LEBANON'S NEW PRESIDENT

Elected President of Lebanon last week was the little republic's No. 1 soldier: Major General Fuad Chehab, 56.

Family: Born March 19, 1902, member of Lebanon's foremost family and heir to the noble title of emir held by his illustrious forebears who ruled Lebanon under the Ottoman Empire in the 18th and 19th centuries. A devout Maronite Roman Catholic, as tradition requires in Lebanese Presidents, he married Rose Noiret of Nice, a French officer's daughter. They have no children.

Military Career: Joined the French army under the mandate, educated at France's famed St. Cyr. Promoted by the Vichy French to command of the Lebanese battalion of the French Army of the Levant, he was named chief of independent Lebanon's new army in 1945, has built it into a compact, disciplined force under firm control.

Personal Traits: Short, soft-voiced, trim but arthritic, he is a professional soldier of high personal integrity, known to every Lebanese simply as "The General." He attends few parties, reads mainly military writings, says little. His censors regularly, at his own order, cut his name out of all dispatches during the rebellion.

Recent Role: During a 1952 political crisis he reluctantly took office as acting President for three days, until

President Chamoun's election, and during the Suez crisis he held office briefly again as Chamoun's Defense Minister. Throughout this year's fighting, he has invited rebel leaders to tea, kept their supply lines open, consulted them regularly by telephone. But he would not order army troops to attack rebels, despite heaviest pressure from the palace and Western embassies, presumably because he wanted to preserve his army's scrupulous political neutrality. When the Marines landed, Chehab felt Chamoun had betrayed him by inviting them without consulting him. He opposed the landing, and at first refused to cooperate with the Marines in Beirut. His ambiguous order of the day to his men: "Do as your military honor commands."

Assessment: Chehab, says a top diplomat, "is an able, conscientious fence-sitter who sat there twelve years and kept the army together, and now believes he can sit there six years more and keep Lebanon together." Once in office, he will probably ask that U.S. forces be withdrawn. Anti-Communist and essentially pro-Western, he believes Lebanon cannot survive unless it works out a lasting relationship with Nasser. Chehab is likely to withdraw Chamoun's commitment to the Eisenhower Doctrine and reaffirm Lebanese neutrality among Arab lands. Nonetheless, Washington calls him the "best hope" for peace in Lebanon.

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