CHAPTER EIGHT
After the signing of the armistice agreements between Israel and the Arab countries, the West tried to stabilize the situation in the Middle East with the Tripartite Declaration made by Britain, the United States and France on 25 May 1950. This acknowledged that the Arab states and Israel needed to maintain a certain level of armed forces for the purposes of legitimate self-defence of the area as a whole. The three powers agreed to consider all applications for arms or war materials by the countries of the Middle East in the light of these principles.1 The United States, in particular, was concerned that its prestige had declined seriously in all Arab countries, and the State Department was anxious to convince the Arab states that it wanted the friendliest relations with both Israel and the Arab states on a strictly impartial basis. It was in the strategic interests of the United States that the Middle East be strengthened for defence against communist aggression, and that the countries in question obtain their arms from friendly sources.2
Initially the Arabs resorted to economic tactics: their boycott was consolidated by the closing of both the Suez Canal and the oil pipelines to Israel. The Iraq Petroleum Company transferred its headquarters from Haifa to Tripoli. Israel had to rely on oil imported by tankers, and started to explore for this commodity in the occupied territories. In 1949 Israel tried using the port of Eilat on the Gulf of Aqaba, but Saudi Arabia leased islands at the mouth of the gulf to Egypt, who then established shore batteries, in December 1950, at Sharm el Sheikh and Ras Nasrani on the southern tip of Sinai to close the gulf to Israeli shipping. In effect these moves did little damage to Israel, except psychologically; perhaps the most irritating consequence was the restriction placed on sea communications with the Zionists in South Africa who, together with their American counterparts, were Israel’s most enthusiastic supporters. Britain repeatedly objected to Egypt, as British shipping was affected. For the Arabs, however, the principal benefit was a new interest in forming an independent Arab economic base in their own states. Arab economics were helped by the view held by many at that time that Europe was dependent on Arab oil, and that the oil lifeline of the West was the Suez Canal. In reality much of the oil from Europe passed through newly constructed terminals on the Mediterranean. But the Middle East’s share of oil production did increase from 16.7 per cent in 1950 to 21.2 per cent in 1955, and its estimated share of the world’s reserves from 45 per cent in 1950 to 75 per cent in 1956. In 1955 the Middle East supplied 79 per cent of Europe’s oil; 45 per cent of this went through the Suez Canal, 33 per cent was carried by the Syrian pipelines and 4 per cent around South Africa. Much of Europe still relied on coal, but the United States, in 1955, depended on oil for 67 per cent of its energy needs. It was anticipated that the European demand for oil would increase.3
Arab nationalism
The First Arab–Israeli War, however, did not unify the Arab world. Rather it led to upheavals in individual Arab countries, often fomented by a new, young and disillusioned generation which had been nurtured on what was considered the injustice of Zionist dispossession of Arab land with the assistance of the Western powers. This emerging Arab nationalism found a common focal point in the hatred of Israel. But it also disliked what it saw as the reactionary influence of the old dynasties. Increasingly, Arabism was not just synonymous with the Islamic religion, the Arabic language and the geographic area of Arabia. The inhabitants of North Africa stressed their Arab identity. This Arab renaissance with its cultural, political and economic manifestations was not always understood by leaders in the West. Some members of the British Establishment, including Anthony Eden, were inclined to identify the Bedouin as Arabs, and to think of the Egyptians as something else. During the 1930s and 1940s Arab writers and thinkers developed the idea of the ba’ath or renaissance of the Arab nation. In 1942 Nuri al-Said and Abdullah developed ideas of the Greater Syria into the Fertile Crescent which would be formed by the union of Transjordan, Palestine, the Lebanon and Syria, and to include in the end Iraq and Saudi Arabia. Britain was disturbed by the likelihood of an adverse reaction to this by Egyptian nationalists and the obvious consequences for the British base in Egypt. In the 1950s, however, Britain resisted what it saw as the claims of Gamal Abdel Nasser to be a Pan-Arabic leader. The young generation’s dislike of Western imperialism was partly fomented by a scorn for the defeat of France and the subsequent division between Gaullist and Vichy officers in the Levant, by the crushing with Anglo-Indian troops in 1941 of the Rashid Ali government in Iraq, and by Lampson’s forcing Farouk – with British tanks in the palace grounds – to appoint Mustafa al-Nahhas Pasha as leader on 4 February 1942.4 Egypt also, unlike the other Arab countries, had experienced a British presence, rather like that based in India, which tended to isolate itself from the Egyptian community and conduct its own social life in the insular surroundings of Shepheard’s Hotel or the Gezira Country Club.5
The revolutions in the Arab countries, brought about by the humiliating defeat at the hands of Israel, started in Syria on 30 March 1949. A series of coups and counter-coups meant in effect that that country was ruled by Colonel Adib Shishakli between 1950 and 1954. During this time the Ba’ath Party gained in strength, particularly when it united with Akram Hourani’s Socialist Party in 1952. Syrian army officers, however, feared a union with Iraq in which they would not have the senior appointment in a combined army. In Jordan the Arab refugees from Palestine made up one-third of the population, and although given Jordanian citizenship they remained a discontented element. One of their number assassinated Abdullah on 20 July 1951 in the al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem. The throne first passed to a mentally unstable son, and in 1952 to the Britisheducated King Hussein, then only seventeen. Nasser invited the young King to Egypt, and both Syria and Egypt were critical of Hussein’s British connections. He faced a difficult position as the Israelis mounted reprisal raids on frontier villages in retaliation for attacks by the Palestinian refugees in Jordan. Hussein was widely criticized for his reliance on Glubb, considered by some to be the real ruler of Jordan. As if to show his own independence, Hussein dismissed Glubb on 1 March 1956, and in October of that year elections returned a pro-Nasser government in Jordan. In Baghdad on 22 November 1952, what started as a demonstration by schoolchildren developed into arson and riots and military control. Similar outbreaks occurred until 1957. Iraq went through periods of martial law in between general elections. But from 1954 it did embark upon a programme of social improvement. In the Lebanon Camille Chamoun became President in 1953 and for a while made overtures to Iraq and Egypt.6
The rise of Nasser
Perhaps the most significant change occurred in Egypt. The conduct of the war against Israel convinced the younger officers that their rulers should be replaced. But initially the Wafd was returned to power and Farouk and Nahhas Pasha were reconciled. In 1950 Nasser was elected president of the Free Officers’ Executive Committee. Following the Wafd’s abrogation of the Anglo-Egyptian treaty, moves were taken to isolate the Suez base. Britain tried to counter persistent guerrilla attacks by surrounding the Ismailia police headquarters on 25 January 1952. Resistance led to the deaths of fifty Egyptian police, and the next day, ‘Black Saturday’, a Cairo mob, instigated by the Muslim Brotherhood, destroyed British property. Nasser was in one of the units that helped to restore order and was encouraged by this demonstration of militant action. As governments came and went Nasser and his officers prepared for a coup scheduled for August 1952. General Muhammad Neguib was chosen as a figurehead, and the date was brought forward to 23 July. The coup was almost bloodless, and the next morning Anwar Sadat told the Egyptian people in the name of Neguib that the army had seized power to purge the country of the traitors and weaklings who had dishonoured Egypt. Farouk went into exile, and the revolution instituted social and land reforms which later came to be known as Arab socialism. The revolution took strong action against communist agitators and initially was largely nationalist rather than Pan-Arab. On 18 June 1953 Egypt was proclaimed a republic with Neguib as President and Prime Minister, and Nasser as his deputy. But Neguib was outmanoeuvred by Nasser, who replaced him in October 1954, at the same time as the repression of the Muslim Brotherhood. In a work published in 1954, The Philosophy of the Revolution, Nasser outlined his plans. Egypt was located at the coincidence of three circles: the Arab circle, the African circle and the Islamic circle. Egypt’s wealth, size, population and religious and intellectual qualities made it the obvious leader of the Arab world, though Nasser did acknowledge that Egypt in the past had become somewhat detached from its Arab roots. The emerging Black African nations, struggling for their independence, would also look to Egypt, which formed the link between Africa and the outside world. Cairo, with its ancient university, was also the major focal point in the Muslim world. It was obvious that to play the role envisaged by Nasser, Egypt would have to throw out Britain. Some British statesmen did not like Nasser’s claims to be a grand Pan-Arabic leader, to say nothing of heading Africa, then largely still under the British Crown, and heading the Muslim world with which Britain, because of its Commonwealth connections, felt a special identity. French strategists regarded The Philosophy of the Revolution as a revised edition of Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf, and members of the French Ministry of Defence often drew the analogy between Nasser and Hitler. France, after all, had influence over most of North Africa.7
Following the First Arab–Israeli War, France was increasingly faced with demands for independence from the three Maghreb states in North Africa, which also seemed to be wakening to a new Arab consciousness. In Tunisia, the Neo-Destour Party, under Habib Bourguiba, demanded autonomy and a parliament. Bourguiba was arrested, and later taken to France. There were acts of terrorism against the French police, and after various concessions Bourguiba returned in June 1955 to lead Tunisia with his gradualist tactics, and immediately won a campaign against an opponent who favoured a more violent approach. In Morocco the nationalist movement spread with the support of the Arab League, but was resisted by the French colony in that country. But French reprisals led to massive support for the Sultan, Muhammad V, and on 6 November 1955 France acknowledged the independence of Morocco, the transfer of power which acknowledged French interests taking place on 2 March 1956. In Algeria, France had granted an elected assembly in 1947 and acknowledged many Muslim rights, but the French community there prevented their practical application. An open Muslim rebellion started on 1 November 1954. By 1956 its headquarters were in Cairo.8
The premiership of Sharett and the return of Ben-Gurion
After 1949 Israel tried to consolidate its internal and international position. While maintaining a small regular army Israel introduced conscription for men and women: within forty-eight hours it could put into the field 200,000 soldiers. In November 1953, Moshe Sharett succeeded Ben-Gurion as Prime Minister. During the First World War Sharett had taken Ottoman citizenship and become an officer in the Turkish army. His approach was that of moderation and gradualism. Between February and September 1954 Egypt, anxious not to antagonize Britain and the United States, allowed shipping to and from Israel to pass through the Suez Canal. With the premiership of Pierre Mendès-France, Israel secured the sympathy of France. In August 1954 American Zionists tried to prevent the British evacuation of the Canal Zone, while at the same time attempting to secure Israel’s use of the Suez Canal. Between 22 August and 3 September Israel mounted a number of reprisal raids in the Gaza Strip, the first serious skirmishes since 1949. The Bat Galim, an Israeli-owned ship and the first to attempt the Suez passage since 1949, was seized by Egypt on 28 September for allegedly firing on Egyptian fishermen in the Gulf of Suez. The crew of the ship was finally released through Gaza on 1 January 1955. This test case confirmed the Egyptian boycott. Gradualism did not seem to achieve much.
Israel’s image during these years was tarnished by several incidents. The Qibya raid of 14–15 October 1953, ordered by Ben-Gurion, achieved considerable international publicity. On that night Israeli soldiers killed sixty-six men, women and children of the village. Even sympathetic American newspapers compared the incident to the Nazi massacre of 185 men of the village of Lidice in Czechoslovakia on 10 June 1942 in reprisal for the assassination of an SS chief. Perhaps the worst Arab reprisal was the ambush of an Israeli bus on Scorpions’ Pass, in the eastern Negev, on 17 March 1954: eleven Israelis died. In retaliation, Israeli raiders hit the village of Nahhaleen, and killed nine inhabitants. Britain threatened that Israel would have to fight both Britain and Jordan if it occupied any Jordanian territory. Henry A. Byroade, speaking for the State Department, warned Israel to drop the policy of force and retaliatory killings. In July 1954, possibly at the instigation of Ben-Gurion, a group of rather amateur Israeli agents tried to sabotage British and American property in Egypt in the hope of giving the impression that violent elements in Egypt opposed the rapprochement with Britain and the United States, and that the Egyptian government could not control these dissident elements. The operations failed, and the Egyptians later released details of the ring, and hanged two members on 31 January 1955. The Israeli Defence Minister, Pinchas Lavon, was seen by some as being responsible, but he tried to blame the affair on Shimon Peres, the Director-General of the Ministry of Defence, Moshe Dayan, and General Benjamin Givly, the chief of intelligence.
A consequence was the return of Ben-Gurion as Minister of Defence on 17 February 1955. Ben-Gurion had a special attachment to the Defence Ministry which he had maintained during his sojourn on a kibbutz as a shepherd. It was hoped that he would be able to restore the Mapai Party’s sagging fortunes for the forthcoming election. Ben-Gurion returned with his activist policies. Perhaps, even during Sharett’s premiership, activism had been independently pursued through Ben-Gurion’s cohorts, Peres and Dayan, in the Ministry of Defence. Sharett had complained to Lieutenant-General E. L. M. Burns, the United Nations commander, that he needed help from the United Nations against the Arabs on the border incidents so that he could win against that powerful bloc in Israel who wanted to retaliate with force. Ben-Gurion brought with him a philosophy that the only way to secure Israel was to force the Arabs, probably by military measures, to accept peace with Israel. Great Power and United Nations’ intervention were to be avoided, and the Arabs should be made to sue on Israel’s terms. In doing this Israel might also add to its territory. For Ben-Gurion the Gaza Strip was seemingly an obvious target: it was after all populated not by Egyptians, but by Palestinian refugees. On 28 February 1955 two Israeli platoons of paratroopers stormed an Egyptian encampment at Gaza and killed thirty-eight. The Israelis lost eight men. The United Nations Mixed Armistice Commission and the Security Council condemned Israel for a ‘pre-arranged and planned attack ordered by Israeli authorities’. Ben-Gurion’s policy of direct confrontation was under way.9
Israel returned to its policy of activism knowing that it had at least the support of France. Many French officers and members of the Ministries of the Interior and Defence disliked both Britain and the Arabs. Not only had the Israeli army earned their sympathy with its defeat of the Arabs, and in effect earlier of Britain, but Israel’s victories over the Arabs were seen as having delayed the rebellions in North Africa. Some sections of the French Right also saw developments in the Middle East in terms of communism and identified Arab nationalism with Russia. Backing Israel was a means of countering this. The military and the Right were, however, often at odds with a diplomatic corps concerned to preserve France’s relations with the Arabs, and particularly Syria. But as Egypt and not Syria emerged as Israel’s principal enemy, this opposition eased. When Ben-Gurion embarked on his policy of developing Israel’s nuclear option, securing aircraft and an armaments industry, he turned to France. In January 1955 Paris overrode British objections and agreed to sell Mystère aircraft to Israel. There was only a mild reaction in France to the Gaza raid. Ben-Gurion explained to the French Ministry of Defence that he had decided to use French equipment. France became Israel’s principal source of weapons before the Suez–Sinai War of 1956 and the country where Israel’s nuclear researchers learnt their trade.10
American preoccupations with communism
In effect, France replaced the United States as Israel’s sponsor. The presidential election of November 1952 had returned Dwight D. Eisenhower and a Republican administration. Eisenhower chose John Foster Dulles as his Secretary of State. Throughout his life Dulles had been preparing for this office. Anthony Eden told Eisenhower that he hoped the President would appoint someone else, but was informed that Eisenhower knew of no one so well qualified. Fairly late in life, Dulles had been a convert to fundamentalist Christianity, and was thus inclined to see the world in terms of good and evil, black and white with no greys. The emerging philosophy of neutralism was peculiarly abhorrent to the new Secretary of State. While at Versailles at the end of the First World War Dulles had acquired a suspicion of what he saw as British machinations. In the negotiations leading up to the signing of the Japanese peace treaty Dulles had dealt with Herbert Morrison, and the British Foreign Secretary had paid tribute to Dulles’s helpful attitude when he urged the Cabinet to accept the terms. Eden, however, did not get on with Dulles. Indeed the new Republican administration reviewed the special relationship, and in Bermuda in December 1953 Eden and Churchill learnt that Britain was no longer the special ally, but only one among a number of allies. At the Geneva Conference of 1954 Britain went its own way and Eden triumphed over Dulles. The special relationship was only revived again, at American instigation, when the leaders of the two countries met in Bermuda in early 1957 in the aftermath of the Suez crisis.11
Dulles had been a member of the American delegation to the United Nations in 1947–48 when the partition of Palestine was considered. He did not take much part in discussions, and had confined himself to legalistic niceties. Perhaps it was lack of an overenthusiasm for Zionism that led to accusations in 1949 that he was anti-Semitic.12 Shortly after becoming Secretary of State, Dulles undertook a tour of the Middle East and gave the impression of American neutrality and impartiality in the Arab–Israeli dispute. Dulles’s principal concern, as he told the American people when he returned in June 1953, was to encourage the area to strengthen itself against communism: the members of the Arab League seemed so engrossed in their quarrels with Britain, France and Israel that they did not seem to notice Russia. Israel felt betrayed. When Byroade, as Assistant Secretary of State, campaigned for the ‘de-Judaization’ of Israel, Abba Eban, the Israeli ambassador to the United States, protested officially. Eban also felt that the United States showed a reluctance to redress what he saw as the growing imbalance of arms in the Middle East.13
At the time of the Cold War, however, Washington’s main preoccupation in the Middle East was to prevent Russian penetration, and even to secure a defence organization to fulfil the same role in the area as NATO did in Europe. Eisenhower, perhaps, saw Britain as the country best able to take the lead in this: Britain, after all, had considerable experience of the Arab world. Defence discussions between Washington and London in the early 1950s concluded that the Middle East would be largely a British responsibility. It was official American policy – though Britain at times doubted some of the manifestations of this – to help Britain to secure and consolidate its interests in the Middle East.14
Mossadeq, Nasser and British paramountcy in the Middle East
British paramountcy in the Middle East was undermined by the birth of Israel. At the end of the First Arab–Israeli War Britain’s military foothold in Arabia proper was restricted to the use of two air bases in Jordan and two in Iraq. Britain’s share of Middle East oil was also cut when Dr Mohammed Mossadeq secured the passage through the Iranian parliament (Majlis) on 1 May 1951 of a bill nationalizing the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company. The British Cabinet considered military action, but Washington approved of nationalization, urged restraint and sent a mediator to Tehran, Averell Harriman, who, en route, assured Hugh Gaitskell in Paris that he would do his best to sustain the British position. Just before handing over to Churchill, Attlee told his colleagues that Britain could not afford to break with the United States on an issue like this.15 In the end the United States was convinced that Mossadeq was not the only alternative to communism in Iran. British external intelligence, MI6, and the Central Intelligence Agency arranged the overthrow of Mossadeq and the return of the Shah. The American ambassador, Loy Henderson, worked with his British counterpart, Sir Roger Stevens, to secure a satisfactory arrangement over oil. But it meant that the share of British capital invested in the oil industry of the Middle East dropped from 49 to 14 per cent, and the British share of oil production from 53 to 24 per cent. The American share increased from 44 to 58 per cent, and the American companies controlled 42 per cent of the capital. The image of British power faded in Arab eyes.16 Saudi Arabia, furthermore, made moves towards the British-protected sheikhdoms in the Persian Gulf, and in August 1952 a Saudi expedition seized the Buraimi oasis. Relations between Britain and Saudi Arabia were strained. The attempted annexation had been arranged by Kim Roosevelt of the Central Intelligence Agency: the Saudis had tempted the Americans with the offer of oil concessions. But British-led Omani scouts drove the Saudis out. Roosevelt then attempted to bribe people in Abu Dhabi to concede the oasis to King Saud to open the way to the American firm Aramco, and to close it to the British-controlled Iraq Petroleum Company. But Britain was informed, and took the dispute to an international court where the Central Intelligence Agency tried to bribe the arbitrators.17
Britain’s power in the Middle East, however, depended on its success in renegotiating the Anglo-Egyptian treaty of 1936. With the onset of the Cold War British ministers’ and military officials’ concern extended from just securing the Canal Zone to the defence of the Middle East as a whole. During 1946 talks with the Egyptians resulted in consideration being given by both sides to a draft treaty, but the whole issue foundered on Cairo’s insistence on the unity of the Sudan with Egypt under the Egyptian Crown. Negotiations were broken off at the beginning of 1947, at a time when the Cabinet was considering throwing the Palestine question to the United Nations. The Chief of the Air Staff warned that although Palestine was of special importance in the general scheme of defence, in war Egypt would be Britain’s key position in the Middle East. With the formation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Britain’s responsibility for the defence of the Middle East remained, and London tried to interest Commonwealth countries, particularly Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, in playing a part. But in July 1950 Sir Robert Menzies, the Australian Prime Minister, failed to interest Cairo in the idea of a Commonwealth force to assist in Egyptian defence. In British eyes Egypt remained more concerned over Israel than the threat of Russia. In the Egyptian view Britain had exceeded the provisions of the 1936 treaty. As Morrison reported to the Cabinet, just before the Labour government was voted out of office, Cairo was determined to rid Egyptian soil of British troops irrespective of the consequences for Middle East security.18
On 16 October 1951 the Egyptian parliament, in a unanimous vote, abrogated the 1936 treaty with Britain. The new Conservative government sent reinforcements to the Canal Zone. The conflict escalated and strained Britain’s military reserves. In January 1952 Churchill asked for token forces from the United States, France and Turkey, but met with a stony response. At the end of the month clashes in Ismailia resulted in about fifty Egyptians dead. This probably precipitated the riots of 26 January, ‘Black Saturday’, in which the Muslim Brotherhood, socialists and students, probably assisted by the police angered over the sacrifice of their fellows by the government at Ismailia, attacked the European quarter of Cairo with cries of ‘Allah akbar’ and ‘We want arms to fight for the Canal’. The symbols of the British in Egypt, Shepheard’s Hotel, Thomas Cook’s and the British Overseas Airways Corporation, were ravaged, together with 400 other buildings, and 17 British subjects were killed. Farouk dismissed Nahhas and the Wafd, and the new government worked for cordial Anglo-Egyptian relations. But Nasser and his officers advanced the date of their coup. Britain revived the idea of a Middle East defence organization in September 1952: the suggestion was dismissed by Neguib as ‘hateful and horrible’. The officers were determined to get Britain out, and were prepared to risk the Sudanese question to do this; they probably hoped Sudan would voluntarily choose association with Egypt. On 6 February 1953 London and Cairo agreed terms for the liquidation of the Condominium and self-determination for the Sudan. The next month Eden secured the agreement of Washington – which had previously backed Egypt on the Sudan question – to a new approach for securing a workable British base in Egypt, and one which could be reactivated in time of war. Washington helped London in the subsequent negotiations by dropping hints to the Egyptians of possible economic aid if a fair solution were achieved. But negotiations reached deadlock. To Eden, however, it seemed that Washington and its ambassador, Jefferson Caffrey, were encouraging Egyptian beliefs that Cairo was the victim of British ‘colonialism’. The United States and Egypt, under Caffrey’s guidance, entered into technological and economic agreements which disturbed Israel as well. But the possession of the nuclear deterrent was changing Britain’s thinking. In any case the Anglo-Egyptian treaty was due to expire in 1956 and it seemed important to try to salvage something.
In December 1953 Britain decided to transfer the headquarters of the Middle East forces from the Canal Zone to Cyprus. By the middle of December, forty-one Conservative Members of Parliament had formed the Suez group. Led by Captain Waterhouse they fought to stop what they saw as a retreat from empire that had been uninterrupted since 1945. The Suez group felt that under Egyptian and American pressure the government had lost touch with British opinion: they fought to restore Britain’s mission and won the emotional sympathy of Churchill. They were also supported by Zionists who suddenly found the Suez Canal the corner-stone of the Commonwealth. But the government became more conscious of air transportation and the Cape route: in 1952 the Comet service was started to Johannesburg; Union Castle Lines sailed between Cape Town and Southampton in under twelve days. As the terms were being negotiated Zionist sympathizers urged the transfer of the British base to the Negev instead of Cyprus. Under the agreement of December 1954 which was to last for seven years, British troops were to withdraw within twenty months, the base would be maintained by 1,200 civilian technicians, and could be remilitarized in the limited emergency of an attack by a foreign power excluding Israel. Britain had rights of re-entry in the event of actual war within limitations. The Suez Canal was acknowledged to be an integral part of Egypt. The Suez group protested at this ‘evacuation’ of the ‘linch-pin of the British Commonwealth’: twenty-six members defied the government in the House. The British Empire lost an area the size of Wales: it was seen as the biggest retreat from empire since the division of the Indian subcontinent. The Anglo-Egyptian agreement of 1954 marked a significant decline in British power in the Middle East. British forces moved to Cyprus and had to contend with mounting terrorism on the Mediterranean island.19
At the time the Anglo-Egyptian agreement was being initialled Nasser started implementing one of the concentric circles of his Philosophy of Revolution: that of leading Black Africa. Nasser’s nationalism had been founded on a hatred of British imperialism represented by Lampson’s treatment of Farouk and British troops calling the Egyptians ‘wogs’. In July 1954 Nasser instigated wireless broadcasts in Swahili supporting Mau Mau terrorism and inciting Black British subjects in East Africa to rebellion. As British settlers were being savaged, Eden started to look to the Iraq controlled by Lawrence’s old comrade, Nuri al-Said, as an alternative base for British influence. Dulles was also concerned about the gap in Western defences on the ‘northern tier’. With his encouragement Turkey was trying to establish a northern alliance, and on 2 April 1954 Turkey and Pakistan formed the nucleus of this with a pact. The Secretary of State also sent a new ambassador, Waldemar Gallman, to Baghdad in September to investigate the possibilities of a defence arrangement including Iraq. Britain had some hesitations about allying with Pakistan, because of possible reactions in India. Nuri had ideas about using the alliance to revive his old ideas of a united Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan. He bitterly resented the rejection of his Fertile Crescent scheme in the early 1940s in favour of the Arab League centred on Cairo. Having secured his home base with rather dictatorial tactics, Nuri hoped to counter Nasser’s claim to lead the Arab world. Nuri’s policy reflected the historical rivalries between Iraq and Egypt. To achieve his aims Nuri accepted American arms on American terms, and told Nasser in Cairo in September 1954 that while he could accept Western help to counter the Russian threat, his commitments to the Arab League’s collective security pact would prevent him from joining formal Western defence pacts. Nuri then went on to London and Ankara to lay the foundations of what emerged as the Baghdad Pact. Eden saw this arrangement as a means of reasserting British influence in the area. Dulles did not expect the announcement of the agreement between Iraq and Turkey on 12 January. Iraq hoped that Britain would accede to the pact as soon as possible. Eden anticipated that Iran and Jordan might become members as well and that the pact might grow into a NATO for the Middle East.
The Baghdad Pact
Eden travelled east. On the way he saw Nasser, who, despite Eden’s greeting in flawless Arabic, remained hostile to the envisaged pact. Nasser was increasingly attracted to philosophies of neutralism, and did not want the Arab world dragged into a conflict between East and West. Eight days after the meeting with Eden, Israel attacked Egypt with the raid on Gaza. Nasser decided immediately that it was necessary to increase Egypt’s armaments. On 25 February Iraq and Turkey formalized the pact. Dulles was taken by surprise; Byroade thought it an unfortunate development but said that the United States had no option other than to give its cautious approval. On his return from the East, Eden dropped in to see Nuri in Baghdad to discuss Britain’s accession. The Labour opposition was worried about the effect on Israel of the pact, but did not divide the House, and on 5 April 1955 Britain acceded formally to the pact. Pakistan joined in September, and Iran in November. Early in 1956 Harold Macmillan as Foreign Secretary worked for its extension to Jordan: the United States wanted Jordan in so as to relieve pressure on Iraq, which was criticized for being the only Arab member. Eden’s actions placed Dulles in a difficult position. The form the Baghdad Pact took, as the Near Eastern affairs section of the State Department warned, would antagonize Nasser and most other Arab leaders who shared his anti-British views. Dulles’s principal concern was to block Russian expansion into the Middle East. The Baghdad Pact emphasized a division in the Arab world that could prevent overall Arab participation in this enterprise. Eden wanted to reassert British power and prestige in an area where Britain had been paramount for three decades. Increasingly, Eden also wanted to isolate Nasser, who, through his propaganda, was setting out to challenge Britain’s position in Africa. Dulles did allow Gallman to be an observer to the new pact organization in Baghdad, and by February 1956 it was apparent that the United States would give Britain support over the pact, moral and material, and possibly, after the presidential election of November 1956, might even join.20
Nasser, threatened both by the Baghdad Pact and the Gaza raid of 28 February 1955, needed money and arms to build his new Egypt that would form the centre of the three circles. He tried for arms from the West. Britain stalled: it was backing another part of the Arab world and was reluctant to arm a man inciting British subjects to rebellion elsewhere on the African continent. The Americans hesitated as well. Initially the Americans had refused: Churchill had told Eisenhower that it would be inappropriate for the Americans to give the Egyptians arms to kill British soldiers who had fought alongside American troops during the war. There was also another important factor: in the 1954 congressional elections the Republican share of the vote had dropped. Political analysts explained this in terms of Zionist displeasure with the Dulles policy of courting Egypt at the expense of Israel. Then, in April 1955, Nasser actively furthered his neutralist activities and departed for the conference of non-aligned nations at Bandung. En route, in Rangoon, Nasser spoke to Chou En-lai, Communist China’s delegate, about the aggressions of Israel. Chou agreed to place Nasser’s difficulties over arms supplies to the Russians. Dulles was furious: the Communist Chinese were threatening Quemoy and Matsu. The Russians made the necessary overtures in Cairo between April and July, and then, on 20 July, explained to Nasser that as talks with the Americans were progressing well at the Geneva summit, the arms would have to come through Czechoslovakia. The Central Intelligence Agency uncovered what had happened and its head, Allen Dulles, urged his brother to get Byroade, then ambassador in Cairo, to put pressure on Nasser. John Foster had lost faith in Byroade’s attempts to keep Nasser in the Western camp, and flew Kim Roosevelt there instead. When Nasser learnt this, he publicly announced Egypt’s arms deal with Czechoslovakia before Roosevelt even arrived. Roosevelt was followed by Eric Johnson, the President’s special representative, and George V. Allen, the Assistant Secretary of State. All to no avail. Eisenhower was not especially close to John Foster: the President preferred the company of George Humphrey, the Secretary of the Treasury, and his golfing cronies. But in September he had a heart attack while on holiday in Colorado, and Dulles, under the guidance of Vice-President Richard Nixon, took charge.
The Aswan Dam loan
While Eisenhower was convalescing, Washington learnt of the scheme for which Nasser needed money: the Aswan dam. This Nasser felt would move Egypt into the modern age: harnessing the waters of the Nile would provide the energy. Earlier British feasibility studies had correctly predicted that this would ruin the Egyptian ecology and economy. But the World Bank, under the American, Eugene R. Black, concluded otherwise in its studies in 1953 and 1954. Nasser, after the Czechoslovak arms deal, let Washington know that he would prefer to finance the dam with American money, and so maintain his neutral posture. The American response was slow: Eisenhower was being protected from difficult matters; Humphrey saw the scheme as a British plot and Humphrey did not like Britain; one of Humphrey’s closest friends, Herbert Hoover Jr., whom Dulles placed in charge of the negotiations, saw it as a greedy ploy mounted by British manufacturers and construction companies. Discussions took place in Washington between Black, the Egyptian Finance Minister, Abdel Kaissouni, and the British ambassador, Sir Roger Makins, between 21 November and 16 December. The United States would provide $56m and Britain $14m for the first stage of the construction, and consider later grants up to $200m. Contingent on the Anglo-American grants, the World Bank would lend $200m. The American Zionists disliked the scheme, as did the ‘cotton’ senators, who felt their industry in the south would be damaged. Early in December Dulles secured Eisenhower’s approval for a scheme that would lessen their domestic risks. An American emissary, Robert B. Anderson, would try to persuade Nasser that with a strengthened domestic position the President could negotiate a peace with Israel. But shuttle diplomacy between Cairo and Tel Aviv was fruitless: Nasser felt he could not speak for other Arab states; Ben-Gurion did not think the Aswan dam good for Israel. Dulles perhaps hoped that American financing would mean control of the Egyptian economy and thus no more arms from Czechoslovakia. But the Secretary of State became disillusioned with the domestic opposition, probably partly engineered by the anti-British alliance of Hoover and Humphrey.21
Relations deteriorated all around early in 1956. Nasser’s suspicions of Eden were confirmed by the British efforts to secure Jordanian accession to the Baghdad Pact. Eden, possibly thinking that Macmillan was taking too independent a line as Foreign Secretary, moved him to the Exchequer, but the older man, reputedly bitter that Eden’s accession to the premiership had destroyed his chances, only went on the understanding that as Chancellor he would still be the number two. Selwyn Lloyd, more amenable to Eden’s interference in foreign affairs, replaced him. Lloyd was with Nasser in Cairo when Hussein dismissed Glubb on 1 March 1956. Nasser congratulated him on Britain’s removing Glubb to improve relations with Egypt. Eden initially thought Nasser was behind Glubb’s dismissal, but the former head of the Arab Legion probably persuaded the Prime Minister otherwise. But Eden had made his reputation as an opponent of Neville Chamberlain’s policy of the appeasement of Europe. He saw the 1950s through the spectacles of the myths created largely for political ends, about the conduct of British policy in the 1930s. Eden was a finely charged thoroughbred. He was also sometimes on the drug benzedrine, as a result of three operations on his bile duct of which only the last one in Boston had been partially successful. Eden concluded that Nasser had to go.22
Dulles was wary about the visit of Nikita Khrushchev and Nikolai Bulganin to Britain in April. There, on 27 April, Khrushchev spoke about Russia preferring an arms embargo in the Middle East and offered Russian participation in this if it were organized by the United Nations. Nasser thought this threatened his arms supply from Russia and hastily recognized Communist China. Dulles was furious. Eden initiated meetings between the Foreign Office and the State Department to consider a coup against Nasser. British external intelligence, MI6, and the Central Intelligence Agency investigated the matter, but Dulles prevaricated. Dulles and Eden, however, were in agreement about the overall objective of Anglo-American policy from this point and throughout the Suez crisis: the removal of Nasser.23
Initially, Britain had pursued the Aswan dam loan as a way of maintaining some influence in Egypt at a time when Russian penetration was evident. But when Lloyd returned from the Middle East in March 1956 opinion was shifting. The Foreign Secretary feared that Nasser intended to undermine the government of Libya which was friendly to the West, and queried whether Britain should pursue the loan. On 12 March Eden spoke to Guy Mollet, the French Premier, and discussed the possibility of an Anglo-French alignment against Nasser. A Cabinet meeting of 21 March suggested that Nasser could be isolated by Anglo-American action: Britain could use Iraq to overthrow a regime sympathetic to Nasser in Syria, while the United States could use Saudi Arabia. Action could also be taken against Nasser, including the cancellation of the loan. Eisenhower, too, was thinking of isolating Egypt in the Arab world and winning over the Saudis. The President was depressed that Nasser had not responded to the Anderson mission and evidently did not intend to make peace with Israel. Britain, however, would have to make concessions to Saudi Arabia. The Foreign Office prepared a scheme on these lines, but Eden rejected it: he did not like American influence in Saudi Arabia. At the end of March, Lloyd warned Makins that Nasser would not get the money unless Egypt acknowledged Western interests in the Middle East. Early in May, at a NATO meeting in Paris, the Foreign Secretary and the Secretary of State agreed to let the Aswan dam project ‘wither on the vine’.24
Nasser was warned of this decision through his intelligence agents. Cairo tried to let London known that it would nationalize the Suez Canal to find an alternative source of revenue. Hints were passed to the oriental counsellor to the British embassy, Trefor Evans, but, as he later admitted, he failed to put two and two together and went home on leave. It seems that neither the Foreign Office nor the State Department anticipated Nasser’s actions. Nasser, envisaging the possibility of a Russian loan, decided to force the issue. Suddenly he accepted the conditions that had been imposed: Black and Byroade had done their utmost to persuade him. The last British troops withdrew from the Canal Zone on 13 June: London decided that it could not renege on the agreements of 1954. Against this background Nasser sent his ambassador, Ahmed Hussein, to Washington. Dulles was having trouble with Congress. He summoned his staff and they decided that it was not worth fighting every clause of the loan through that body. There was some opposition to a sudden cancellation, but that was what was agreed. On 7 June Eisenhower had been stricken with an attack of ileitis and had undergone major surgery; for a while the President lost control of his faculties. He was still recovering in Gettysburg when Dulles informed him on 13 July of the new developments. Having decided to run again as President, Eisenhower resented having to take any political risks domestically for Nasser. But it seems that Eisenhower left the handling of policy to Dulles. Britain was informed but not consulted about Dulles’s decision: the British tactic was to ‘play this long’. The press releases were prepared before Dulles, accompanied by Hoover and Allen, saw Hussein on 19 July 1956. Hussein gave Dulles the opportunity for a staged show of temper when he patted his pocket in agitation at the drift of Dulles’s statement and said that he had there a Russian promise of finance. Probably Hussein did not want Russian finance: the ambassador was pro-American and wanted American aid. But Dulles apparently retorted that anyone who built the dam would earn the hatred of the Egyptian people because the burden would be crushing: the United States was leaving that pleasure to Russia. Dulles seemed to doubt whether Russia would offer the money anyway. The British Cabinet decided on 20 July that it also had to withdraw from the dam project. Sir Harold Caccia told the Egyptian ambassador that the decision had been an economic one: Egypt was indulging in other expenditures which would prevent it from giving priority to the Aswan dam. Britain still wanted good relations with Egypt.25
Israel’s alliance with France
All this Great-Power diplomacy that was to culminate in the Suez–Sinai confrontation in October 1956 took place against a background of renewed Israeli preparations for war against Egypt. These were partly prompted by the fedayeen, the special unit of ‘self-sacrificers’ who raided Israel from the surrounding countries. Established in April 1955 by Egyptian general headquarters, the fedayeen increased their activities in September. Opinion in Israel was particularly sensitive to the deaths of its citizens. Egypt also blockaded the Straits of Tiran in September, effectively stopping the movement of ships from the Red Sea to Eilat, and flights of the Israeli airline, El Al, to South Africa. On 29 September Cairo radio threatened that Israel’s defeat was at hand. Dayan, holidaying in France, was summoned home by Ben-Gurion and told to make preparations for the capture of the Straits of Tiran to ensure the passage of shipping through the Gulf of Aqaba. The general elections of 2 November meant that Ben-Gurion became Prime Minister as well as retaining his portfolio as Minister of Defence. The new Cabinet, however, opposed the scheme to take the straits by force. Ben-Gurion warned the Israeli parliament, the Knesset, on 2 January 1956 that Nasser’s Czechoslovak arms deal had changed the balance between Egypt and Israel in a most serious and dangerous manner. Israel pursued the French connection as it emerged that Egypt was acquiring up to 250 modern aircraft, armoured vehicles and cannons. France was also worried: Nasser could send his obsolete weapons to the Algerian rebels. But changes in French ministries resulted in delays in furthering agreements on the supply of Mystère IVs, tanks and artillery to Israel in terms of the discussions between Shimon Peres and Maurice Bourgès-Maunoury in October 1955. Elements in France were also worried about the publicity in the Arab countries given to earlier French sales to Israel, and annoyed over Israeli exhortations to Jews in North Africa to emigrate to Israel. American approval was also necessary for the transfer of Mystère IVs as they were being manufactured for NATO. Early in 1956, however, Mollet’s ministry came to power, and after talks between Peres and Bourgès-Maunoury, now Minister of Defence, and Christian Pineau, the Foreign Minister, Paris tried for American consent to the sale of the Mystères. Eisenhower, in February, had no objection to Israel acquiring twelve: he later observed that these twelve multiplied like rabbits. The first eight Mystères arrived in Israel on 11 April 1956. At the same time Israel was negotiating for the purchase of aircraft and Centurion tanks from Britain, who agreed to sell six Meteor night-fighters. The United States, however, maintained its arms embargo. On 17 June Dayan and Peres met members of the French secret service and learnt that Paris was prepared to provide Israel with what it wanted. Mollet and Pineau were informed about the discussions. It seems that the Israelis had hints of the possibility of an Anglo-French action against Egypt. Perhaps Dayan and Peres also were told, or surmised, that France was thinking of action in concert with Israel. At any rate Israel knew that it had a source of weapons to balance Nasser’s supply from Czechoslovakia, both in quantity and quality.26
Sharett, the gradualist, had to go. He resigned as Foreign Minister on 18 June and was replaced by the activist, Golda Meir. On 20 June two destroyers bought in Britain, with crews trained by the Royal Navy, sailed into an Israeli port. Large quantities of arms were arriving in secret from France. Ben-Gurion, who, unlike Dayan, had had doubts about the likelihood of an Israeli victory over the Arabs, acquired a new confidence.27
The origins of the Suez–Sinai War of 1956 can be found in the realignment of power in the Middle East that followed the First Arab–Israeli War of 1948–49. Changes of governments in the Arab states, humiliated by the recent defeat, meant that a new Arab nationalism was able to take root across North Africa and Arabia. This was largely motivated by what many Arabs saw as the existence of an aggressive, expansionist and alien state in their midst. Britain had lost its paramountcy over the Zionists in 1948. Between 1949 and 1956 British influence in the Arab world, as had been predicted by Bevin and the Foreign Office and their counterparts in the 1920s and 1930s, was shattered with the creation of the Zionist state. London did try to reassert its position with the formation of the Baghdad Pact, but in effect this constituted working with the old ruling houses and not the new nationalists. In a major retreat from empire, Britain lost what had been considered in the prenuclear age the essential base for Middle Eastern security, Egypt. This transfer of power invited Russian penetration. The United States, despite domestic opposition, tried a policy of even-handedness. Washington’s priority was to close a gap in the West’s security system; London’s was considerations of imperial policy. France, too, was drawn in with the Algerian rebellion. By 1956 the Middle East was an area of Great-Power politics. And it was this power politics that made Israel’s pre-emptive war against Egypt possible. Nasser’s claims to be a great Pan-Arabic leader, his vision of Egypt as the centre of three eccentric circles, challenged Britain’s position not only in the Middle East but in Africa, and its special relationship with the Muslim world; it threatened France’s base in Algeria; it offended American susceptibilities about neutralism. By the middle of 1956 those who saw the 1950s through an erroneous interpretation of the 1930s were increasingly making comparisons between Nasser and Mussolini and Hitler: even the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Dag Hammarskjöld, told Lloyd in April 1956 that Nasser was comparable to Hitler in 1935.28 Nasser’s policies and propaganda effectively killed the tripartite agreement of 1950 by which the Western powers had tried to stabilize the Middle East. Nasser replaced Zionism as the threat to the British power base: the Philosophy of Revolution resulted in Britain and France arming Israel against Egypt. All three Western powers were in agreement: Nasser had to go. Where they differed was on the means and timing. Israel was the beneficiary: the Sharett policy of gradualism was finally eclipsed by Ben-Gurion’s determination to force a peace on the Arabs on Israel’s terms. But it was Great-Power politics that made this possible.
References
1Department of State Bulletin, Vol. 22, p. 886.
2Foreign Relations of the United States 1950 (5), pp. 895–899, Department of State to Truman, sent 18 May 1950; pp. 913–15, Webb to Johnson, 25 May 1950.
3D. A. Farnie, East and West of Suez. The Suez Canal in History 1854–1956 (Oxford 1969), pp. 660–690.
4Peter Mansfield, The Arabs (London 1978), pp. 1–154, 261–267; Jon Kimche, The Second Arab Awakening (London 1970), pp. 148–153; Howard M. Sachar, Europe Leaves the Middle East (London 1972), pp. 176–334.
5See Trefor E. Evans (Ed.), The Killearn Diaries (London 1972), passim; contra Lawrence Durrell, The Alexandrian Quartet (London 1957–60); Monsieur or The Prince of Darkness (London 1974).
6John Glubb, A Soldier with the Arabs (London 1957), pp. 285–428; Britain and the Arabs. A Study of Fifty Years 1908 to 1958 (London 1959), pp. 295–305; Mansfield, op. cit., pp. 305–310.
7Anthony Nutting, Nasser (London 1972), pp. 12–73; R. Hrair Dekmejian, Egypt under Nasser. A Study in Political Dynamics (London 1972), pp. 82–118; Gamal Abdel Nasser, The Philosophy of the Revolution (Buffalo, New York 1959), passim; Sylvia K. Crosbie, A Tacit Alliance. France and Israel from Suez to the Six Day War (Princeton, NJ 1974), p. 18.
8Mansfield, op. cit., pp. 310–316; Edgar O’Ballance, The Algerian Insurrection, 1954–62 (London 1967), pp. 19–69; David C. Gordon, The Passing of French Algeria (London 1966), pp. 49–69; Jamil M. Abun-Nasr, A History of the Maghrib (Cambridge 1971), pp. 313–392.
9Benny Morris, Israel’s Border Wars 1949–1956: Arab Infiltration, Israeli Retaliation, and the Countdown to the Suez War (Oxford 1997), pp. 118–370; Ahron Bregman and Jihan El-Tahri, The Fifty Years War: Israel and the Arabs (London 1998), pp. 51–56; Kennet Love, Suez. The Twice-Fought War (London 1970), pp. 1–80; E. L. M. Burns, Between Arab and Israeli (Toronto 1962), pp. 7–68; David Ben-Gurion, Israel: A Personal History (London 1971), pp. 378–443; Shablai Teveth, Moshe Dayan (London 1972), pp. 180–243; Moshe Dayan, The Story of My Life (London 1976), pp. 119–150; Farnie, op. cit., pp. 712–716; David Ben-Gurion, Israel: Years of Challenge (London 1964), pp. 45–70. For an account of the extent to which Israel pursued a nonaligned foreign policy before allying itself to the West see Uri Bialer, Between East and West: Israel’s Foreign Policy Orientation 1948–1956 (Cambridge 1990); see also Efraim Karsh, ‘Israel’, in Yezid Sayigh and Avi Shlaim (Eds), The Cold War and the Middle East (Oxford 1997), pp. 156–185 at p. 157.
10Crosbie, op. cit., pp. 29–57.
11Dwight D. Eisenhower, Mandate for Change (London 1963), p. 142; Townsend Hoopes, The Devil and John Foster Dulles (Boston 1973), pp. 3–328; Leonard Mosley, Dulles: A Biography of Eleanor, Allen, and John Foster Dulles and Their Family Network (London 1978), pp. 3–301; Victor Bator, Vietnam: A Diplomatic Tragedy (London 1967), pp. 19–23; Cab 129, 46, ff. 89–96, CP (51) 166, Memorandum by Morrison on Japanese Peace Treaty, 19 June 1951.
12Dulles Oral History (Princeton University Library), Loy W. Henderson (7 Nov. 1963), ff. 1–3; Jacob J. Javits (2 March 1966), f. 3; John Foster Dulles Papers (Princeton University Library), Box 34, Dulles to Irving M. Ives, 28 Feb. 1947; Box 37, Dulles to Austin, 9 March 1948; Box 38, Silver to Dulles, 30 June 1948.
13Robert W. Stookey, America and the Arab States: An Uneasy Encounter (New York 1975), pp. 136–176; Abba Eban, An Autobiography (London 1977), pp. 179–183.
14Dwight D. Eisenhower, Waging Peace (London 1966), pp. 22–23; Ritchie Ovendale, ‘The South African policy of the British Labour government, 1947–1951’, International Affairs 59 (1982–3), pp. 44–50.
15Cab 128, 19, Cab 28 (51) 3, 16 April 1951; Cab 30 (51) 3, 23 April 1951; Cab 33 (51) 7, 10 May 1951; Cab 37 (51) 3, 28 May 1951; Cab 44 (51) 5, 21 June 1951; Cab 50 (51) 2, 9 July 1951; 20, Cab 60 (51) 6, 27 Sept. 1951; 21, Cab 52 (51) 1, 16 July 1951.
16Ritchie Ovendale, Britain, the United States, and the Transfer of Power in the Middle East, 1945–62 (London 1996), pp. 45–73; James F. Goode, The United States and Iran: In the Shadow of Mussaddiq (New York 1997), pp. 1–153; Eisenhower, Mandate for Change, pp. 159–166; Anthony Eden, Full Circle (London 1960), pp. 198–219; Mosley, op. cit., pp. 325–327, 347; Farnie, op. cit., pp. 678–679; H. G. Nicholas, Britain and the United States (London 1963), pp. 113–115; James A. Bill and Wm. Roger Louis (Eds), Musaddeq, Iranian Nationalism, and Oil (London 1988); Brian Lapping, End of Empire (London 1985), pp. 204–220.
17Ovendale, Britain, the United States, and the Transfer of Power in the Middle East, 1945–62, pp. 125–130; Elizabeth Monroe, Britain’s Moment in the Middle East, 2nd edn (London 1981), pp. 172; Mosley, op. cit., pp. 348–349.
18Cab 129, 43, CP (50) 283, Nov. 1950; Cab 128, 11, Cab 6 (47), Confidential Annex, 15 Jan. 1947; Ovendale, ‘South African policy of the British Labour government’, pp. 44–50; Cab 129, 45 CP (51) 140, June 1951; Ritchie Ovendale, The English-Speaking Alliance. Britain, the United States, the Dominions and the Cold War 1945–51 (London 1985), pp. 118–142.
19Eden, op. cit., pp. 224–261; Lord Moran, Winston Churchill, The Struggle for Survival 1940–1965 (London 1968), pp. 610–618; Eisenhower, Mandate for Change, pp. 150–159; Mosley, op. cit., pp. 349–350; Farnie, op. cit., pp. 691–717; Sachar, op. cit., pp. 580–618; Ritchie Ovendale, ‘Egypt and the Suez base agreement’, in John W. Young (Ed.), The Foreign Policy of Churchill’s Peacetime Administration 1951–1955 (Leicester 1988), pp. 135–155; Evelyn Shuckburgh, Descent to Suez, Diaries 1951–56 (London 1986), pp. 215–241.
20Ovendale, Britain, the United States, and the Transfer of Power in the Middle East, 1945–62, pp. 108–139; Magnus Persson, Great Britain, the United States, and the Security of the Middle East: The Formation of the Baghdad Pact (Lund, Sweden 1998), pp. 113–337; Mary Ann Heiss, Empire and Nationhood: The United States, Great Britain, and Iranian Oil, 1950–1954 (New York 1997); Eden, op. cit., pp. 219–223; Harold Macmillan, Tides of Fortune (London 1969), pp. 631–655; Riding the Storm (London 1971), p. 91; Love, op. cit., pp. 193–206; Hoopes, op. cit., pp. 320–323; Nutting, Nasser, pp. 74–90; Robert Stephens, Nasser. A Political Biography (London 1971), pp. 145–153; for an examination of Britain’s desire to maintain its sphere of influence see W. Scott Lucas, ‘The path to Suez: Britain and the struggle for the Middle East, 1953–56’, in Ann Deighton (Ed.), Britain and the First Cold War (London 1990), pp. 253–272; see also Brian Holden Reid, ‘The “Northern Tier” and the Baghdad Pact’, in Young, op. cit., pp. 159–179; for an Anglo-American plan to impose a solution on the Arab–Israeli conflict see Shimon Shamir, ‘The collapse of Project Alpha’, in Wm. Roger Louis and Roger Owen (Eds), Suez 1956, The Crisis and its Consequences (Oxford 1989), pp. 73–100; Ovendale, Britain, the United States, and the Transfer of Power in the Middle East, 1945–62, pp. 115–117, 131, 133.
21Mosley, op. cit., pp. 379–400; Love, op. cit., pp. 297–314; Hoopes, op. cit., pp. 323–336; Eisenhower, Mandate for Change, pp. 535–546; Nutting, Nasser, pp. 91–139.
22Macmillan, Riding the Storm, p. 1; Selwyn Lloyd, Suez 1956 (London 1978), pp. 32–48; Anthony Nutting, No End of Lesson. The Story of Suez (London 1967), pp. 28–35; Ovendale, Appeasement and the English Speaking World, passim; Eden, op. cit., Foreword, pp. 51–52, 518.
23Hoopes, op. cit., pp. 336–337; Love, op. cit., p. 216.
24Humphrey Trevelyan, The Middle East in Revolution (London 1970), pp. 48–55; Lloyd, op. cit., pp. 32–72; Love, op. cit., pp. 308–310.
25Nutting, Nasser, pp. 138–141; Stephens, op. cit., pp. 191–194; Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 9; Eden, op. cit., p. 422; Love, op. cit., pp. 314–322; Lloyd, op. cit., pp. 70–72; Mosley, op. cit., pp. 400–404; Hoopes, op. cit., pp. 340–342; Trefor Evans, Lecture on Suez at University College of Wales, Aberystwyth, 1971; Herbert Finer, Dulles over Suez: The Theory and Practice of His Diplomacy (New York 1964), p. 46; Ovendale, Britain, the United States, and the Transfer of Power in the Middle East, 1945–62, pp. 140–156; W. S. Lucas, Divided We Stand: Britain, the US and the Suez Crisis (London 1991); Keith Kyle, Suez (London 1992).
26Shimon Peres, David’s Sling. The Arming of Israel (London 1970), p. 185; Dayan, op. cit., pp. 145–150; Crosbie, op. cit., pp. 57–67; Teveth, op. cit., pp. 237–250; Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 29; André Beaufre, The Suez Expedition 1956 (London 1969), pp. 23–25.
27Ben-Gurion, Israel: A Personal History, pp. 494–496.
28Lloyd, op. cit., p. 66.