The Almost Perfect Regicide

One day last winter Morocco's King Hassan II and his trusted lieutenant, General Mohammed Oufkir, were in the seaside resort of Agadir, discussing an official visit by Libya's Colonel Muammar Gaddafi to nearby Mauritania. To the King's astonishment, Oufkir suddenly proposed that the Moroccan air force be used to assassinate Gaddafi, who had never made any secret of his antipathy toward Hassan. "If only we could find out Gaddafi's flight plan," asked Oufkir, "what would you think of sending an F-5 to smash into him in the middle of the desert?"

"Oufkir, are you mad?" replied Hassan. "Even supposing we knew his flight plan, his altitude, his route and we hit him, you must realize that there would be an inquiry. They would find traces of bullets and rockets. In this area only Morocco has F-5s. Can you imagine the international scandal? Piracy in midair against a chief of state?" Then, to put the matter firmly out of hand, the King added: "Oufkir, I absolutely forbid this business."

THIS remarkable story of political intrigue--so similar in plan to the abortive coup that General Oufkir led against the Moroccan monarch himself two weeks ago--was recalled by King Hassan last week as he told of his narrow escape from the aerial attack on his plane. When three Moroccan air force F-5s opened fire on the King's Boeing 727 jetliner over the Mediterranean, Hassan related, it was this scene with Oufkir that flashed across his mind "immediately, just like a film."

Hassan had summoned newsmen to the Royal Guest Palace to reveal details of the attempted midair regicide. The King portrayed his Defense Minister, whom he had considered his most loyal supporter, as a chronic plotter of palace intrigue. Earlier, Hassan had claimed bitterly that he had protected Oufkir "beyond all reasonable bounds," and had even "endangered our relations with France" when he refused to extradite Oufkir for the Paris kidnaping and presumed murder in 1965 of Moroccan Leftist Mehdi Ben Barka.

King's Confidence. At the very time that Oufkir was proposing the assassination of Gaddafi he was already plotting the attack on Hassan, according to the King. The scheme, in fact, was hatched only four days after army cadets stormed the King's summer palace last July. If Oufkir had a hand in that affair, it was never revealed. But he kept the King's confidence by ordering the summary execution of ten high-ranking officers (who, had they lived, might have implicated him).

Oufkir's error this time, said Hassan, had been "to think he could commit the perfect crime." The plot was later described to the King by two of the captured airmen. One of the pilots, Lieut. Colonel Mohammed Amekrane--who suffers from an incurable kidney ailment--disclosed the details after Hassan coldly reminded him that if military justice did not finish him off, his illness would. As Hassan related it, the plan called for the plane to be shot down at sea "so as to leave no trace." With the deaths of the King, three of his children and his only brother, Prince Moulay Abdullah--all of whom were on the plane--Oufkir would have had dictatorial powers as head of a regency in the name of nine-year-old Crown Prince Sidi Mohammed. In fact, he had planned to pick up the child, who was vacationing in the mountains, immediately after the attack.

But when Oufkir saw the King's Boeing 727 land safely on the runway, he apparently lost his nerve. "It's not possible," Hassan quoted him as saying. "It must be another airplane." Without waiting to see the King, Oufkir drove to army headquarters. "From that moment," said Hassan, "I began to wonder what was going on."

Not until later that evening did Hassan feel certain of Oufkir's guilt. By that time, both Amekrane and another pilot, Major Kouera el Ouafi, were being questioned, a fact known by Oufkir. At 11 p.m., Hassan summoned Oufkir to his palace at Skhirat. Oufkir delayed, but after two more phone calls from the King, he arrived around midnight. The royal family was waiting; in a fury Hassan's mother grabbed Oufkir. "Listen, I've had enough of this army that has frightened me twice already," she said. Oufkir moved on into the children's room, nervously smoking one cigarette after another. "I'll go get His Majesty," said the King's protocol chief. "Wait," said Oufkir. "Has His Majesty seen Kouera?" The aide made no reply.

"All right, I understand," said Oufkir. "I know what's left for me to do." With that, according to Hassan, Oufkir pulled his revolver to shoot himself. Others tried to stop him; some wild shots hit the ceiling. "The last shot was fatal," said Hassan--though he may not have told the whole story. Paris' Le Nouvel Observateur reported that those who saw Oufkir's body the next morning said that one bullet had hit him in the stomach, another near the lung, a third in the right arm, and a fourth in the back of his neck emerging through his left eye--too many wounds for a suicide.

Obviously shaken by the unreliability of his military, Hassan last week lashed out at the army as "despicable and evil" and moved to reassert his authority. He abolished the posts of defense minister and chief of staff, made himself commander-in-chief of the armed forces and named his personal pilot, who had landed the shot-up royal plane on one engine, chief of the air force. Although Morocco's tiny navy was the only armed service that had not yet mounted an attack against him, Hassan sacked the navy chief as well. He also summarily retired four military judges who earlier this year acquitted 1,007 cadets involved in the 1971 revolt. Evidently Hassan intended to see that those involved this time would be dealt with more harshly. Last week at least 50 persons, including Oufkir's widow, were still being interrogated, although Hassan guessed that "not more than 15" actively took part in the plot.

Quick Thinker. In a large measure, Hassan's survival can be attributed to the fact that he is a quick thinker--"twice as fast as anybody else around here," remarked one knowledgeable diplomat. "His most implacable opposition," cabled TIME Correspondent Curt Prendergast from Morocco last week, "lies in the cities, where laborers' tin and tar paper shantytowns contrast sharply with the lavish life-style of the rich, most notably Hassan himself. So far, Hassan has succeeded in keeping his political opposition at bay. The conservative Istiqlal Party and the leftist National Union of Popular Forces are in a shaky alliance at best; the militancy of the better-organized Union Marocaine du Travail is mitigated by the fact that for every job there are two hungry men seeking it." When negotiations with the parties broke down, Hassan proclaimed a new constitution last March. The parties boycotted the election. But government trucks went out and transported voters to the polls; Morocco's third constitution in a decade was ratified by 98% of the voters.

With the monarch and the monarchy both more vulnerable to the pressures around them, Hassan last week reiterated that new elections would be held in a few months. "I want to build on the basis of legality, in 'the open,' " said the King, using some of his favorite golfing terms. "It's a match where everybody can join in." But he clearly expected the political parties to make concessions to him, and not vice versa. He was ready to open talks, Hassan said, but only if the parties changed their demands--which are, essentially, rule by Parliament rather than the throne.

After a wary silence, both the Istiqlal Party and the National Union of Popular Forces issued statements attacking Hassan's "antidemocratic" policies and his "absolutist" style of government. The papers had hardly hit the streets when Hassan's Information Ministry confirmed the point by seizing the entire press run.

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