that followed the lash of a rhino whip.
‘After a while our prisoners just accept their lot,’ Haidar continued, ‘and, all things considered, they are reasonably happy here.’
I offered up a silent prayer of thanks on behalf of the prisons back home, where balls and chains, thumbscrews and whips weren’t in use. I’d always found Haidar Pasha to be a compassionate sort of man, and wondered if he was simply kidding himself. Whether he was or not, I didn’t enjoy my coffee that afternoon and was glad when it was time for me to leave.
My Egyptian friends at the club were in high spirits that evening, and they tried their best to coax me out of my dark mood.
‘Do not be sad, Paddy,’ Nasser said, buying another round of drinks for the room. ‘Nobody is more surprised by the evacuation than we Egyptians. After all this time, the British finally took us seriously!’
‘But now we’ve gone, it makes us no better than the vanquished Roman Empire,’ I said. ‘We’re a spent force, confined to the pages of history. And none of you lot will rest until we’re hurled out of Egypt completely.’
Nasser laughed and patted me on my shoulder. ‘Do not worry, Paddy Pasha,’ he said. ‘You are a good man and our friend. We do not wish to see the back of you.’
By this time Marjorie, Terence and I had moved into a new flat in a less conspicuous area of Cairo, having handed back to the Egyptians the block of flats that once housed the British Military Mission families. However, we weren’t destined to stay there long. While I was at work one day, a group of well-dressed young Egyptian men approached my wife and advised her to persuade me to move on, or else. They were most polite in manner and caused no trouble, but they knew an awful lot about me, including the fact I’d helped to train the Egyptian Army. Fearing for the safety of my family, I found us a new place to live and once again we began packing up our belongings.
With our entire home balanced on the back of a cart pulled by a donkey, and with Rex leading the way, we were off. We’d not gone far before the donkey ‘decided’ he was tired and sat down in the middle of the road, stubbornly refusing to get up again. With many eyes upon us from overhead windows, the wily Arab who was driving our cart demanded more money. As soon as I handed it over, the donkey miraculously rose to his feet and continued on his way.
It was a relief when we eventually reached our new home: a pleasant little villa near the racecourse. It was a decent part of town where we thought our troubles would finally be over, but I kept a loaded pistol underneath my pillow, just in case. I also kept a large cavalry sword, unsheathed, resting against my bedside, and with old Rex keen and ready at all times to savage anybody who wasn’t known to him, I had every faith all would be well. The fly in the ointment turned out to be my new houseboy, smiling little Ali, who was barely more than thirteen years of age. I’d acquired his services through a friend, and after much training and encouragement had finally got Rex to accept him.
Returning from a party one night and feeling a bit squiffy, I failed to notice Rex was off colour, having no doubt been slipped something objectionable in a titbit. It was a stifling hot night so I opened the bedroom window before climbing into bed and falling straight to sleep. Some hours later I awoke with a start, sensing someone was around. I jumped to my feet and groped in the darkness for my sword.
‘Get him, Rex!’ I shouted, but the poor dog was no use at all that night.
Our bedroom was on the ground floor so I leapt through the open window into the garden, but lost my footing and fell. I heard rustling noises coming from the bushes but was too busy fumbling around on the lawn to get there in time. With no chance of catching up with the culprit, and having no clue in which direction he’d fled, I went back inside to see if anything had been taken. Alas, my black box had gone, which contained some fifty Egyptian pounds, hundreds of cigarettes and several other items of value. My wife’s wrap and fur coat were also missing.
I went out into the street and hailed a passing policeman. I tried to explain what had just happened but unfortunately the fellow was rather dim, as policemen were uneducated in those days.
‘I did see a small boy running down the road, in that direction, with a black box under his arm,’ the policeman said, after much scratching of his head.
I was more than a bit exasperated by this time. ‘Well, don’t you think you should have stopped the wallad and found out what he was up to? Especially at this time of the night! Isn’t that what you’re paid to do?’
‘Effendi,’ the policeman began, shaking his head, ‘all the money in Abdin Palace would not entice me to chase a robber across the racecourse at this time of night.’
Maybe he was smarter than I gave him credit for. He told me the racecourse was a notorious hiding place for all the vagabonds of Egypt, who wouldn’t think twice about thrusting a knife deep into anybody stupid enough to encroach on their sanctuary in the dead of night. Anyway, I never saw Ali or my black box again.
I’m sure whenever a person has had the misfortune of being burgled, they feel they can never again be truly happy in their home. It was exactly so for my wife and me. We’d grown to hate our little villa so decided to move into a private hotel for a while until we could find suitable housing. It was a select little place, owned and managed by a Frenchman called Mario who’d served as an officer with the Free French Forces during the war. We were given comfortable rooms and it made a pleasant change for my wife not to have to do any housework.
Some few days after we’d moved in, Mario received a call from the American Embassy. They were trying to find accommodation for four families who were working for the Naval Research Hospital, and Mario was more than obliging. The American guests duly arrived at the hotel, and over time, as we got to know each other, we became close. Their work sounded most interesting: they were engaged in a complete study of tropical sicknesses in the hope of finding vaccines.
One of the chaps was from Texas, and he always carried a gun strapped below his armpit. I often went with him and his friend, Rusty, for a drink at the Shufti Inn and they always ordered a double whiskey rye. It was downed in one swift gulp as a handful of money was placed on the counter for the barman to help himself to, which he did with pleasure. These new companions of ours always had money to burn. Their allowances had been trebled since coming to Egypt, no doubt to show the world that America wasn’t short of the ready.
When I was with the Egyptian Army, I’d enjoyed the privilege of purchasing scotch and gin at the knockdown price of 3s. 6d. a bottle. I still had a sizeable stash in my possession, so I invited my American friends to a drinking party in my rooms one evening. Their eyes popped when they saw the display of spirits.
‘Damn, Paddy,’ the Texan declared. ‘Back in the States, the only time we get to enjoy a bottle of gin is Christmas Day or Thanksgiving!’
Being thick-skinned and used to drink, it took a little time to get them all into the party spirit, but once they did, they were the life and soul. I was surprised by their unusual custom of throwing the empty bottles either over their heads or out of the window. Thankfully, the street below was fairly empty and they didn’t cause too much damage. At one point in the evening, after a few choruses of Molly Malone and Danny Boy, I remember singing There’ll Always be an England but my rendition was met by a stony silence. I quickly substituted the word ‘England’ for ‘America’, which delighted everyone.
My new friends were called Rusty, Wayne and Ed. They soon became fully paid-up members of my club, though all three were shocking at driving so I insisted on catching a taxi whenever we went out together. They were somewhat of a novelty in Egypt, with their strong accents and brash ways, and unfortunately made mistakes that were socially unacceptable, so it took time for the locals to get accustomed to them. Despite this, I found them pleasant enough and we spent many happy hours in each other’s company. On Sunday mornings, after church, we played golf at the Mena House Hotel. It seemed like an age since the days when I used to pass this lovely clubhouse, never daring to enter because of the ‘out of bounds to other ranks’ sign that was hanging outside in bold red letters. Now, of course, there were no British officers around anymore, so the notice had long since been taken down. The Americans were quite good at golf. I had only a little knowledge of the sport, but thoroughly enjoyed my Sunday mornings nonetheless. We’d leave our wives on the veranda of the clubhouse to sip long iced drinks and enjoy the sunshine, while we’d go round the course having the time of our lives.
All good things come to an end, and this happened all too soon in our case, when the dreaded gang of well-dressed Egyptian youths turned up at the hotel one afternoon. They manhandled the owner’s wife and threatened to cut me to pieces on my return. Fortunately, I was late coming home from work, and by the time I arrived they seemed to have long gone. Not wanting to take any chances, we found ourselves on the move once again.
During my last few months in Egypt, trouble was the order of the day. Houses and buildings were blown skywards, mob rule took over and life was unhappy for many. Egypt was a frightened land and people were always looking over their shoulders. I soon began to notice that many of my once good friends were cooling off towards me. The welcome they afforded me at my club was restricted to a quick smile at best, and then I was treated to a view of their backs for the rest of the evening as they continued to whisper amongst each other. This rudeness stirred my Irish blood, so one evening I decided to have it out with them.
‘Why are you all avoiding me?’ I directed to the room, slamming my glass onto the table. ‘Have I suddenly grown the head of a sphinx or something?’
Everything fell quiet. I was ushered to the bar and found a large whiskey and soda had been placed in my hand.
‘Do not be such a fool,’ my friend hissed. ‘Nothing has changed, but these days we have to be careful who we are seen talking to, if we know what is good for us. There are those in high places who are telling us to beware of the English who are left behind. This includes you, Paddy Pasha.’
Though the Second World War was over, another war was hotting up. Under a Labour government at Westminster, the British troops had been withdrawn to the garrison towns at Moascar and Fâyid. The British Army was busy building new barracks, offices, married quarters and sports grounds on the virgin sands that had only ever seen tents before. The Royal Air Force was doing likewise, and constructed some splendid looking aerodromes. GHQ relocated to the Fâyid area and everybody thought that’d be enough to please the Egyptians, but it wasn’t. Spurred on by the easy evacuation from Cairo, the underground factions became bolder. Brimming with confidence and with a promised victory in sight, the Egyptian forces marched to Palestine on a gamble that didn’t pay off.
Civil war had descended across this nation, as Jew clashed with Arab, Arab clashed with Jew, and both despised the British in equal measure. Bombs and bullets roared across the barren Sinai Desert wastes, and for the first time since the nineteenth-century Sudanese revolt, the Egyptians found themselves facing the wrong end of a gun. Thanks to their king, their illiterate army was ill-equipped, scantily supplied and commanded by officers who had little idea of what they were doing. One story went around that the boots of the Egyptian soldiers parted company with their wearers long before they reached the borders of Palestine. Morale was at an all-time low, for this motley force had crossed the blazing desert only to be met by a wall of steel when they finally arrived. Behind every gun was a well-trained soldier. The Jews were determined their new home under the Star of David wasn’t going to be taken away from them so easily, and were well prepared for an Egyptian incursion.
Meanwhile, the streets of Cairo were going wild with delight for the great ‘victories’ that were being won; or, at least, so the papers and radio sets were telling everyone. The Rose al-Yūsuf, the Akhbar el-Yom, and the many other newspapers that once told the Arab world that the British were committing the worst crimes imaginable were now stoking the fires of hell. The rural storyteller was in his element as he spun his web of lies to his spellbound audience. Though there were no Jewish planes over Egypt, anti-aircraft guns in the Egyptian towns and cities were spitting out red-hot lead high into the air, blowing off the tops of houses. Their aim was really rotten. Night after night from dawn until dusk the gunners performed their pantomime, aiming for nothing but the stars, while the air raid sirens wailed through the streets. The Jews were never more hated for crimes they weren’t committing.
Back on the battlefields, the Egyptians must have been wondering what had gone wrong. They’d been told so long and often that the Jews could be beaten with a stick, but now they were learning the hard way that the truth was quite different. Most of the leaders of the Egyptian forces fled, leaving their troops to be killed or chased back across the desert. A group of Jewish women actually captured a band of soldiers and ordered them to remove their trousers and footwear, before making them walk all the way back to Egypt. On their way home, they ran into a spot of trouble when they met a posse of local Bedouin tribesmen, who scoffed at and attacked the degraded troops.
Still out fighting in the deserts, littered with the dead, were the last remains of an Egyptian Infantry Brigade. Its commander had long since fled, and the officer who assumed control was none other than Lieutenant Colonel Gamal Abdel Nasser. He set such a high example that his battle-hungry troops remained fighting until the bitter end. Short of ammunition, food and water, they held on, and received full honours of war from the Palestinians, who allowed them to march past their commanding officer at Faluja Gap and return to Egypt, defeated but alive. Colonel Nasser covered himself in glory that day, earning the nickname ‘the Tiger of Faluja’. At the head of his troops, he arrived back in Cairo. Though their heads were held high, hatred still burned deep in their hearts, and Nasser vowed he’d live to see the day when he’d get another crack of the whip.
I stood on the balcony of my office overlooking the crowded city and watched the victory procession pass by. There was no doubting the Egyptians were labouring under a delusion. They’d turned their defeat into a triumph and even began to believe they’d been victorious. Lorry after lorry rolled past, as legions of infantry troops marched by with their rifles held at a position that would have made a Guards’ instructor want to blow his brains out. Fireworks rocketed high overhead, lighting up the evening sky. Over at the palace, the king was preparing to honour the Tiger, but I had to wonder why. Nasser wasn’t by any means what I’d term an efficient soldier, but he was undoubtedly a brave, determined and ambitious soul, with a burning patriotism that couldn’t be quenched.
Despite all the bravado, I was especially pleased to hear that some of my old comrades from the Small Arms Training School were also to be honoured. Colonel Khalifa was given command of the Egyptian Armed Forces in the Sinai Desert, and Captain Hassan Zulfiqar Sabri was promoted to colonel and took up an appointment as Egyptian Ambassador to the Sudan.
The war in Israel had ended with the utter defeat of the Egyptian Army, but the Egyptians followed the old – and some might say sensible – proverb: He who lives to run away, lives to fight another day.