1956 The Suez Canal Crisis
On July 26, 1956, Egypt’s President Gamal Abdel Nasser gave a grand public speech on Alexandria square announcing that he was taking over the Suez Canal:
“The Suez Canal was dug by the efforts of the sons of Egypt … Today, O citizens, we declare that our property has been returned to us. We are realizing our glory and our grandeur. … And it will be run by Egyptians! Egyptians! Egyptians!”
The British and the French were not going to sit idly by, but immediately put into motion a plan to seize back the canal. They enlisted Israel in on their plans. Israel would attack Egypt and capture Sinai. This would give the European Great Powers the pretext to step in and establish peace as well as resume control of the canal.
President Eisenhower would not back their play, though. In fact, he was furious over this naked aggression. He threatened serious economic sanctions that led the British and the French to back down. Lawrence Wright argues that this marked the “tombstone for European colonialism”, replacing the old Great Powers with the emergence of the United States and the Soviet Union as the new superpowers on the world scene.
As for Israel, the Jewish state did not come off too badly after being left out on a limb, as this was how they acquired the technology and resources to join the Nuclear Club. As the French Prime Minister Mollet put it, “I owe the bomb to them.”
[Source: Lawrence Wright, “Thirteen Days in September: Carter, Begin, and Sadat at Camp David”]
“The Suez Canal was dug by the efforts of the sons of Egypt … Today, O citizens, we declare that our property has been returned to us. We are realizing our glory and our grandeur. … And it will be run by Egyptians! Egyptians! Egyptians!”
The British and the French were not going to sit idly by, but immediately put into motion a plan to seize back the canal. They enlisted Israel in on their plans. Israel would attack Egypt and capture Sinai. This would give the European Great Powers the pretext to step in and establish peace as well as resume control of the canal.
President Eisenhower would not back their play, though. In fact, he was furious over this naked aggression. He threatened serious economic sanctions that led the British and the French to back down. Lawrence Wright argues that this marked the “tombstone for European colonialism”, replacing the old Great Powers with the emergence of the United States and the Soviet Union as the new superpowers on the world scene.
As for Israel, the Jewish state did not come off too badly after being left out on a limb, as this was how they acquired the technology and resources to join the Nuclear Club. As the French Prime Minister Mollet put it, “I owe the bomb to them.”
[Source: Lawrence Wright, “Thirteen Days in September: Carter, Begin, and Sadat at Camp David”]