Political Changes: 1967-1970 • 343Egypt After Nasir
Nasir's death set off an extraordinary wave of public mourning in Egypt.
The Guinness Book of World Records cited his funeral for having had more
participants (4 million is a conservative estimate) than any other in history.
Anwar al-Sadat, Nasir's vice president and one of the last of the original
"free officers," was chosen to succeed him, but few expected him to last long
in power. Other Nasirites competed against Sadat and with one another.
Only on 15 May 1971 did Sadat assert full control of his government by
purging his opponents. While feigning loyalty to Nasir's principles, Sadat
began making far-reaching changes. Nasir's elaborate internal security ap¬
paratus was dismantled. Sadat invited Egyptian and foreign capitalists to
invest in local enterprises, even though such investment meant a retreat
from socialism. The country's name, which remained the United Arab Re¬
public even after Syria's secession, was changed to the Arab Republic of
Egypt. Although Egypt's Soviet ties were seemingly tightened by a fifteen-
year alliance treaty signed in May 1971, they were actually unraveling be¬
cause Moscow would not sell offensive weapons to Sadat for use against
Israel. The next year, Sadat's patience would become so frayed that he
would expel from Egypt most of the Soviet advisers and technicians.
The End of the Rogers Peace Plan
What happened to the US government's efforts to bring peace to the Mid¬
dle East? The temporary cease-fire was renewed several times during the
fall of 1970 and winter of 1971, as Jarring shuttled between Egypt and Is¬
rael. In February he sent notes to both sides, inviting them to accept cer¬
tain points as a prerequisite to negotiations. Egypt would have to sign a
peace agreement with Israel embodying the final settlement. And Israel
would have to pull back to what had been the frontier between Egypt and
Palestine (giving Egypt control of Sinai, but not the Gaza Strip). Sadat ac¬
tually consented to sign a contractual agreement on the terms of a peace
with Israel, something Nasir had never done. But Israel refused to with¬
draw to the pre-June 1967 armistice line, and Jarring ended his mission
and thus the Rogers Plan. Both Israel and Egypt did express interest in a
partial settlement that would have included reopening the Suez Canal
(closed since 1967), with Israel withdrawing slightly from its east bank.
Washington tried to obtain agreement on this interim deal, and Egypt and
Israel might have saved many lives later by accepting it in 1971. Sadat took
to calling 1971 "the year of decision," in which Egypt and Israel would
either make peace or go to war. But in fact 1971 was not that decisive year,
and neither was 1972.