A Tuneful Takeover

When Radio Damascus plays martial music, interspersed with ringing slogans, Syrian businessmen begin to wince. It usually means a coup d'etat or a government crackdown.

The martial music began one night at 11:30 and the first slogan was: "1965 shall witness fundamental developments in strengthening the foundations of the regime!" That seemed to rule out a coup. At 1:30 a.m. the radio came clean: the announcer read off four new decrees that will take Syria's wobbly Baath (Renaissance) socialist government far down the Marxist road and virtually wipe out private ownership of Syria's major industries.

Strongman Amin Hafez's first two decrees wholly or partly nationalized 115 firms worth some $70 million--from textiles to beer. The remaining decrees promised 1) compensation to owners over a 15-year period at 3% interest (most unlikely in a country that has had 15 government reshuffles in 18 years), and 2) life imprisonment or death to anyone attempting to "obstruct" the operation.

The after-midnight announcement last week was intended to catch businessmen unawares. When they rushed to their offices next morning they were met by troops and tanks at the factory gates; at the government-owned banks, some found their safe-deposit boxes had been opened and all hard currency found there replaced by Syrian pounds. But Syrian businessmen are every bit as canny as their socialist rulers. They had long feared the worst, and since March 1963 an estimated $1 billion has been smuggled out of the country to safety in Lebanon and Switzerland. With last week's repressive action, the businessmen may soon be in flight after their money, causing a "brain drain" that Syria's ardent but inept socialists can ill afford.

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