Al-Ahram: A Diwan of contemporary life (592) As a ruler Professor Yunan Labib Rizk To mark Mohamed Ali's 200th anniversary of his assumption to the throne, Professor Yunan Labib Rizk moves to part four of this nine-part series, selecting a study which focuses on Mohamed Ali's assimilation into Egyptian society, his political ambitions and the primary principles of his rule Mohamed Ali: The Man and his Psychology, the Ruler and his Policy was the title of another study Al-Ahram newspaper published in its November 1949 issue commemorating 100 years since the death of Mohamed Ali Pasha. The author, Jacques Tager, a scholar of Syrian origin, was the curator of the library of Abdeen Palace, the author of The Translation Movement in Egypt in the 19th Century and Copts and Muslims, and co-author of Ismail as Portrayed in Official Documents. Although he had close connections with the palace, Tager never compromised his scholastic integrity. In the following article, apart from the slightly ingratiating tone of the concluding paragraph he remains strictly objective. One striking characteristic of Tager's approach is his tendency to pose questions without providing conclusive answers. These questions remain pending to this day, and will probably remain so. "History has passed diverse judgments on the age of Mohamed Ali. Historians have offered contradictory opinions on the character of the man and his rule. Some have praised him to the skies, others have criticised him harshly; indeed, attacked him vehemently. Foremost among the criticisms leveled at Mohamed Ali was that he failed to adopt the forms of Western civilisation and to apply to the letter the political and social principles that prevailed at that time in advanced nations. However, to begin with, was Mohamed Ali inclined to imitate the West at all costs? Was it his intention to overturn the system of government and replace oriental principles with others over a period of 20 to 30 years without preparing the people for this transition? "Through an examination of the personal papers and memoirs published by King Fouad and by His Majesty King Farouq I and of the documents housed in the Abdeen Palace archives we should be able to clarify many obscurities and paint an accurate portrait of Mohamed Ali, the man and the ruler. "First, however, I would like to clarify the following points: whether Mohamed Ali assimilated into Egyptian society, his political ambitions and, thirdly, his major principles of rule. The more light we shed on these points the easier it will be for us to understand the man and his psychology and the ruler and his policy". THE ASSIMILATION OF MOHAMED ALI: "Mohamed Ali was Macedonian by birth and died Egyptian. However, throughout his life he contended with major political issues as a member of the Ottoman ruling class. This situation should come as no surprise, for at the beginning of the 19th century the subject peoples of the Supreme Porte were internationally recognised as bearing the same nationality: Ottoman. "True, some Ottoman subjects in Christian Europe, influenced by the principles of the French revolution, fought to attain their independence. This did not apply to the Muslim subjects apart from occasional instances in the lands on the fringes the Empire, such as North Africa and the lands of Nuba. In these cases, the people would take advantage of their rulers' weakness or preoccupation with important affairs to withhold payment of taxes, compelling the sultan to assert his power and launch a disciplinary campaign against the rebel leaders. Once the Ottoman forces won, the people would throw off the yolk of their rebel leaders and life would return to normal under Ottoman rule. "Ottoman governors in those days were always moving from one post to another, from Crete to Baghdad to Beirut to Egypt, as the firmans of investiture dictated. It was not theirs to choose their destination nor did they evince a desire during their terms of governorship to involve themselves in their subjects' affairs. "Mohamed Ali arrived in Egypt at the head of an Albanian regiment whose task it was to drive out the French and suppress insurrection. He did not feel that he had arrived in a foreign country, for there were Ottoman officials in place to administer government affairs, maintain order and defend the country. "Some historians have compared Mohamed Ali to Ali Bey the elder and held that Ali Bey was the first of the two to aspire to impose his absolute rule over Egypt. If this was the case, there was a vast difference between their approach. Ali Bey intended to conduct the affairs of the country exclusively through the Mameluke overlords, whereas Mohamed Ali cast his lot with the Egyptian people and appealed to them for their aid in eliminating the Mamelukes. "His critics also said that Mohamed Ali changed his position after coming to power. Although he created a peasant army he only thought of recruiting Egyptians after failing to organise his Albanian forces into a modern army and realising that he could not form Nubian regiments. Although he appointed Egyptians to senior administrative posts, he only did so after having been in power for 30 years and then only for reasons pertaining to his own interests. In addition, these Egyptian appointees were not treated equally as their Turkish peers. They also said that he relied on Armenians and Macedonians in diplomatic affairs and that he gave no consideration to training Egyptians in the art of diplomacy. Finally, they held that his personal retinue consisted entirely of Turks, Armenians and other foreigners, the only exception being a sole Egyptian, his personal physician Nabarawi, and he only appeared in court towards the end of his reign. "These criticisms were only leveled at Mohamed Ali after the principle of the nation state gained ground in the orient, the very principle that had once been fought in Europe as vehemently as the West fights communism today. In addition, Turkish rulers habitually scorned their Arab subjects and refused to let them have a voice in government. We recall, too, that Ibrahim Pasha renounced his project of creating an Arab empire after the fires of rebellion flared in Syria and the Arabian Peninsula. Is it fair, therefore, to censure Mohamed Ali for not acting differently from his Turkish-speaking peers? Is it fair to blame him, who knew nothing of Egyptian history or the Egyptian people when he arrived, for not having let the Egyptian people participate in the revival of their country from the moment he took power? "It was Mohamed Ali who ignored the opinion of his court and set his mind on creating a new army consisting of Egyptian fellahin. It was he who deafened his ears to the skepticism of his Turkish commanders and gradually raised the ranks of Egyptian soldiers until the Turks came to realise that they did not hold a monopoly on military rank and the art of war. Moreover, Mohamed Ali persisted in this in spite of Egyptian attempts to evade conscription and schooling. He had to be strict in order to ensure that Egyptians enrolled in the schools but he fed them, clothed them and paid for their tuition and accommodation at the expense of the state, which ultimately meant out of his own pocket. "Commentators might object that Mohamed Ali assembled Egyptians in the schools and army because he was desperate for soldiers, officers, engineers, physicians and other such civil servants. However, he could just have well stacked the schools he constructed with his Mameluke Turks. After all, did he not send those Turks on study missions to France and Italy, once in 1813 and a second time in 1818, to school them in the modern sciences? When he founded the engineering school in the citadel he filled it with Turkish youths only to be surprised by the disappointing results. In contrast, it was students like Othman Noureddin and Niqola Masabki who shined above others as the first technical cadres to emerge from those schools. "Consider, too, that Mohamed Ali demonstrated an interest in Egyptian culture. He created a study mission of Egyptian students who had been raised in Al-Azhar or the primary schools. And when he founded the schools of medicine, engineering and administration he ensured that many Egyptians were enrolled. Or should we forget that he decreed that Arabic should be the primary language of education in these schools and went to great lengths to make this possible, bringing in translators from Syria to translate the Italian and French textbooks into Arabic and founding the printing press in Boulaq to publish the Arabic schoolbooks. Could he not have made things easier for himself by instructing students in Turkish and having books and teachers brought over from Istanbul? Obviously he could have, but decided not to and instead to instill Arabic culture in the emerging generation of educated Egyptians. "He then instituted a measure that was instrumental in promoting the rise of the Egyptian people: he selected educated Egyptians from within the civil service and appointed them as directors of provincial directorates. Yes, directors had to follow policy directives issued from above, but they still had broad, almost absolute, authority within their directorate. They had to be prepared to assert their influence at any moment, take rapid and firm measures to punish delinquencies, maintain public security, collect taxes, and other such matters. At the same time, we should remember that the Egyptian peasant had been out of power for centuries and that their morale had long since been eroded by the severe and cruel rule of foreigners. How could Mohamed Ali turn to the humble, wretched and submissive peasant long accustomed to trembling before his rulers, place the rod of authority in his hand and tell him to use it against those who had once terrorised him with their cruelty? "Political observers once mocked this bold innovation. They scoffed at the image of the Egyptian director quaking before his supercilious Turkish employees and they maintained that Mohamed Ali only employed Egyptians when he gave up on the Turks or found a way to cut the exorbitant salaries he was paying them. It is sufficient to put paid to this image to point to the fact that the rise of Egyptians to the highest ranks of the military is what led to the insurrection of 1882 and the beginning of the national independence movement in Egypt. "As regards his personal retinue, Mohamed Ali came to Egypt as a middle aged man who only learned to read and write after the age of 45. In addition, he was a stranger to the country and only spoke his native tongue. Finding himself, at first, cut off from his surroundings, he relied on his children and handed them some general posts. Then he called upon some of his intellectual friends and placed them in positions of responsibility as well. No one at the time objected to this practice or found it odd, for anyone who held Ottoman nationality could reside in any part of the empire he pleased and work or invest his money with no obstruction from the local rulers. In addition, the chief magistrate and chief notary, two of the most highly revered posts in Ottoman provinces, were appointed directly by the sultan from among officials in Istanbul. "Then too, Mohamed Ali wanted to establish relations with foreigners, which is why he engaged several Armenians because of their ability to speak Turkish, French and even English. Such appointments were only natural because Egyptians could not speak those languages. However, Mohamed Ali availed himself of all opportunities to reach out to Egyptians and by the end of his era they appeared in the khedival court. In addition, unlike all Ottoman viceroys before him, he refused to reside behind the walls of the citadel and, therefore, built palaces in Cairo, Alexandria, Beni Soueif, Esna, the Fayyoum and other areas of the country. This was only one of many signs of his desire to mix with his people. Nor should we forget that Mohamed Ali only left Egypt five times, and for short periods. The first of these was to the Hijaz to supervise military affairs there and the pilgrimage; the second was to Syria in 1834 to address the tensions there; the third was an inspection tour of Crete in 1838; the fourth was to Istanbul in 1845 to visit the Sultan and the last was his voyage in 1848 to Italy for the purpose of medical treatment. "He would always tell his guests and retinue that he loved Egypt more than any other spot in the world and never wanted to leave it. In 1840, at the peak of the clash between him and the combined forces of the sultan and European powers, he could have pressed his good fortune and fought the tyranny of the powers to the end. However, he opted to relinquish his kingdoms abroad in exchange for the assurance that his children would inherit the throne to Egypt so that he could rest in the assurance of the future of this country". HIS POLITICAL AMBITIONS: "Let us pause a moment to ask whether Mohamed Ali sought total independence, which was the claim reiterated by foreign consuls at the time of the clash between him and the sultan, or whether his objective was to secure dynastic succession to the throne of Egypt and autonomy under the empire. Mohamed Ali never explicitly stated his position on this matter. Rather he operated as circumstances permitted. Sultan Mahmoud could have won Mohamed Ali's affection and made him the strongest pillar of the Ottoman Empire. In fact, when the sultan asked him to fight the Wahabis and the Greeks, Mohamed Ali humbly and willingly obeyed. The sultan intended to reward him, however Khasraw Pasha, Mohamed Ali's most formidable enemy, intervened and succeeded in sowing discord between the sultan and Mohamed Ali. "Mohamed Ali decided to seize Syria, control of which province he regarded as the reward he merited for the services he performed in rescuing the Ottoman Empire. After constructing an enormous fleet, he asked the sultan permission to attack Acre, stating that its governor, Abdallah Pasha, refused to hand over deserters from the Egyptian army. The Supreme Porte knew that Mohamed Ali wanted to expand his borders towards Syria in order to protect his northeastern frontier. But, instead of dissuading Mohamed Ali from his plan to invade Acre, the sultan encouraged him, giving him to understand unofficially that he wanted to eliminate Abdallah Pasha. "Mohamed Ali plunged into battle, the sultan all the while certain that this war against Acre would debilitate the Egyptian army. Indeed, Acre put up a long and valorous resistance against the assault from land and sea. But, when Abdallah Pasha appealed to the sultan for aid, the sultan sent back nothing but promises until he felt that Acre was on the verge of surrender. "It was Ibrahim Pasha who thwarted Istanbul's scheme, intercepting and totally decimating the forces the sultan had finally dispatched to rescue Abdallah Pasha. Then Ibrahim returned and conquered Acre, after which he rerouted his Egyptian forces and, together with the forces of the Amir Bashir, engaged the Turkish army again and beat it into retreat. Then, in Konya, Ibrahim scored a tremendous victory, opening the path to an assault on Istanbul itself. It was at this juncture that European powers intervened causing Mohamed Ali to order his officers to halt their advance and to agree to a truce that would place Syria under Egyptian rule. "Some historians claim that Mohamed Ali made the biggest mistake of his career when he ordered Ibrahim to stop fighting and allowed the European powers to settle the dispute between him and the sultan. To this, we can only reiterate the question as to whether Mohamed Ali truly wanted independence. If so, why did he refrain from invading Istanbul and forcing his will on the caliph? It is our belief that Mohamed Ali still believed that, in spite of the sultan's antagonism towards him, Egypt and Turkey could still cooperate on the condition that Khasraw be removed from power. In addition, Mohamed Ali feared Russian land forces more than Britain's naval power. The Egyptian navy was powerful enough to defend the eastern shores of the Mediterranean while the Egyptian army was exhausted from its long campaigns in Syria and Anatolia and would not be strong enough to prevent Russian forces from attacking Istanbul and wresting away the capital of the Ottoman Empire. To this we should add that Mohamed Ali did not possess the means to withstand a confrontation against the combined forces of the European powers. These powers had warned him that they would intervene to halt his advance on Istanbul and he feared that if he ignored this ultimatum he would not only risk losing his Levantine possessions but Egypt as well". PRIMARY PRINCIPLES OF GOVERNMENT: "We have said that historians contemporary to Mohamed Ali criticised him for failing to implement the social and political principles prevalent in the civilised West to the letter. However, Mohamed Ali was an advocate of absolute rule. He was convinced that the Egyptian people who had lived for centuries in ignorance and destitution needed an iron hand to steer them. In addition, Mohamed Ali loathed hollow promises. When asked his opinion on Sultan Abdel-Mejid's Kalkhana Plan *, he responded without hesitation that if Egypt, which had begun to institute reforms 40 years earlier, could not put that plan into effect, Turkey, which was behind Egypt in this respect, was even less capable of doing so. "Mohamed Ali was a practical man above all else. Yes, he never studied law or economy but he knew his country and his people and he strove to better them both. Some intellectuals maintain that he committed many grievous errors in his rule, that, for example, he overtaxed the economy, failed to produce a new generation of educated elites, and failed to establish a profitable industrial base. They add that were it not for the many wars he engaged in he would have been able to avoid such mistakes. "We agree that the hostility which the sultan harboured towards him and the many wars he was forced to engage in did indeed hamper his efforts. However, it is also our opinion that these factors were the prime impetus behind these efforts -- and they were enormous. The mistake, if anything, resides in the pace of implementation. Mohamed Ali was an old man and keen for posterity to remember him. He was therefore in a hurry and impatient; he wanted his projects completed according to the deadlines he set. "At the same time, he was not quick to anger when he learned of the mistakes committed by officers, engineers and physicians. For example, following the strike against Acre several ships had to be returned to base because of construction flaws that had come to light during the campaign. When his naval engineer, de Cerisy Bek, ** brought it to his attention that the wood that was used in the construction of the ships should have had time to dry, Mohamed Ali said, 'What good are perfectly constructed ships if I can't use them? The ships you constructed performed the greatest service in spite of their flaws'. "As Mohamed Ali was perfectly aware that it would take decades to realise the Egyptian revival, he personally oversaw the education of his sons upon whom he would rely after his death to continue the reforms he had introduced. He was also firm in his belief that if Egypt were to acquire the wherewithal to attain the level of European civilisation, it needed European teachers and technicians to build an army worthy of his great forefathers. He was, therefore, assiduously generous towards the foreigner experts he brought in; however, he never abandoned the wish to see Egyptians replace the foreigners as soon as possible. "It is truly a marvel that the members of the House of Mohamed Ali succeeded in following the legacy of the founder of their great dynasty, leading Egypt through their wisdom to full independence. Today, having obtained independence and freedom from all restrictions, Egypt under His Majesty King Farouq aspires to take its place once again among great nations, deriving inspiration towards this end from that glorious ruler the anniversary of whose death Egypt is commemorating today". FOOTNOTES * The first of a series of reforms, known as the tanzimat, this plan was introduced in response to European pressure and unveiled at a large official ceremony in Kalkhana Palace in 1839. Under this reform, the sultan ceded powers to the Judicial Rulings Council which now had the right to pass legislation although it still had to be ratified by the sultan. The Kalkhana reform also established the principle that no one could be convicted without a public trial and that Muslims and non- Muslims were equal under the law. In addition, it called for legislation to counteract nepotism and commerce in public offices and it recognised the need for compulsory military conscription. ** de Cerisy Bek, who oversaw the construction of the Egyptian naval arsenal in Alexandria, could do little wrong in Mohamed Ali's eyes. Mohamed Ali always spoke of him with great affection: "France sent to me the genius who constructed a great fleet and a vast arsenal within the space of only three years" . de Cerisy arrived in Egypt in 1829. Before that he constructed the ships Mohamed Ali needed in the port of Toulon. Nominated by France to construct the Alexandria arsenal, Mohamed Ali gave him full and unrestricted authority over this task on condition that he complete it in the shortest possible time. In 1835, a dispute broke out between him and a French officer in the employ of the Egyptian navy. Mohamed Ali was unable to dissuade Cerisy from tendering his resignation.
