Military Interventions In Sierra Leone: Lessons From A Failed State: Fill & Download for Free

Q. Why didn't the US support Britain, France and Israel during the Suez Crisis?A. TL;DR Short history of conflict.1956: Suez and the end of empire (theguardian.com) by Derek BrownKing Farouk, the ruler of Egypt, was forced into exile in mid-1952. Power then fell into the hands of an ambitious and visionary young colonel who dreamed of reasserting the dignity and freedom of the Arab nation, with Egypt at the heart. His name was Gamal Abdel Nasser.TIME Magazine Cover: Gamal Abdel Nasser -- July 28, 1958He had three main goals: Egyptian independence, military power to defeat Israel, and to modernize Egypt by building the Aswan dam to improve irrigation, water supply and electricity.For Egyptian independence, he negotiated withdrawal of British forces from the Suez canal within 20 months, ending the last vestige of British imperial dominance since the 1880’s. Then joint control.The world was in flux. Winston Churchill resigned in 1955, replaced by Anthony Eden, a forever foreign minister and an old guard wistful of imperial days. France was driven from Indochina and was in an epic struggle in Algeria.Prime Minister Anthony Eden (left) and foreign secretary John Selwyn-Lloyd outside 10 Downing Street, London, speaking to members of the press during the Suez Crisis. (Photo by Picture Post/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)The United States emerged from WWII a super power, with responsibilities in decolonization and furthering/supporting democracy. Eisenhower wanted no blemish on his record as a “peace” president in reelection contest.The Israelis were barred from the Strait of Tiran by Egyptian forces. She was also desirous of control of the Gaza strip and Sinai peninsula; as well retaliation for sanctioned terroristic incursions from the Egyptian side of the border.USSR had an interest in Middle East affairs and was increasing military aid to Syria.His second goal of arming Egypt was thwarted by Eden’s refusal to deliver agreed to/purchased weapons. Nasser then turned to the Soviets for airplanes and Czechoslovakia for tanks and arms. He also became friendly with the Easter Bloc. Recognized the People’s Republic of China.Unsure about the profitably of the large Aswan Dam project, US Secretory of State John Foster Dulles and UK Swelyn Loyd pulled out financing. With the World Bank’s refusal of a requested $200M, Nasser announced nationalisation of the Suez Canal Company to generate revenue to finance the project.Eden was scandalized, and feared repeat appeasement (a la Third Reich). He opted for a disproportionate response (land invasion). This plan was brought to him by French and Israeli officials who had been meeting over the sale of military hardware to the Israeli Defense Forces.As scheduled, the IDF marched through Gaza into the Sinai on September 29, 1956, overwhelming Egyptian defense forces. France and England demanded a cease-fire, which was turned down by Nasser. As planned French and British invaded, marching toward the Suez canal with great success. Stated goal was to separate Egyptian and Israeli forces and to maintain freedom of navigation.Eden, a master of self-delusion, thought he had approval from John Foster Dulles, the US secretary of state.Washington was appalled by the Anglo-French-Israeli invasion of the canal zone and the Sinai, which threatened to destabilise the entire region, strengthen Soviet links with liberation movements, and complicate recurring superpower crises.Dwight D Eisenhower was enraged by the action. Bypassing the Security Council with two belligerents holding veto power, he received by a wide margin General Assembly approval for a UN resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire. Britain held no 'special relationship' with the USA. The final straw occurred when British Treasury told the government that the sterling, under sustained attack over the crisis, needed urgent US support of one billion dollars. 'Ike' had a crisp reply: no ceasefire, no loan.The invaders halted on the eighth day, and awaited UN intervention force.In the aftermath, what happened?The British were hurt most by Suez. Eden resigned soon afterwards, his health wrecked, his reputation in tatters, his lies and evasions damaged the country's tendentious reputation for fair play. The crisis exploded Britain's lingering imperial pretensions, and hastened the independence of its colonies.Some talked of a “Suez syndrome”, where, in Margaret Thatcher's words, Britain's rulers “went from believing that Britain could do anything to an almost neurotic belief that Britain could do nothing”. Certainly, much of Mrs Thatcher's prime ministership, particularly the retaking of the Falklands in 1982, was an essay in exorcising the demons of Suez. Tony Blair has not been afraid to take advantage of her success, by deploying British power in Sierra Leone, the Balkans and Iraq.But never again without the Americans' support. The major lesson of Suez for the British was that the country would never be able to act independently of America. Unlike the French, who have sought to lead Europe, most British politicians have been content to play second fiddle to America.While British soldiers would go on fighting in various corners of the shrinking empire - east Africa, Aden, Malaya, Borneo and the Falklands - for another 25 years or so. The difference, after Suez, they fought largely to defend local regimes and systems, rather than to impose the will of London.A motivation for France was Nasser’s support for the costly civil war raging against her in Algeria, where 400,000 French boots were on the ground, protecting 1M French nationals. France similarly lost imperial prestige. She also learned that the “special relationship” between Great Britain and the United States was stronger than Great Britain’s bond with Europe. The Americans and the British, to the French were both unreliable and annoyingly superior. So the French had to look elsewhere for more durable allies.The story goes that on the evening of November 6th, when French Prime Minister Guy Mollet got the call from Eden that he was aborting the invasion, he happened to be with the German chancellor, Konrad Adenauer. The French foreign minister, Christian Pineau, recorded Adenauer as saying that “France and England will never be powers comparable to the United States...Not Germany either. There remains to them only one way of playing a decisive role in the world: that is to unite Europe...We have no time to waste; Europe will be your revenge.”Thus was born the six-country European common market, which has now become the 25-country European Union. The founding Treaty of Rome was signed the very next year, in 1957. And the French, particularly Charles de Gaulle in the 1960s, kept the British, America's Trojan horse, out of it for as long as they could, until 1973. France had by then made herself truly independent of American military power (unlike the British) by building its own nuclear deterrent from scratch and, in 1966, leaving NATO's integrated command structure. France stood alone, had her own political and military policies and at times, opposed US positions with glee. She particularly enjoyed the reversal of role in the run up to Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003, played by Jacques Chirac.Israel eventually returned Gaza and Sinai. She retained access to the Strait of Tiran, an important port for commerce. The Suez crisis was the last time the United States showed disagreement with Israeli policy.Israeli AMX-13Egypt lost militarily on the ground, and her air force was decimated. But her prestige soared in the arab/third world. Nasser’s reputation subsequently nose dived after disastrous alliances like with Syria, and after another disaster against Israel in the 1967 campaign.The United States gained clout among the Arab countries, especially Egypt early on. Undisputed supremacy.Russia gained greater influence and became a major player in the region, almost always in opposition to US interests.Dwight Eisenhower was reelected President, not breaking his promise for peace.Pan Arab nationalism gained traction. Israel-Palestinian conflict evolved into one between Israel and the Arab world.Greatest Irony: the operation was counterproductive. Far from bolstering Anglo-French interests, it badly undermined political and military prestige of both countries. And far from ensuring international freedom of navigation, it did just the opposite: under Nasser’s order, 47 ships were scuttled in the waterway. The Suez canal was totally blocked.Suez Crisis – Summarized in 20 points: From Empire to Europe (medium.com)The Suez crisis was an international conflict in 1856 which culminated in the failed military intervention of an allied Britain, France and Israel in Egypt. The whole conflict summarized in 20 points:Suez Canal = ship canal, linking the Mediterranean and the Red Sea, shortest shipping route between Europe and Asia.Suez Canal was very important to Britain’s oil supply.Originally, French & Egyptian shares, Egyptian shares later acquired by GB.Founding of IsraelEgypt denied ships to and from Israel for most of the passage.Overthrow of Egyptian King Farouk I. by General Naguib (first president) and Lt. Colonel Nasser. Nasser later became 2nd president.Nasser nationalized the Suez Canal to finance the construction of the Aswan High Dam after US and UK reneging on loan agreement.Interested PartiesEgypt (nationalized the Suez Canal)IsraelEngland and France (main shareholders of the Suez Canal, interested in freedom of navigation)United States (Cold War anti-soviet middle east meddling)Soviet Union (open to all Suez Canal access)UN forces (secure transit, freedom of navigation)9. March 1956: Egypt alliance with Syria and Jordan.10. July 1956: Nationalization of the Suez Canal by Egypt.11. August 1956: Nasser rejected invitation to first London Conference. “The nationalization would not affect the contracts concluded in 1888" (UK and France have a different view).12. September 1956: Nasser rejected invitation to second London Conference.13. October 1956: Israel meets collusion with France and GB.14. Israeli troops landed on the Suez Canal, conquering in 8 days the peninsula within 16 km of the Suez Canal. War made the canal impassable.15. France and GB curbed Israeli troops to justify use of force.16. Russia threatened to drop atomic bomb on London. Threat not taken seriously.17. End result: Suez Canal is again passable for ships of all nations.18. GB and France lost supremacy in the world.19. Russian satellite states in the Middle East felt justified in their anti-Western-Israeli stance.20. The cost incurred during the war was so high that several Aswan dams could be built.1956: Suez and the end of empire (theguardian.com) Derek BrownIntroductionThe Suez crisis is often portrayed as Britain's last fling of the imperial dice. In 1956, the globe was indeed still circled by British possessions and dependencies, from the Caribbean in the west to Singapore, Malaya and Hong Kong in the east. Much of the African map was still imperial pink.In reality, though, the sun had long since begun to sink over the British empire. The greatest possession of them all, the Indian subcontinent, had taken its freedom. Nationalist movements were flourishing in most of the rest, patronised by Soviet Russia and encouraged by the United States in its self-appointed role as leader of the free world. Britain itself was only beginning to emerge from postwar austerity, its public finances crushed by an accumulation of war debt.Still, there were powerful figures in the "establishment" - a phrase coined in the early 1950s - who could not accept that Britain was no longer a first-rate power. Their case, in the context of the times, was persuasive: we had nuclear arms, a permanent seat on the UN security council, and military forces in both hemispheres. We remained a trading nation, with a vital interest in the global free passage of goods.But there was another, darker, motive for intervention in Egypt: the sense of moral and military superiority which had accreted in the centuries of imperial expansion. Though it may now seem quaint and self-serving, there was a widespread and genuine feeling that Britain had responsibilities in its diminishing empire, to protect its peoples from communism and other forms of demagoguery.Much more potently, there was ingrained racism. When the revolutionaries in Cairo dared to suggest that they would take charge of the Suez canal, the naked prejudice of the imperial era bubbled to the surface. The Egyptians, after all, were among the original targets of the epithet, "westernised (or wily) oriental gentlemen. They were the Wogs.BackgroundKing Farouk, the ruler of Egypt, was forced into exile in mid-1952. A year later, a group of army officers formally took over the government which they already controlled. The titular head of the junta was General Mohammed Neguib. The real power behind the new throne was an ambitious and visionary young colonel who dreamed of reasserting the dignity and freedom of the Arab nation, with Egypt at the heart of the renaissance. His name was Gamal Abdel Nasser.Nasser's first target was the continued British military presence in the Suez canal zone. A source of bitter resentment among many Egyptians, that presence was a symbol of British imperial dominance since the 1880s. In 1954, having established himself as uncontested leader of Egypt, Nasser negotiated a new treaty, under which British forces would leave within 20 months.At first, the largely peaceful transition of power in Egypt was little noticedin a world beset by turmoil and revolution. The cold war was at its height. Communism was entrenched throughout eastern Europe; the French were being chased out of Indo-China and were engaged in a vicious civil war in Algeria; the infant state of Israel had fought off the combined might of six Arab armies, and Britain was trying to hold down insurgents in Cyprus, Kenya and Malaya.British politics, too, was in a state of flux, with a new generation of leaders emerging to preside over belated postwar prosperity. But when Winston Churchill resigned as prime minister in 1955, at the age of 80, he was succeeded by the last of the old guard: Anthony Eden.After a lifetime at the cutting edge of British statesmanship, Eden was a curiously inadequate man. He had the vanity that often accompanies good looks, and the querulous temper that goes with innate weakness. He had been foreign secretary throughout the war and again, under the old imperialist Churchill, from 1951 to 55. For all his experience, he never absorbed the simple postwar truth: that the world had changed forever.In July 1956, the last British soldiers pulled out of the canal zone. On July 26, Nasser abruptly announced the nationalisation of the Suez Canal Company. Eden was scandalised and, riding a wave of popular indignation, prepared a grotesquely disproportionate response: full scale invasion.Military operationsNasser's nationalisation of the canal was followed by intensive diplomatic activity, ostensibly aimed at establishing some kind of international control of the strategically vital waterway. It turned out to be a smokescreen for military preparations.In September, Nasser made a defiant speech rejecting the idea of international supervision of an Egyptian national asset. By then, the die was cast.British and French troops, spearheaded by airborne forces, invaded the canal zone on October 31. Their governments told an outraged world that they had to invade, to separate Egyptian and Israeli forces, and thus protect thefreedom of navigation on the canal. The reality was that the British and French, in top secret negotiations with Israel had forged an agreement forjoint military operations. Israel, in fact, had the most legitimate grievance of the three invaders, for since the establishment of the Jewish state in 1948, Egypt had denied passage through the canal to any Israeli-flagged or Israel-bound ships.The Complex Israeli: Ariel Sharon, 1928-2014Israeli forces swept into the Sinai desert on September 29, two days before the Anglo-French invasion, and raced towards the canal. (One column was headed by a young brigade commander who would go on to become prime minister: Ariel Sharon). In less than seven days, the entire Sinai peninsula was in Israeli hands.The Anglo-French invasion was a good deal more ignominious. Just eight days after the first airborne lands, the operation was halted under a ceasefire ostensibly ordered by the United Nations, but in fact dictated by the Americans. The Egyptian air force had been destroyed and its army mauled - though it put up spirited resistance both in the canal zone and in Sinai. There is little doubt that the invading allies, who had overwhelming military advantage, could have gone on to take undisputed control of the canal zone - albeit at a cruel cost.The greatest irony of the operation was that it was totally counterproductive. Far from bolstering Anglo-French interests, it had badly undermined the political and military prestige of both countries. And far from ensuring international freedom of seaborne passage, it had done just the opposite: under Nasser's orders, 47 ships were scuttled in the waterway. The Suez canal was totally blocked.The diplomatic crisisThough Eden scarcely seemed to appreciate it, Britain was simply no longer capable of mounting a solo imperial adventure. In the Suez operation, British soldiers fought alongside French ones. More importantly, both fading European powers were allied with the youngest but already most potent force in the Middle East: Israel.But it wasn't Britain's military allies which mattered in the final analysis; it was her political foes. They most obviously included the Soviet Union and its allies, who were given a glorious opportunity to attack western imperialism (and deflect world attention from their own brutality in crushing the simultaneous Hungarian uprising).Much more telling than Soviet condemnation was the disapproval of the Eisenhower administration in the USA. Washington was appalled by the Anglo-French-Israeli invasion of the canal zone and the Sinai. The action threatened to destabilise the strategically vital region, and strengthen Sovietlinks with liberation movements around the world. It raised global tensionsin an age dominated by the nuclear arms race and recurring superpower crises. More viscerally, it was viewed with distaste as a nakedly imperial exercise in a post-imperial age.Eden, a master of self-delusion, thought he had received a nod and wink of approval for the invasion from John Foster Dulles, the US secretary of state. He should have checked with Dwight D Eisenhower, who was enraged by the action. He forced through the UN resolution imposing a ceasefire, and made it clear that in this matter at any rate, Britain would have no 'special relationship' with the USA.The final straw for Eden came when the Treasury told the government that sterling, under sustained attack over the crisis, needed urgent US support to the tune of a billion dollars. 'Ike' had a crisp reply: no ceasefire, no loan.The invaders were ordered to halt, and await the arrival of a UN intervention force.Milestones: The Suez Crisis, 1956 (history.state.gov)The political crisisThe Suez crisis provoked a mighty, if predictable, wave of jingoistic fervourin the rightwing British press. There was a tide of genuine public support for "our boys" and a widespread mood of hostility towards Nasser. But at the same time - and arguably for the first time - there was a countervailing popular wave of revulsion against imperialist aggression. Hugh Gaitskell, not exactly the most radical of Labour party leaders, railed passionately against the war. So did Liberals and leftwing groups. Their stand was not hugely popular - the circulation of the Manchester Guardian, which fiercely opposed the war, fell markedly during the crisis - but the anti-war movement was a dramatic, even traumatic, shock for the nation.What fatally undermined the Conservative government, however, was the dissent in its own ranks. Less than 50 years ago, there were plenty of Tories who still believed in the virtues of empire. But there was also a new generation which recognised the damage being done to Britain's real interests in the new world, and which was outraged by Eden's blinkered approach. Two junior ministers, Edward Boyle and Anthony Nutting, resigned from the government in protest against Suez. Among those who stayed on, but who expressed deep reservations about the Suez enterprise, was RA 'Rab' Butler, the man widely seen as Eden's heir apparent.Eden himself was shattered by Suez, politically, physically and emotionally. On November 19, just three days before the last of the British invaders finally left the canal zone, he abruptly took himself off to Jamaica to recover, leaving behind Rab Butler in charge of the cabinet. On January 9, 1957, Eden resigned. The Conservative mandarins who controlled the leadership promptly took their revenge on Butler, seen as the leading liberal in the party, by elevating the more rightwing Harold Macmillan to Downing Street.ConclusionIt may now seem astonishing to those who were not alive during the Suez crisis that Britain was prepared to take part in such an imperial adventure so recently. Even to those who clearly remember it - including this writer - it seems an anachronism; an atavistic throwback.In 1956, after all, Elvis Presley was already a star, Disneyland had been opened in California, and British theatre was in the throes of the 'kitchen sink' revolution. And yet, though it took place well within living memory, Suez was also a link with a not-so-distant past in which imperialism was a matter of pride rather than a term of abuse. Indeed, it marked definitively the transition between those two things.British soldiers would go on fighting in various corners of the shrinking empire - east Africa, Aden, Malaya, Borneo and the Falklands - for another 25 years or so. The difference, after Suez, is that they fought largely to defend local regimes and systems, rather than to impose the will of London.The years immediately following Suez saw a slew of new countries on the world stage which had formerly been colonies and dependencies. There is little doubt that the end of the imperial era was greatly accelerated by the squalid little war in Egypt.The Other Side of Suez (BBC Documentary)"This is a story of how the government of the United Kingdom decided to attack an Arab nation; of how, afraid its oil supplies were under threat, it embarked on a strategy of regime change; of how Britian deliberately bypassed the United Nations, and of how a British prime minister led the nation to war based on suspect intelligence. "But this isn't Iraq, 2003. This is Egypt, 1956." - NarratorBBC Suez A Very British Crisis Part 1BBC Suez A Very British Crisis Part 2 ConspiracyBBC Suez A Very British Crisis Part 3 WarHow significant was the Suez Crisis?BBC - History - British History in depth: The Suez CrisisThe crisis buildsAnthony Nutting and Abdel Nasser sign the Anglo-Egyptian Suez Agreement of 1956 has its roots in the post-war upsurge of nationalism in Egypt. In 1951, Nahas Pasha leader of the recently-elected nationalist Wafd party revoked the Anglo-Egyptian Treaty of 1936.Attacks on the British garrison soon followed and in January 1952 the British government authorised an operation to disarm the Egyptian paramilitary police force in Ismailia which was orchestrating the violence. This was successful, but the violence continued. Riots in Cairo of an unprecedented scale followed, culminating in attacks on Saturday 26 January on British property and the expatriate community, thereafter known as Black Saturday.It was agreed that British troops would be permitted to return if the Suez Canal was threatened.British threats to occupy Cairo prompted King Farouk of Egypt to dismiss Nahas Pasha, but in July 1952 Farouk was overthrown in a military coup and General Mohammed Neguib seized power. Rather than insist on Britain's rights under the 1936 Treaty, Anthony Eden, the British foreign secretary tried to negotiate with the new government.In 1954, Colonel Gamel Abdul Nasser replaced General Neguib. He had three goals: to make Egypt independent by ending British occupation; to build up Egyptian forces for a successful attack on Israel; to improve Egypt’s economy by constructing a high dam at Aswan to irrigate the Nile valley.On 19 October 1954 a treaty was signed by Nasser and by Anthony Nutting, British minister of state for foreign affairs. The agreement was to last for seven years.British troops were to be withdrawn from Egypt by June 1956, and the British bases were to be run jointly by British and Egyptian civilian technicians. Egypt agreed to respect the freedom of navigation through the canal, and it was agreed that British troops would be permitted to return if the Suez Canal was threatened by an outside power.Appeasement fearsIn February 1955, Anglo-Egyptian affairs were strained once more by Eden's decision to deprive Nasser of promised British arms. In April, Eden succeeded Winston Churchill as prime minister.As the last British troops left Egypt, Nasser was completing the purchase of Soviet-made aircraft, tanks and arms from Czechoslovakia, which might help him to realise one of his goals, the destruction of Israel.Despite anti-western demonstrations in Egypt, in January 1956 the United States and Britain had pledged funding to help finance the construction of a new High Dam at Aswan. The US, however, became convinced that the Dam project would not be a success and wanted to reduce expenditure on foreign aid.It was also concerned about Nasser's purchase of Soviet arms. On 19 July, US Secretary of State John Foster Dulles informed the Egyptian ambassador in Washington that his government had decided that it would not provide funding for the construction of the dam.The British foreign secretary, Selwyn Lloyd, followed suit and withdrew the British offer of aid. The World Bank then refused to advance Egypt a promised $200 million. On 26 July 1956, President Nasser nationalised the Anglo-French Suez Canal Company to finance his dam.Eden, who recalled Britain's appeasement of Adolf Hitler in the 1930s, looked to military action which might result in Nasser's downfall and restore Britain's influence in the region. The United States, however, made it clear that unjustified military action would not be tolerated.Treaties and collusionThe end of the Second World War in 1945 had brought a period of rapid change. The creation of the state of Israel in 1948 was followed by the first Arab-Israeli War, and a renewed upsurge of Arab nationalism made the Middle East a volatile region.The United States had emerged from World War Two as a global superpower and, as a former colony itself it was committed to overseeing the decolonisation of the globe. Furthermore, the spread of communismfostered by the Soviet Union was seen by the US as a threat to western democracy.A secret agreement was made that Israel should attack Egypt as a pretext for an Anglo-French invasion of Suez.In an attempt to strengthen security in the Middle East against Soviet influence, Britain, Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Pakistan signed a treaty known as the Baghdad Pact in 1955. But Egypt, which was looking to the Soviet Union for armaments, refused to sign. Iraq later withdrew and the pact,which was renamed the Central Treaty Organisation, became ineffective in preventing the Cold War from reaching the Middle East.In January 1956, Guy Mollet was elected prime minister in France and promised to bring peace to Algeria, a French colony, in the throes of a nationalist uprising. But the presence of a million French settlers there made a withdrawal from Algeria politically impossible and his attempts to resolve the situation escalated the violence.Meanwhile, Israel, greatly concerned about Egypt’s rearmament and involved in a series of border clashes with Egypt, was purchasing aircraft and weapons from France. The French government had been meeting secretly with Israel and invited Britain to join the negotiations.Left to right: French foreign minister Christian Pineau (1904 - 1995), French Prime Minister Guy Mollet (1905 - 1975), Anthony Eden British Foreign SecretaryIn October 1956, Mollet, Eden and Israeli Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion met at Sevres near Paris and concluded a secret agreement that Israel should attack Egypt, thereby providing a pretext for an Anglo-French invasion of Suez.Military actionBritish troops moving through Port Said ©Ben-Gurion then ordered General Moshe Dayan, his chief of staff to plan an attack on Egypt. On 29 October 1956, the Israeli attack was spearheaded by an airborne drop to seize control of the Mitla Pass. Heavy fighting followed.The next day, Britain and France issued ultimatums to both sides to stop the fighting immediately. The Israelis continued their operations, expecting an Egyptian counter-attack. Instead, Nasser’s army was withdrawing.The Royal Navy aircraft carrier HMS Albion (R07) during the Suez Crisis (Wikimedia Commons)Militarily the operation was well on its way to being a great success.On 5 November, some three months and 10 days after Nasser had nationalised the canal, the Anglo-French assault on Suez was launched. It was preceded by an aerial bombardment, which grounded and destroyed the Egyptian Air Force.Soon after dawn, soldiers of 3rd Battalion, the Parachute Regiment, dropped onto El Gamil airfield, while French paratroopers landed south of the Raswa bridges and at Port Fuad.Within 45 minutes, all Egyptian resistance on the airfield had been overcome and Royal Naval helicopters were bringing in supplies. With El Gamil secured, the British Paras moved eastwards towards Port Said,meeting their first serious opposition en route. With air support, they overwhelmed the Egyptian forces then stopped and dug-in overnight because the beach area of Port Said was to be bombarded next day during the seaborne landing.On 6 November, the sea and helicopter-borne assault went in. Royal Marine Commandos, together with British and French airborne forces supported by British tanks soon defeated the Egyptian forces, capturing men, vehicles and many of the newly purchased Czech-manufactured weapons.At midnight on 6 November a cease-fire was called on the insistence of UN Secretary General Dag Hammarskjöld. The Anglo-French forces had reached El Cap, just south of Port Said, but were not yet in control of the entire canal when they were stopped. Militarily, the operation was well on its way to being a great success.BacklashPolitically, the intervention in Suez was a disaster. US President Dwight Eisenhower was incensed. World opinion, especially that of the United States, together with the threat of Soviet intervention, forced Britain, France and Israel to withdraw their troops from Egypt. In Britain too there had been widespread outrage.President Eisenhower giving a televised speech addressing the Suez Crisis. (Photo by Paul Schutzer/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images)A United Nations peacekeeping force was sent in to supervise the ceasefire and to restore order. The Suez Canal was cleared and reopened, but Britain in particular found its standing with the US weakened and its influence 'east of Suez' diminished by the adventure.Eden told the Commons: 'There was not foreknowledge that Israel would attack Egypt. There was not.’Accusations of collusion between Britain, France and Israel started in 1956, but were denied in parliament by Eden who tried to avoid giving a clear and categorical answer.He was at last asked whether there was foreknowledge of the Israeli attack and on 20 December in his last address to the House of Commons, recorded in Hansard, he replied: 'I want to say this on the question of foreknowledge, and to say it quite bluntly to the House, that there was not foreknowledge that Israel would attack Egypt. There was not.’In January 1957, his health shattered and his political credibility severely damaged, Sir Anthony Eden, the British prime minister, resigned. Guy Mollet, the French prime minister, survived longer despite fierce criticism, but his government collapsed in June 1957 over the taxation he imposed to pay for the Algerian War.Anglo-American relations were strained by the Suez Crisis, but as Cold War Allies in the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) they continued to cooperate, and by 1962 Britain had adopted the US Polaris missile system. Nonetheless, the real balance of power in the post-World War Two world had been starkly demonstrated and Britain's prestige was dealt a severe blow.The History Guy: Arab-Israeli Wars:Suez War (1956)Suez Crisis, 1956The Suez Crisis of 1956, in which the Egyptian Government seized control of the Suez Canal from the British and French owned company that managed it, had important consequences for U.S. relations with both Middle Eastern countries and European allies.On July 26, 1956, Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser nationalized the British and French owned Suez Canal Company that operated the Suez Canal. Nasser's decision threatened British and French stock holdings in the Company and, as the Canal afforded Western countries access to Middle Eastern oil, also threatened to cut off Europe's oil supply. The ensuing Suez Crisis threatened regional stability and challenged the U.S. relationship with two primary Cold War allies, Britain and France.Nasser nationalized the canal after the United States and Britain renegedon a previous agreement to finance the Aswan Dam project. The Aswan Dam was designed to control the Nile's flood waters and provide electricity and water to the Egyptian populace and, as such, was a symbol of Egypt's modernization. The United States and Britain withdrew their financing for the Aswan Dam after Nasser made several moves that appeared friendly to the communist block, including an arms deal with Czechoslovkaia and recognition of the Chinese Government in Beijing. Without support from the United States and Britain, Nasser needed the revenue generated from tolls collected from ships using the Suez Canal to subsidize the cost of building the dam.Although the United State was concerned about Nasser's nationalization of the canal, it sought a diplomatic solution to the problem. Britain and France, however, viewed the situation as a threat to their national interests. Accordingly, they sought a military solution that involved Israel. They secretly contacted the Israeli Government and proposed a joint military operation in which Israel would invade the Sinai and march toward the Suez Canal zone after which Britain and France would issue a warning to both Egypt and Israel to stay away from the Canal. Britain and France would then land paratroopers in the Canal Zone on the pretense of protecting it. Israel willingly agreed to this scenario since it gave Israel the opportunity to gain control of the Gaza Strip and Sinai Peninsula, end the Egyptian blockade of the Straits of Tiran, and retaliate against Egypt over its support for Palestinian commando raids on Israel's western border during the previous two years.Strait of Tiran between Gulf of Aqaba and Red SeaOn October 29, 1956, Israeli forces moved across the border, defeated the Egyptian army in the Sinai, captured Sharm al-Sheikh and thereby guaranteed Israeli strategic control over the Straits of Tiran. Britain and France issued their ultimatum and landed troops, effectively carrying out the agreed upon operation. However, the United States and the Soviet Union responded to events by demanding a cease-fire. In a resolution before the United Nations, the United States also called for the evacuation of Israeli, French, and British forces from Egypt under the supervision of a special United Nations force. This force arrived in Egypt in mid-November. By December 22, the last British and French troops had withdrawn from Egyptian territory, but Israel kept its troops in Gaza until March 19, 1957, when the United States finally compelled the Israeli Government to withdraw its troops.The Suez conflict fundamentally altered the regional balance of power. It was a military defeat for Egypt, but Nasser's status grew in the Arab world as the defender of Arab nationalism. Israel withdrew from Egyptian territory gained in the fighting but regained access to the Straits of Tiran, while the United Nations adopted a larger role maintaining a peacekeeping force in the Sinai. Britain and France lost influence in the region and suffered humiliation after the withdrawal of their troops from the Canal Zone. Moreover, relations between the United States and its British and French allies temporarily deteriorated in the months following the war. In contrast, Soviet influence in the Middle East grew, especially in Syria where the Soviets began to supply arms and advisers to the Syrian military. The United States had played a moderating role, and in so doing had improved its relations with Egypt, but the fundamental disputes between Israel and its neighbors remained unresolved. When these disagreements resurfaced, the United States would again be drawn into the conflicts.Suez Crisis (wikizero.com) BestWhat happened to Ben-Gurion’s Oasis in the Desert?Suez Crisis - Cold War (history.com)An Affair To Remember (economist.com)The Suez crisis of 50 years ago marked the end of an era, and the start of another, for Europe, America and the Middle EastJul 27th 2006ON JULY 26th 1956 Gamal Abdul Nasser, president of Egypt, addressed a huge crowd in the city of Alexandria. Broad-shouldered, handsome and passionate, Nasser stunned even this gathering of enthusiastic supporters with the vehemence of his diatribe against British imperialism. Britain had ruled Egypt, one way or another, from 1882 to 1922, when the protectorate gained nominal independence, and continued to influence Egyptian affairs thereafter, maintaining troops there and propping up the decadent monarchy overthrown by Nasser in 1952.In that speech in Alexandria, though, Nasser chose to delve back even further into history, in a long digression on the building of the Suez canal a century earlier. That gave him the chance to mention the name of the Frenchman who had built the canal, Ferdinand de Lesseps. This he did at least 13 times. “De Lesseps”, it turned out, was the code word for the Egyptian army to start the seizure, and nationalisation, of the canal. It also launched the start of a new era in the politics of Europe, the Middle East and America.The Suez crisis, as the events of the following months came to be called, marked the humiliating end of imperial influence for two European countries, Britain and France. It cost the British prime minister, Anthony Eden, his job and, by showing up the shortcomings of the Fourth Republic in France, hastened the arrival of the Fifth Republic under Charles de Gaulle.It made unambiguous, even to the most nostalgic blimps, America's supremacy over its Western allies. It thereby strengthened the resolve of many Europeans to create what is now the European Union. It promoted pan-Arab nationalism and completed the transformation of the Israeli-Palestinian dispute into an Israeli-Arab one. And it provided a distractionthat encouraged the Soviet Union to put down an uprising in Hungary in the same year.It also divided families and friends, at least in Britain and France, with a degree of bitterness that would not be seen in a foreign-policy dispute until the invasion of Iraq in 2003. If that is difficult to understand, remember that the world was a different place then. Many European politicians still believed their countries had a right to run the affairs of others. Many were also scarred by memories of appeasement in the 1930s. Faced with a provocation, even an entirely legal one involving the nationalisation of a foreign-owned asset like the Suez canal, the instinct of such Europeans was to go to war. They and their Israeli partners-in-invasion were restrained, eventually, by theUnited States, led by a Republican president and war hero, Dwight Eisenhower. The venture involved intrigue, lies, nemesis—and no end of a lesson. How did it come about?The road to collusionIn Egypt, the British had become so resented for their racist, arrogant ways that by the early 1950s even Winston Churchill, the grand old imperialist who had returned as prime minister in 1951, felt he could resist the tide of nationalism no more. After 1951 the British were confined to the Suez canal zone, harassed by Egyptian irregulars who wanted them out altogether. By June 1956 the last British soldiers had left even the canal zone.Eisenhower And The Cold War – Analysis / President Eisenhower and John Foster Dulles in 1956.Yet Anglo-Egyptian relations did not improve. Nasser was enraged by America's withdrawal of its offer of loans to help pay for the building of a dam on the Nile at Aswan. This project was central to his ambitions to modernise Egypt. But John Foster Dulles, the American secretary of state, thought the dam would place too much strain on the resources of newly independent Egypt.For their part, the British, mistrustful of Nasser and feeling the pinch, were also ready to withdraw their loan offer. So, thought Dulles, best to let the Russians take on the dam, as he knew they would if the West backed out. He did not, however, bargain for Nasser's immediate response—the nationalisation of the Suez canal, whose revenues, Nasser argued, Egypt now needed to replace the loans promised by Britain and America for the dam.The reaction in Britain was unanimous in condemning “Grabber Nasser”, as the Daily Mirror put it. Comparisons were immediately made to Hitler and Mussolini in the 1930s: if he got away with this, where would he—and other emboldened post-colonial leaders—stop? Eden, who had succeeded Churchill as prime minister the year before, argued that the canal was Britain's “great imperial lifeline”, especially for oil. Nasser could not be allowed to have his hand “on our windpipe”.The French reacted just as strongly, but for different reasons. First, they had a stake in the Paris-based company that ran the canal. Second, they were fighting an increasingly nasty little colonial war in Algeria. The new government of Guy Mollet was resolved to put down an Arab uprising there with all the force that the Fourth Republic could muster. By the summer of 1956 France had about 400,000 soldiers in Algiers. Nasser backed the Arab insurgents, so the French were as eager as the British to see the back of him. Accordingly, Britain and France started to co-ordinate plans for a military invasion of Egypt and a reoccupation of the canal zone.Algerian WarBut their bellicosity was matched by the scepticism of the Americans, and of Eisenhower in particular, who from the beginning was against the use of force by his two main allies. One concern for him was the presidential election due that November, which he intended to win as the incumbent “peace” president. He knew that the voters would not thank him for taking them into a foreign imbroglio in which America had no direct interest.Eisenhower was also motivated by an anti-imperialism rooted in the attitudes that had made Americans break free from the British empire. Intensifying his scepticism was a fear that, in the new cold war, any British and French bullying of Egypt would alienate Arabs, Asians and Africansand drive them towards the communist camp. To head off Anglo-French military action, Eisenhower and his secretary of state ensnared the Europeans in a fruitless round of talks and conferences.Aware that they were on shaky legal ground for an invasion, the British and French reluctantly played along. But they were losing the momentum for military action, which was the American intention. The increasingly histrionic Eden, in particular, wanted not only the reversal of the canal's nationalisation but also regime change: he wanted Nasser “destroyed”.The Israelis provided a way out. On September 30th a delegation secretly presented the French with a fabricated casus belli: Israel would invade Egyptand race to the canal. The French and British could then invade, posing as peacekeepers to separate the two sides, and occupy the canal, ostensibly to guarantee the free passage of shipping. When this plan was presented to Eden, he jumped at it. Thus was collusion born. The details were agreed on at a secret meeting in Sèvres, outside Paris. Not for nothing is the Suez crisis known in Egypt as the “tripartite aggression”.The British and French forces now had a pretext to invade. For the Israelis, it would punish Egypt for its escalating incursions into Israel from Gaza. It would also hitch the major European powers to the cause of Israel: up to that point, the French had tried to be even-handed between Israel and its neighbours; the British had leaned towards the Arab states.A complete mess and botchOnly a handful of people were let in on the collusion. Most of them thought it was mad from the start, arguing, quite correctly, that the cover for the invasion was so flimsy it would soon be blown. To disguise what was going on, the British, in particular, were drawn ever deeper into a bog of lies and deception, particularly with the Americans. Parliament was also deceived. Both Eden and Selwyn Lloyd, his foreign secretary, told the House of Commons that, as Lloyd put it, “there was no prior agreement” with Israel.On October 29th, Israeli paratroopers, led by a zealous officer called Ariel Sharon, were dropped into Sinai to fulfil their side of the bargain. Feigning surprise, the British and French issued an ultimatum to both sides to cease fire. When the Egyptians rejected this, British planes started bombing the Egyptian air force on the ground and on November 5th Anglo-French troops went ashore to begin the invasion of the canal zone and, it was hoped, topple Nasser.Eisenhower, kept completely in the dark, felt utterly betrayed by his erstwhile allies. “I've just never seen great powers make such a complete mess and botch of things,” he told his aides. He determined to put a stop to the whole enterprise.America struck at Britain's fragile economy. It refused to allow the IMF to give emergency loans to Britain unless it called off the invasion. Faced by imminent financial collapse, as the British Treasury saw it, on November 7thEden surrendered to American demands and stopped the operation, with his troops stranded half way down the canal. The French were furious, but obliged to agree; their troops were under British command.America also proved adept at working through the UN. On November 2nd an American resolution demanding a ceasefire was passed by a majority of 64 to five, the Russians voting with the United States. And to sidestep Anglo-French vetoes at the Security Council, for the first time the General Assemblymet in emergency session (where no country held a veto) and took up a Canadian suggestion to assemble an international emergency force to go to the canal and monitor the ceasefire. These were to be the first “blue hat” UN peacekeepers. The organisation was one of the clear winners of the crisis, gaining an enhanced role in the world. For the other participants in the drama, the consequences were more mixed.The French drew the clearest lessons. Suez showed that they could never rely on perfide Albion. Britain, then Europe's strongest power, would, it seemed, always put its “special” relationship with America above its European interests. And the Americans, to the French, were both unreliable and annoyingly superior.So the French would have to look elsewhere for more durable allies—a search that was, by one account, short. The story goes that on the evening of November 6th, when Mollet got the call from Eden that he was aborting the invasion, he happened to be with the German chancellor, Konrad Adenauer. The French foreign minister, Christian Pineau, records Adenauer as saying that“France and England will never be powers comparable to the United States...Not Germany either. There remains to them only one way of playing a decisive role in the world: that is to unite Europe...We have no time to waste; Europe will be your revenge.”Thus was born the six-country European common market, which has now become the 25-country European Union. The founding Treaty of Rome was signed the very next year, in 1957. And the French, particularly Charles de Gaulle in the 1960s, kept the British, America's Trojan horse, out of it for as long as they could, until 1973. France had by then made itself truly independent of American military power (unlike the British) by building its own nuclear deterrent from scratch and, in 1966, leaving NATO's integrated command structure.It should have been no surprise, then, that in the months before the invasion of Iraq in 2003, it was the French who played the American role of 1956, though Jacques Chirac could hardly deliver the coup de grâce, as Eisenhower had done in 1956. In reaction to Suez, France had constructed a new identity as the ostensible leader of Europe, upholding a set of universal values in competition with the Americans.The British were hurt most by Suez. Eden resigned soon afterwards, his health wrecked, his reputation in tatters, his lies and evasions damaging the country's always tendentious reputation for fair play. The crisis exploded Britain's lingering imperial pretensions, and hastened the independence of its colonies.Some talked of a “Suez syndrome”, where, in Margaret Thatcher's words, Britain's rulers “went from believing that Britain could do anything to an almost neurotic belief that Britain could do nothing”. Certainly, much of Mrs Thatcher's prime ministership, particularly the retaking of the Falklands in 1982, was an essay in exorcising the demons of Suez. Tony Blair has not been afraid to take advantage of her success, by deploying British power in Sierra Leone, the Balkans and Iraq.But never without the Americans' support. The major lesson of Suez for the British was that the country would never be able to act independently of America again. Unlike the French, who have sought to lead Europe, most British politicians have been content to play second fiddle to America.Eden recuperated from the crisis in Ian Fleming's house, Goldeneye, in Jamaica. It was an appropriate choice, as it was Fleming who was to mythologise the new relationship in his James Bond novels. The first, “Casino Royale”, was published to little attention in 1953, but the series took off in the years after the Suez crisis, offering some sort of literary consolation to a country coming to terms with its new, humbler status. The partnership between Bond and Felix Leiter, a CIA agent, reflected the way the British now liked to see things, the one suave, smart and endlessly resourceful, the other with a lot of money and a slightly plodding manner.Eisenhower won his election in America. The crisis affirmed the country's new status as the global superpower, challenged only by the Soviet Union. Suez was also to be the last incident in which America was to take strong action against Israel. As Eisenhower had feared, the Russians moved into the Middle East to fill the gap left by the disorderly retreat of the British, so the Americans felt compelled to get in as well. Thus the cold war spread to north Africa and Egypt (the Russians duly stepped in to finance the Aswan dam, and much else), and Israel became ever more closely tied to the United States.Before 1956, Israel had been militarily vulnerable, but, beyond the Arab world, morally and politically unassailable. The Israeli occupation of Sinai (and Gaza) in 1956 began the gradual inversion of this state of affairs, as it marked the first expansion of Israel beyond its original borders, with all the subsequent criticisms of its occupation of Arab or Palestinian land. In 1956 the Israelis were quickly forced to withdraw from Sinai by American (and Russian) pressure. Never again, however, would an American president face down Israel as Eisenhower had done at Suez.The rise of NasserismThe chief victor of Suez, in the short term, was Nasser. Before the crisis he had faced lingering opposition in Egypt, not only from the former ruling class but also from communists and the radical Islamists of the Muslim Brotherhood. “Pulling the Lion's tail”, and getting away with it, proved wildly popular. As dissidents fled, fell silent or filled its jails, Nasser's Egypt projected itself as the vanguard of Arab nationalism and a beacon to liberation movements across the third world.Puffed up by his own success, Nasser launched misguided adventures such as a short-lived political union with Syria and disastrous nationalisations of Egyptian industry. And the Nasserist dream inspired a wave of pan-Arab nationalism that helped install lookalike leaderships, with similar flags, propaganda and secret police, across much of the Arab world. Saddam Hussein was one who drew inspiration. Nasser himself was largely discredited by Israel's crushing victory in the 1967 war, but the institutions of Nasserism still lived on, in Egypt and elsewhere, as effective systems of political control.No end of lessons AFPNasser's 1956 triumph endured in Arab memory as a moment of cathartic liberation. It inspired, to some extent, Saddam's dramatic moves, such as invading Iran and later Kuwait. A famous Egyptian film, “Nasser 56”, lingers nostalgically over the Egyptian leader. Amid rousing music, he is portrayed in black and white, shrouded in pensive solitude by a swirl of cigarette smoke, reaching his momentous decision to nationalise the canal. But the film jumps to the happy outcome, ignoring the fact that Nasser's victory was not won by this new Arab superman, but delivered by superpower intervention.A wider lesson lies in the interpretation of history. Eden, who had honourably resigned as foreign secretary in 1938 in disapproval of the appeasement of Hitler and, especially, Mussolini, was nonetheless haunted by Neville Chamberlain's readiness to yield to tyrants. His impulses at Suez were surely complex. Eden was far from anti-American or indifferent to American concerns. He had resigned in 1938 partly because he thought his prime minister, Chamberlain, had treated Roosevelt shabbily. Yet he saw Nasser as a “Mussolini” and was plainly determined to avoid any charge of appeasement, even though the essential features of Munich and Suez were wholly different. Instead of saying that those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it, George Santayana might have better said that those who misinterpret the past are condemned to bungle the present.This day in History: Oct 29, 1956: Israel invades Egypt; Suez Crisis begins (coldwarproject2015.weebly.com)Israeli armed forces push into Egypt toward the Suez Canal, initiating the Suez Crisis. They would soon be joined by French and British forces, creating a serious Cold War problem in the Middle East.The catalyst for the joint Israeli-British-French attack on Egypt was the nationalization of the Suez Canal by Egyptian leader General Gamal Abdel Nasser in July 1956. The situation had been brewing for some time. Two years earlier, the Egyptian military had begun pressuring the British to end its military presence (which had been granted in the 1936 Anglo-Egyptian Treaty) in the canal zone. Nasser's armed forces also engaged in sporadic battles with Israeli soldiers along the border between the two nations, and the Egyptian leader did nothing to conceal his antipathy toward the Zionist nation. Supported by Soviet arms and money, and furious with the United States for reneging on a promise to provide funds for construction of the Aswan Dam on the Nile River, Nasser ordered the Suez Canal seized and nationalized.The British were angry with the move and sought the support of France (which believed that Nasser was supporting rebels in the French colony of Algeria), and Israel (which needed little provocation to strike at the enemy on its border), in an armed assault to retake the canal. The Israelis struck first, but were shocked to find that British and French forces did not immediately follow behind them. Instead of a lightening strike by overwhelming force, the attack bogged down. The United Nations quickly passed a resolution calling for a cease-fire.Israeli paratroopers dig in near the Mitla Pass, 31 October 1956Smoke rises from oil tanks beside the Suez Canal hit during the initial Anglo-French assault on Port Said, 5 November 1956.The Soviet Union began to issue ominous threats about coming to Egypt's aid. A dangerous situation developed quickly, one that the Eisenhower administration hoped to defuse before it turned into a Soviet-U.S. confrontation. Though the United States sternly warned the Soviet Union to stay out of the situation, Eisenhower also pressured the British, French, and Israeli governments to withdraw their troops.2ème RPC paratroopers patrol in Port Said, October 1956.A British link up between the 3rd Battalion, The Parachute Regiment, and the Commandos at the Coast Guard barracks in Port Said. The paratroopers have with them a captured SU-100 tank destroyer, and the Commandos a Buffalo amphibious assault vehicle.They eventually did so in late 1956 and early 1957.Ibrahim el Awal after its capture by the Israeli NavyStatue of Ferdinand de Lesseps (a Frenchman who built the Suez Canal) was removed following the nationalisation of the Suez Canal in 1956.Israel invades Egypt; Suez Crisis begins - Oct 29, 1956 - HISTORY.comSuez Crisis (military.wikia.com)When Gamal Abdel Nasser was announced new leader of Egypt one of his first action plans is to create the Aswan Dam. Needing help to pay for the creating of the new dam America gave a loan, hoping to spread government support and gain an ally. All seemed smoothed until until the U.S. withdrew their loan due to conflicts with the soviets. Nasser and Egypt were furious and betrayed.Damaged Egyptian equipmentNeeding quick and easy money, Nasser took control of the Suez Canal. A man made passageway from Europe to the middle east or India, 120 miles long and 670 feet wide. Egypt collected money for envisioned Aswan Dam. In their tripartite collusion, Israel attacked first, followed by Britain and France purportedly to separate the combatants. Egypt did not give up without a fight. France and Britain resorted to strategic bombing. The UN halted further advance on the 8th day.THE SUEZ CRISIS (OPERATION MUSKETEER) 1956This event during the cold war was important due to the fact that the U.S. and the Soviet Union for the first time where on equal terms. Both wanted the canal open. 59 years later the canal is open today.The Suez Crisis of 1956 and its aftermath: A Comparative Study of Constitutions, Use of Force, Diplomacy and International Relations (bu.edu)Michael Olsen Historia (eiu.edu)Suez Crisis - Wikipedia

TL;DR Short history of conflict. 1956: Suez and the end of empire(theguardian.com) by Derek BrownKing Farouk, the ruler of Egypt, was forced into exile in mid-1952. Power then fell into the hands of an ambitious and visionary young colonel who dreamed of reasserting the dignity and freedom of the Arab nation, with Egypt at the heart. His name was Gamal Abdel Nasser.TIME Magazine Cover: Gamal Abdel Nasser -- July 28, 1958He had three main goals: Egyptian independence, military power to defeat Israel, and to modernize Egypt by building the Aswan dam to improve irrigation, water supply and electricity.For Egyptian independence, he negotiated withdrawal of British forces from the Suez canal within 20 months, ending the last vestige of British imperial dominance since the 1880’s. Then joint control.The world was in flux. Winston Churchill resigned in 1955, replaced by Anthony Eden, a forever foreign minister and an old guard wistful of imperial days. France was driven from Indochina and was in an epic struggle in Algeria.Prime Minister Anthony Eden (left) and foreign secretary John Selwyn-Lloyd outside 10 Downing Street, London, speaking to members of the press during the Suez Crisis. (Photo by Picture Post/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)The United States emerged from WWII a super power, with responsibilities in decolonization and furthering/supporting democracy. Eisenhower wanted no blemish on his record as a “peace” president in reelection contest.The Israelis were barred from the Strait of Tiran by Egyptian forces. She was also desirous of control of the Gaza strip and Sinai peninsula; as well retaliation for sanctioned terroristic incursions from the Egyptian side of the border.USSR had an interest in Middle East affairs and was increasing military aid to Syria.His second goal of arming Egypt was thwarted by Eden’s refusal to deliver agreed to/purchased weapons. Nasser then turned to the Soviets for airplanes and Czechoslovakia for tanks and arms. He also became friendly with the Easter Bloc. Recognized the People’s Republic of China.Unsure about the profitably of the large Aswan Dam project, US Secretory of State John Foster Dulles and UK Swelyn Loyd pulled out financing. With the World Bank’s refusal of a requested $200M, Nasser announced nationalisation of the Suez Canal Company to generate revenue to finance the project.Eden was scandalized, and feared repeat appeasement (a la Third Reich). He opted for a disproportionate response (land invasion). This plan was brought to him by French and Israeli officials who had been meeting over the sale of military hardware to the Israeli Defense Forces.As scheduled, the IDF marched through Gaza into the Sinai on September 29, 1956, overwhelming Egyptian defense forces. France and England demanded a cease-fire, which was turned down by Nasser. As planned French and British invaded, marching toward the Suez canal with great success. Stated goal was to separate Egyptian and Israeli forces and to maintain freedom of navigation.Eden, a master of self-delusion, thought he had approval from John Foster Dulles, the US secretary of state.Washington was appalled by the Anglo-French-Israeli invasion of the canal zone and the Sinai, which threatened to destabilise the entire region, strengthen Soviet links with liberation movements, and complicate recurring superpower crises.Dwight D Eisenhower was enraged by the action. Bypassing the Security Council with two belligerents holding veto power, he received by a wide margin General Assembly approval for a UN resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire. Britain held no 'special relationship' with the USA. The final straw occurred when British Treasury told the government that the sterling, under sustained attack over the crisis, needed urgent US support of one billion dollars. 'Ike' had a crisp reply: no ceasefire, no loan.The invaders halted on the eighth day, and awaited UN intervention force.In the aftermath, what happened?The British were hurt most by Suez. Eden resigned soon afterwards, his health wrecked, his reputation in tatters, his lies and evasions damaged the country's tendentious reputation for fair play. The crisis exploded Britain's lingering imperial pretensions, and hastened the independence of its colonies.Some talked of a “Suez syndrome”, where, in Margaret Thatcher's words, Britain's rulers “went from believing that Britain could do anything to an almost neurotic belief that Britain could do nothing”. Certainly, much of Mrs Thatcher's prime ministership, particularly the retaking of the Falklands in 1982, was an essay in exorcising the demons of Suez. Tony Blair has not been afraid to take advantage of her success, by deploying British power in Sierra Leone, the Balkans and Iraq.But never again without the Americans' support. The major lesson of Suez for the British was that the country would never be able to act independently of America. Unlike the French, who have sought to lead Europe, most British politicians have been content to play second fiddle to America.While British soldiers would go on fighting in various corners of the shrinking empire - east Africa, Aden, Malaya, Borneo and the Falklands - for another 25 years or so. The difference, after Suez, they fought largely to defend local regimes and systems, rather than to impose the will of London.A motivation for France was Nasser’s support for the costly civil war raging against her in Algeria, where 400,000 French boots were on the ground, protecting 1M French nationals. France similarly lost imperial prestige. She also learned that the “special relationship” between Great Britain and the United States was stronger than Great Britain’s bond with Europe. The Americans and the British, to the French were both unreliable and annoyingly superior. So the French had to look elsewhere for more durable allies.The story goes that on the evening of November 6th, when French Prime Minister Guy Mollet got the call from Eden that he was aborting the invasion, he happened to be with the German chancellor, Konrad Adenauer. The French foreign minister, Christian Pineau, recorded Adenauer as saying that “France and England will never be powers comparable to the United States...Not Germany either. There remains to them only one way of playing a decisive role in the world: that is to unite Europe...We have no time to waste; Europe will be your revenge.”Thus was born the six-country European common market, which has now become the 25-country European Union. The founding Treaty of Rome was signed the very next year, in 1957. And the French, particularly Charles de Gaulle in the 1960s, kept the British, America's Trojan horse, out of it for as long as they could, until 1973. France had by then made herself truly independent of American military power (unlike the British) by building its own nuclear deterrent from scratch and, in 1966, leaving NATO's integrated command structure. France stood alone, had her own political and military policies and at times, opposed US positions with glee. She particularly enjoyed the reversal of role in the run up to Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003, played by Jacques Chirac.Israel eventually returned Gaza and Sinai. She retained access to the Strait of Tiran, an important port for commerce. The Suez crisis was the last time the United States showed disagreement with Israeli policy.Israeli AMX-13Egypt lost militarily on the ground, and her air force was decimated. But her prestige soared in the arab/third world. Nasser’s reputation subsequently nose dived after disastrous alliances like with Syria, and after another disaster against Israel in the 1967 campaign.The United States gained clout among the Arab countries, especially Egypt early on. Undisputed supremacy.Russia gained greater influence and became a major player in the region, almost always in opposition to US interests.Dwight Eisenhower was reelected President, not breaking his promise for peace.Pan Arab nationalism gained traction. Israel-Palestinian conflict evolved into one between Israel and the Arab world.Greatest Irony: the operation was counterproductive. Far from bolstering Anglo-French interests, it badly undermined political and military prestige of both countries. And far from ensuring international freedom of navigation, it did just the opposite: under Nasser’s order, 47 ships were scuttled in the waterway. The Suez canal was totally blocked.Suez Crisis – Summarized in 20 points: From Empire to Europe (medium.com)The Suez crisis was an international conflict in 1856 which culminated in the failed military intervention of an allied Britain, France and Israel in Egypt. The whole conflict summarized in 20 points:Suez Canal = ship canal, linking the Mediterranean and the Red Sea, shortest shipping route between Europe and Asia.Suez Canal was very important to Britain’s oil supply.Originally, French & Egyptian shares, Egyptian shares later acquired by GB.Founding of IsraelEgypt denied ships to and from Israel for most of the passage.Overthrow of Egyptian King Farouk I. by General Naguib (first president) and Lt. Colonel Nasser. Nasser later became 2nd president.Nasser nationalized the Suez Canal to finance the construction of the Aswan High Dam after US and UK reneging on loan agreement.Interested PartiesEgypt (nationalized the Suez Canal)IsraelEngland and France (main shareholders of the Suez Canal, interested in freedom of navigation)United States (Cold War anti-soviet middle east meddling)Soviet Union (open to all Suez Canal access)UN forces (secure transit, freedom of navigation)9. March 1956: Egypt alliance with Syria and Jordan.10. July 1956: Nationalization of the Suez Canal by Egypt.11. August 1956: Nasser rejected invitation to first London Conference. “The nationalization would not affect the contracts concluded in 1888" (UK and France have a different view).12. September 1956: Nasser rejected invitation to second London Conference.13. October 1956: Israel meets collusion with France and GB.14. Israeli troops landed on the Suez Canal, conquering in 8 days the peninsula within 16 km of the Suez Canal. War made the canal impassable.15. France and GB curbed Israeli troops to justify use of force.16. Russia threatened to drop atomic bomb on London. Threat not taken seriously.17. End result: Suez Canal is again passable for ships of all nations.18. GB and France lost supremacy in the world.19. Russian satellite states in the Middle East felt justified in their anti-Western-Israeli stance.20. The cost incurred during the war was so high that several Aswan dams could be built.1956: Suez and the end of empire (theguardian.com) Derek BrownIntroductionThe Suez crisis is often portrayed as Britain's last fling of the imperial dice. In 1956, the globe was indeed still circled by British possessions and dependencies, from the Caribbean in the west to Singapore, Malaya and Hong Kong in the east. Much of the African map was still imperial pink.In reality, though, the sun had long since begun to sink over the British empire. The greatest possession of them all, the Indian subcontinent, had taken its freedom. Nationalist movements were flourishing in most of the rest, patronised by Soviet Russia and encouraged by the United States in its self-appointed role as leader of the free world. Britain itself was only beginning to emerge from postwar austerity, its public finances crushed by an accumulation of war debt.Still, there were powerful figures in the "establishment" - a phrase coined in the early 1950s - who could not accept that Britain was no longer a first-rate power. Their case, in the context of the times, was persuasive: we had nuclear arms, a permanent seat on the UN security council, and military forces in both hemispheres. We remained a trading nation, with a vital interest in the global free passage of goods.But there was another, darker, motive for intervention in Egypt: the sense of moral and military superiority which had accreted in the centuries of imperial expansion. Though it may now seem quaint and self-serving, there was a widespread and genuine feeling that Britain had responsibilities in its diminishing empire, to protect its peoples from communism and other forms of demagoguery.Much more potently, there was ingrained racism. When the revolutionaries in Cairo dared to suggest that they would take charge of the Suez canal, the naked prejudice of the imperial era bubbled to the surface. The Egyptians, after all, were among the original targets of the epithet, "westernised (or wily) oriental gentlemen. They were the Wogs.BackgroundKing Farouk, the ruler of Egypt, was forced into exile in mid-1952. A year later, a group of army officers formally took over the government which they already controlled. The titular head of the junta was General Mohammed Neguib. The real power behind the new throne was an ambitious and visionary young colonel who dreamed of reasserting the dignity and freedom of the Arab nation, with Egypt at the heart of the renaissance. His name was Gamal Abdel Nasser.Nasser's first target was the continued British military presence in the Suez canal zone. A source of bitter resentment among many Egyptians, that presence was a symbol of British imperial dominance since the 1880s. In 1954, having established himself as uncontested leader of Egypt, Nasser negotiated a new treaty, under which British forces would leave within 20 months.At first, the largely peaceful transition of power in Egypt was little noticedin a world beset by turmoil and revolution. The cold war was at its height. Communism was entrenched throughout eastern Europe; the French were being chased out of Indo-China and were engaged in a vicious civil war in Algeria; the infant state of Israel had fought off the combined might of six Arab armies, and Britain was trying to hold down insurgents in Cyprus, Kenya and Malaya.British politics, too, was in a state of flux, with a new generation of leaders emerging to preside over belated postwar prosperity. But when Winston Churchill resigned as prime minister in 1955, at the age of 80, he was succeeded by the last of the old guard: Anthony Eden.After a lifetime at the cutting edge of British statesmanship, Eden was a curiously inadequate man. He had the vanity that often accompanies good looks, and the querulous temper that goes with innate weakness. He had been foreign secretary throughout the war and again, under the old imperialist Churchill, from 1951 to 55. For all his experience, he never absorbed the simple postwar truth: that the world had changed forever.In July 1956, the last British soldiers pulled out of the canal zone. On July 26, Nasser abruptly announced the nationalisation of the Suez Canal Company. Eden was scandalised and, riding a wave of popular indignation, prepared a grotesquely disproportionate response: full scale invasion.Military operationsNasser's nationalisation of the canal was followed by intensive diplomatic activity, ostensibly aimed at establishing some kind of international control of the strategically vital waterway. It turned out to be a smokescreen for military preparations.In September, Nasser made a defiant speech rejecting the idea of international supervision of an Egyptian national asset. By then, the die was cast.British and French troops, spearheaded by airborne forces, invaded the canal zone on October 31. Their governments told an outraged world that they had to invade, to separate Egyptian and Israeli forces, and thus protect thefreedom of navigation on the canal. The reality was that the British and French, in top secret negotiations with Israel had forged an agreement forjoint military operations. Israel, in fact, had the most legitimate grievance of the three invaders, for since the establishment of the Jewish state in 1948, Egypt had denied passage through the canal to any Israeli-flagged or Israel-bound ships.The Complex Israeli: Ariel Sharon, 1928-2014Israeli forces swept into the Sinai desert on September 29, two days before the Anglo-French invasion, and raced towards the canal. (One column was headed by a young brigade commander who would go on to become prime minister: Ariel Sharon). In less than seven days, the entire Sinai peninsula was in Israeli hands.The Anglo-French invasion was a good deal more ignominious. Just eight days after the first airborne lands, the operation was halted under a ceasefire ostensibly ordered by the United Nations, but in fact dictated by the Americans. The Egyptian air force had been destroyed and its army mauled - though it put up spirited resistance both in the canal zone and in Sinai. There is little doubt that the invading allies, who had overwhelming military advantage, could have gone on to take undisputed control of the canal zone - albeit at a cruel cost.The greatest irony of the operation was that it was totally counterproductive. Far from bolstering Anglo-French interests, it had badly undermined the political and military prestige of both countries. And far from ensuring international freedom of seaborne passage, it had done just the opposite: under Nasser's orders, 47 ships were scuttled in the waterway. The Suez canal was totally blocked.The diplomatic crisisThough Eden scarcely seemed to appreciate it, Britain was simply no longer capable of mounting a solo imperial adventure. In the Suez operation, British soldiers fought alongside French ones. More importantly, both fading European powers were allied with the youngest but already most potent force in the Middle East: Israel.But it wasn't Britain's military allies which mattered in the final analysis; it was her political foes. They most obviously included the Soviet Union and its allies, who were given a glorious opportunity to attack western imperialism (and deflect world attention from their own brutality in crushing the simultaneous Hungarian uprising).Much more telling than Soviet condemnation was the disapproval of the Eisenhower administration in the USA. Washington was appalled by the Anglo-French-Israeli invasion of the canal zone and the Sinai. The action threatened to destabilise the strategically vital region, and strengthen Sovietlinks with liberation movements around the world. It raised global tensionsin an age dominated by the nuclear arms race and recurring superpower crises. More viscerally, it was viewed with distaste as a nakedly imperial exercise in a post-imperial age.Eden, a master of self-delusion, thought he had received a nod and wink of approval for the invasion from John Foster Dulles, the US secretary of state. He should have checked with Dwight D Eisenhower, who was enraged by the action. He forced through the UN resolution imposing a ceasefire, and made it clear that in this matter at any rate, Britain would have no 'special relationship' with the USA.The final straw for Eden came when the Treasury told the government that sterling, under sustained attack over the crisis, needed urgent US support to the tune of a billion dollars. 'Ike' had a crisp reply: no ceasefire, no loan.The invaders were ordered to halt, and await the arrival of a UN intervention force.Milestones: The Suez Crisis, 1956 (history.state.gov)The political crisisThe Suez crisis provoked a mighty, if predictable, wave of jingoistic fervourin the rightwing British press. There was a tide of genuine public support for "our boys" and a widespread mood of hostility towards Nasser. But at the same time - and arguably for the first time - there was a countervailing popular wave of revulsion against imperialist aggression. Hugh Gaitskell, not exactly the most radical of Labour party leaders, railed passionately against the war. So did Liberals and leftwing groups. Their stand was not hugely popular - the circulation of the Manchester Guardian, which fiercely opposed the war, fell markedly during the crisis - but the anti-war movement was a dramatic, even traumatic, shock for the nation.What fatally undermined the Conservative government, however, was the dissent in its own ranks. Less than 50 years ago, there were plenty of Tories who still believed in the virtues of empire. But there was also a new generation which recognised the damage being done to Britain's real interests in the new world, and which was outraged by Eden's blinkered approach. Two junior ministers, Edward Boyle and Anthony Nutting, resigned from the government in protest against Suez. Among those who stayed on, but who expressed deep reservations about the Suez enterprise, was RA 'Rab' Butler, the man widely seen as Eden's heir apparent.Eden himself was shattered by Suez, politically, physically and emotionally. On November 19, just three days before the last of the British invaders finally left the canal zone, he abruptly took himself off to Jamaica to recover, leaving behind Rab Butler in charge of the cabinet. On January 9, 1957, Eden resigned. The Conservative mandarins who controlled the leadership promptly took their revenge on Butler, seen as the leading liberal in the party, by elevating the more rightwing Harold Macmillan to Downing Street.ConclusionIt may now seem astonishing to those who were not alive during the Suez crisis that Britain was prepared to take part in such an imperial adventure so recently. Even to those who clearly remember it - including this writer - it seems an anachronism; an atavistic throwback.In 1956, after all, Elvis Presley was already a star, Disneyland had been opened in California, and British theatre was in the throes of the 'kitchen sink' revolution. And yet, though it took place well within living memory, Suez was also a link with a not-so-distant past in which imperialism was a matter of pride rather than a term of abuse. Indeed, it marked definitively the transition between those two things.British soldiers would go on fighting in various corners of the shrinking empire - east Africa, Aden, Malaya, Borneo and the Falklands - for another 25 years or so. The difference, after Suez, is that they fought largely to defend local regimes and systems, rather than to impose the will of London.The years immediately following Suez saw a slew of new countries on the world stage which had formerly been colonies and dependencies. There is little doubt that the end of the imperial era was greatly accelerated by the squalid little war in Egypt.The Other Side of Suez (BBC Documentary)"This is a story of how the government of the United Kingdom decided to attack an Arab nation; of how, afraid its oil supplies were under threat, it embarked on a strategy of regime change; of how Britian deliberately bypassed the United Nations, and of how a British prime minister led the nation to war based on suspect intelligence. "But this isn't Iraq, 2003. This is Egypt, 1956." - NarratorBBC Suez A Very British Crisis Part 1BBC Suez A Very British Crisis Part 2 ConspiracyBBC Suez A Very British Crisis Part 3 WarHow significant was the Suez Crisis?BBC - History - British History in depth: The Suez CrisisThe crisis buildsAnthony Nutting and Abdel Nasser sign the Anglo-Egyptian Suez Agreement of 1956 has its roots in the post-war upsurge of nationalism in Egypt. In 1951, Nahas Pasha leader of the recently-elected nationalist Wafd party revoked the Anglo-Egyptian Treaty of 1936.Attacks on the British garrison soon followed and in January 1952 the British government authorised an operation to disarm the Egyptian paramilitary police force in Ismailia which was orchestrating the violence. This was successful, but the violence continued. Riots in Cairo of an unprecedented scale followed, culminating in attacks on Saturday 26 January on British property and the expatriate community, thereafter known as Black Saturday.It was agreed that British troops would be permitted to return if the Suez Canal was threatened.British threats to occupy Cairo prompted King Farouk of Egypt to dismiss Nahas Pasha, but in July 1952 Farouk was overthrown in a military coup and General Mohammed Neguib seized power. Rather than insist on Britain's rights under the 1936 Treaty, Anthony Eden, the British foreign secretary tried to negotiate with the new government.In 1954, Colonel Gamel Abdul Nasser replaced General Neguib. He had three goals: to make Egypt independent by ending British occupation; to build up Egyptian forces for a successful attack on Israel; to improve Egypt’s economy by constructing a high dam at Aswan to irrigate the Nile valley.On 19 October 1954 a treaty was signed by Nasser and by Anthony Nutting, British minister of state for foreign affairs. The agreement was to last for seven years.British troops were to be withdrawn from Egypt by June 1956, and the British bases were to be run jointly by British and Egyptian civilian technicians. Egypt agreed to respect the freedom of navigation through the canal, and it was agreed that British troops would be permitted to return if the Suez Canal was threatened by an outside power.Appeasement fearsIn February 1955, Anglo-Egyptian affairs were strained once more by Eden's decision to deprive Nasser of promised British arms. In April, Eden succeeded Winston Churchill as prime minister.As the last British troops left Egypt, Nasser was completing the purchase of Soviet-made aircraft, tanks and arms from Czechoslovakia, which might help him to realise one of his goals, the destruction of Israel.Despite anti-western demonstrations in Egypt, in January 1956 the United States and Britain had pledged funding to help finance the construction of a new High Dam at Aswan. The US, however, became convinced that the Dam project would not be a success and wanted to reduce expenditure on foreign aid.It was also concerned about Nasser's purchase of Soviet arms. On 19 July, US Secretary of State John Foster Dulles informed the Egyptian ambassador in Washington that his government had decided that it would not provide funding for the construction of the dam.The British foreign secretary, Selwyn Lloyd, followed suit and withdrew the British offer of aid. The World Bank then refused to advance Egypt a promised $200 million. On 26 July 1956, President Nasser nationalised the Anglo-French Suez Canal Company to finance his dam.Eden, who recalled Britain's appeasement of Adolf Hitler in the 1930s, looked to military action which might result in Nasser's downfall and restore Britain's influence in the region. The United States, however, made it clear that unjustified military action would not be tolerated.Treaties and collusionThe end of the Second World War in 1945 had brought a period of rapid change. The creation of the state of Israel in 1948 was followed by the first Arab-Israeli War, and a renewed upsurge of Arab nationalism made the Middle East a volatile region.The United States had emerged from World War Two as a global superpower and, as a former colony itself it was committed to overseeing the decolonisation of the globe. Furthermore, the spread of communismfostered by the Soviet Union was seen by the US as a threat to western democracy.A secret agreement was made that Israel should attack Egypt as a pretext for an Anglo-French invasion of Suez.In an attempt to strengthen security in the Middle East against Soviet influence, Britain, Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Pakistan signed a treaty known as the Baghdad Pact in 1955. But Egypt, which was looking to the Soviet Union for armaments, refused to sign. Iraq later withdrew and the pact,which was renamed the Central Treaty Organisation, became ineffective in preventing the Cold War from reaching the Middle East.In January 1956, Guy Mollet was elected prime minister in France and promised to bring peace to Algeria, a French colony, in the throes of a nationalist uprising. But the presence of a million French settlers there made a withdrawal from Algeria politically impossible and his attempts to resolve the situation escalated the violence.Meanwhile, Israel, greatly concerned about Egypt’s rearmament and involved in a series of border clashes with Egypt, was purchasing aircraft and weapons from France. The French government had been meeting secretly with Israel and invited Britain to join the negotiations.Left to right: French foreign minister Christian Pineau (1904 - 1995), French Prime Minister Guy Mollet (1905 - 1975), Anthony Eden British Foreign SecretaryIn October 1956, Mollet, Eden and Israeli Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion met at Sevres near Paris and concluded a secret agreement that Israel should attack Egypt, thereby providing a pretext for an Anglo-French invasion of Suez.Military actionBritish troops moving through Port Said ©Ben-Gurion then ordered General Moshe Dayan, his chief of staff to plan an attack on Egypt. On 29 October 1956, the Israeli attack was spearheaded by an airborne drop to seize control of the Mitla Pass. Heavy fighting followed.The next day, Britain and France issued ultimatums to both sides to stop the fighting immediately. The Israelis continued their operations, expecting an Egyptian counter-attack. Instead, Nasser’s army was withdrawing.The Royal Navy aircraft carrier HMS Albion (R07) during the Suez Crisis (Wikimedia Commons)Militarily the operation was well on its way to being a great success.On 5 November, some three months and 10 days after Nasser had nationalised the canal, the Anglo-French assault on Suez was launched. It was preceded by an aerial bombardment, which grounded and destroyed the Egyptian Air Force.Soon after dawn, soldiers of 3rd Battalion, the Parachute Regiment, dropped onto El Gamil airfield, while French paratroopers landed south of the Raswa bridges and at Port Fuad.Within 45 minutes, all Egyptian resistance on the airfield had been overcome and Royal Naval helicopters were bringing in supplies. With El Gamil secured, the British Paras moved eastwards towards Port Said,meeting their first serious opposition en route. With air support, they overwhelmed the Egyptian forces then stopped and dug-in overnight because the beach area of Port Said was to be bombarded next day during the seaborne landing.On 6 November, the sea and helicopter-borne assault went in. Royal Marine Commandos, together with British and French airborne forces supported by British tanks soon defeated the Egyptian forces, capturing men, vehicles and many of the newly purchased Czech-manufactured weapons.At midnight on 6 November a cease-fire was called on the insistence of UN Secretary General Dag Hammarskjöld. The Anglo-French forces had reached El Cap, just south of Port Said, but were not yet in control of the entire canal when they were stopped. Militarily, the operation was well on its way to being a great success.BacklashPolitically, the intervention in Suez was a disaster. US President Dwight Eisenhower was incensed. World opinion, especially that of the United States, together with the threat of Soviet intervention, forced Britain, France and Israel to withdraw their troops from Egypt. In Britain too there had been widespread outrage.President Eisenhower giving a televised speech addressing the Suez Crisis. (Photo by Paul Schutzer/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images)A United Nations peacekeeping force was sent in to supervise the ceasefire and to restore order. The Suez Canal was cleared and reopened, but Britain in particular found its standing with the US weakened and its influence 'east of Suez' diminished by the adventure.Eden told the Commons: 'There was not foreknowledge that Israel would attack Egypt. There was not.’Accusations of collusion between Britain, France and Israel started in 1956, but were denied in parliament by Eden who tried to avoid giving a clear and categorical answer.He was at last asked whether there was foreknowledge of the Israeli attack and on 20 December in his last address to the House of Commons, recorded in Hansard, he replied: 'I want to say this on the question of foreknowledge, and to say it quite bluntly to the House, that there was not foreknowledge that Israel would attack Egypt. There was not.’In January 1957, his health shattered and his political credibility severely damaged, Sir Anthony Eden, the British prime minister, resigned. Guy Mollet, the French prime minister, survived longer despite fierce criticism, but his government collapsed in June 1957 over the taxation he imposed to pay for the Algerian War.Anglo-American relations were strained by the Suez Crisis, but as Cold War Allies in the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) they continued to cooperate, and by 1962 Britain had adopted the US Polaris missile system. Nonetheless, the real balance of power in the post-World War Two world had been starkly demonstrated and Britain's prestige was dealt a severe blow.The History Guy: Arab-Israeli Wars:Suez War (1956)Suez Crisis, 1956The Suez Crisis of 1956, in which the Egyptian Government seized control of the Suez Canal from the British and French owned company that managed it, had important consequences for U.S. relations with both Middle Eastern countries and European allies.On July 26, 1956, Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser nationalized the British and French owned Suez Canal Company that operated the Suez Canal. Nasser's decision threatened British and French stock holdings in the Company and, as the Canal afforded Western countries access to Middle Eastern oil, also threatened to cut off Europe's oil supply. The ensuing Suez Crisis threatened regional stability and challenged the U.S. relationship with two primary Cold War allies, Britain and France.Nasser nationalized the canal after the United States and Britain renegedon a previous agreement to finance the Aswan Dam project. The Aswan Dam was designed to control the Nile's flood waters and provide electricity and water to the Egyptian populace and, as such, was a symbol of Egypt's modernization. The United States and Britain withdrew their financing for the Aswan Dam after Nasser made several moves that appeared friendly to the communist block, including an arms deal with Czechoslovkaia and recognition of the Chinese Government in Beijing. Without support from the United States and Britain, Nasser needed the revenue generated from tolls collected from ships using the Suez Canal to subsidize the cost of building the dam.Although the United State was concerned about Nasser's nationalization of the canal, it sought a diplomatic solution to the problem. Britain and France, however, viewed the situation as a threat to their national interests. Accordingly, they sought a military solution that involved Israel. They secretly contacted the Israeli Government and proposed a joint military operation in which Israel would invade the Sinai and march toward the Suez Canal zone after which Britain and France would issue a warning to both Egypt and Israel to stay away from the Canal. Britain and France would then land paratroopers in the Canal Zone on the pretense of protecting it. Israel willingly agreed to this scenario since it gave Israel the opportunity to gain control of the Gaza Strip and Sinai Peninsula, end the Egyptian blockade of the Straits of Tiran, and retaliate against Egypt over its support for Palestinian commando raids on Israel's western border during the previous two years.Strait of Tiran between Gulf of Aqaba and Red SeaOn October 29, 1956, Israeli forces moved across the border, defeated the Egyptian army in the Sinai, captured Sharm al-Sheikh and thereby guaranteed Israeli strategic control over the Straits of Tiran. Britain and France issued their ultimatum and landed troops, effectively carrying out the agreed upon operation. However, the United States and the Soviet Union responded to events by demanding a cease-fire. In a resolution before the United Nations, the United States also called for the evacuation of Israeli, French, and British forces from Egypt under the supervision of a special United Nations force. This force arrived in Egypt in mid-November. By December 22, the last British and French troops had withdrawn from Egyptian territory, but Israel kept its troops in Gaza until March 19, 1957, when the United States finally compelled the Israeli Government to withdraw its troops.The Suez conflict fundamentally altered the regional balance of power. It was a military defeat for Egypt, but Nasser's status grew in the Arab world as the defender of Arab nationalism. Israel withdrew from Egyptian territory gained in the fighting but regained access to the Straits of Tiran, while the United Nations adopted a larger role maintaining a peacekeeping force in the Sinai. Britain and France lost influence in the region and suffered humiliation after the withdrawal of their troops from the Canal Zone. Moreover, relations between the United States and its British and French allies temporarily deteriorated in the months following the war. In contrast, Soviet influence in the Middle East grew, especially in Syria where the Soviets began to supply arms and advisers to the Syrian military. The United States had played a moderating role, and in so doing had improved its relations with Egypt, but the fundamental disputes between Israel and its neighbors remained unresolved. When these disagreements resurfaced, the United States would again be drawn into the conflicts.Suez Crisis (wikizero.com) BestWhat happened to Ben-Gurion’s Oasis in the Desert?Suez Crisis - Cold War (history.com)An Affair To Remember (economist.com)The Suez CrisisThe Suez crisis of 50 years ago marked the end of an era, and the start of another, for Europe, America and the Middle EastJul 27th 2006ON JULY 26th 1956 Gamal Abdul Nasser, president of Egypt, addressed a huge crowd in the city of Alexandria. Broad-shouldered, handsome and passionate, Nasser stunned even this gathering of enthusiastic supporters with the vehemence of his diatribe against British imperialism. Britain had ruled Egypt, one way or another, from 1882 to 1922, when the protectorate gained nominal independence, and continued to influence Egyptian affairs thereafter, maintaining troops there and propping up the decadent monarchy overthrown by Nasser in 1952.In that speech in Alexandria, though, Nasser chose to delve back even further into history, in a long digression on the building of the Suez canal a century earlier. That gave him the chance to mention the name of the Frenchman who had built the canal, Ferdinand de Lesseps. This he did at least 13 times. “De Lesseps”, it turned out, was the code word for the Egyptian army to start the seizure, and nationalisation, of the canal. It also launched the start of a new era in the politics of Europe, the Middle East and America.The Suez crisis, as the events of the following months came to be called, marked the humiliating end of imperial influence for two European countries, Britain and France. It cost the British prime minister, Anthony Eden, his job and, by showing up the shortcomings of the Fourth Republic in France, hastened the arrival of the Fifth Republic under Charles de Gaulle.It made unambiguous, even to the most nostalgic blimps, America's supremacy over its Western allies. It thereby strengthened the resolve of many Europeans to create what is now the European Union. It promoted pan-Arab nationalism and completed the transformation of the Israeli-Palestinian dispute into an Israeli-Arab one. And it provided a distractionthat encouraged the Soviet Union to put down an uprising in Hungary in the same year.It also divided families and friends, at least in Britain and France, with a degree of bitterness that would not be seen in a foreign-policy dispute until the invasion of Iraq in 2003. If that is difficult to understand, remember that the world was a different place then. Many European politicians still believed their countries had a right to run the affairs of others. Many were also scarred by memories of appeasement in the 1930s. Faced with a provocation, even an entirely legal one involving the nationalisation of a foreign-owned asset like the Suez canal, the instinct of such Europeans was to go to war. They and their Israeli partners-in-invasion were restrained, eventually, by theUnited States, led by a Republican president and war hero, Dwight Eisenhower. The venture involved intrigue, lies, nemesis—and no end of a lesson. How did it come about?The road to collusionIn Egypt, the British had become so resented for their racist, arrogant ways that by the early 1950s even Winston Churchill, the grand old imperialist who had returned as prime minister in 1951, felt he could resist the tide of nationalism no more. After 1951 the British were confined to the Suez canal zone, harassed by Egyptian irregulars who wanted them out altogether. By June 1956 the last British soldiers had left even the canal zone.Eisenhower And The Cold War – Analysis / President Eisenhower and John Foster Dulles in 1956.Yet Anglo-Egyptian relations did not improve. Nasser was enraged by America's withdrawal of its offer of loans to help pay for the building of a dam on the Nile at Aswan. This project was central to his ambitions to modernise Egypt. But John Foster Dulles, the American secretary of state, thought the dam would place too much strain on the resources of newly independent Egypt.For their part, the British, mistrustful of Nasser and feeling the pinch, were also ready to withdraw their loan offer. So, thought Dulles, best to let the Russians take on the dam, as he knew they would if the West backed out. He did not, however, bargain for Nasser's immediate response—the nationalisation of the Suez canal, whose revenues, Nasser argued, Egypt now needed to replace the loans promised by Britain and America for the dam.The reaction in Britain was unanimous in condemning “Grabber Nasser”, as the Daily Mirror put it. Comparisons were immediately made to Hitler and Mussolini in the 1930s: if he got away with this, where would he—and other emboldened post-colonial leaders—stop? Eden, who had succeeded Churchill as prime minister the year before, argued that the canal was Britain's “great imperial lifeline”, especially for oil. Nasser could not be allowed to have his hand “on our windpipe”.The French reacted just as strongly, but for different reasons. First, they had a stake in the Paris-based company that ran the canal. Second, they were fighting an increasingly nasty little colonial war in Algeria. The new government of Guy Mollet was resolved to put down an Arab uprising there with all the force that the Fourth Republic could muster. By the summer of 1956 France had about 400,000 soldiers in Algiers. Nasser backed the Arab insurgents, so the French were as eager as the British to see the back of him. Accordingly, Britain and France started to co-ordinate plans for a military invasion of Egypt and a reoccupation of the canal zone.Algerian WarBut their bellicosity was matched by the scepticism of the Americans, and of Eisenhower in particular, who from the beginning was against the use of force by his two main allies. One concern for him was the presidential election due that November, which he intended to win as the incumbent “peace” president. He knew that the voters would not thank him for taking them into a foreign imbroglio in which America had no direct interest.Eisenhower was also motivated by an anti-imperialism rooted in the attitudes that had made Americans break free from the British empire. Intensifying his scepticism was a fear that, in the new cold war, any British and French bullying of Egypt would alienate Arabs, Asians and Africansand drive them towards the communist camp. To head off Anglo-French military action, Eisenhower and his secretary of state ensnared the Europeans in a fruitless round of talks and conferences.Aware that they were on shaky legal ground for an invasion, the British and French reluctantly played along. But they were losing the momentum for military action, which was the American intention. The increasingly histrionic Eden, in particular, wanted not only the reversal of the canal's nationalisation but also regime change: he wanted Nasser “destroyed”.The Israelis provided a way out. On September 30th a delegation secretly presented the French with a fabricated casus belli: Israel would invade Egyptand race to the canal. The French and British could then invade, posing as peacekeepers to separate the two sides, and occupy the canal, ostensibly to guarantee the free passage of shipping. When this plan was presented to Eden, he jumped at it. Thus was collusion born. The details were agreed on at a secret meeting in Sèvres, outside Paris. Not for nothing is the Suez crisis known in Egypt as the “tripartite aggression”.The British and French forces now had a pretext to invade. For the Israelis, it would punish Egypt for its escalating incursions into Israel from Gaza. It would also hitch the major European powers to the cause of Israel: up to that point, the French had tried to be even-handed between Israel and its neighbours; the British had leaned towards the Arab states.A complete mess and botchOnly a handful of people were let in on the collusion. Most of them thought it was mad from the start, arguing, quite correctly, that the cover for the invasion was so flimsy it would soon be blown. To disguise what was going on, the British, in particular, were drawn ever deeper into a bog of lies and deception, particularly with the Americans. Parliament was also deceived. Both Eden and Selwyn Lloyd, his foreign secretary, told the House of Commons that, as Lloyd put it, “there was no prior agreement” with Israel.On October 29th, Israeli paratroopers, led by a zealous officer called Ariel Sharon, were dropped into Sinai to fulfil their side of the bargain. Feigning surprise, the British and French issued an ultimatum to both sides to cease fire. When the Egyptians rejected this, British planes started bombing the Egyptian air force on the ground and on November 5th Anglo-French troops went ashore to begin the invasion of the canal zone and, it was hoped, topple Nasser.Eisenhower, kept completely in the dark, felt utterly betrayed by his erstwhile allies. “I've just never seen great powers make such a complete mess and botch of things,” he told his aides. He determined to put a stop to the whole enterprise.America struck at Britain's fragile economy. It refused to allow the IMF to give emergency loans to Britain unless it called off the invasion. Faced by imminent financial collapse, as the British Treasury saw it, on November 7thEden surrendered to American demands and stopped the operation, with his troops stranded half way down the canal. The French were furious, but obliged to agree; their troops were under British command.America also proved adept at working through the UN. On November 2nd an American resolution demanding a ceasefire was passed by a majority of 64 to five, the Russians voting with the United States. And to sidestep Anglo-French vetoes at the Security Council, for the first time the General Assemblymet in emergency session (where no country held a veto) and took up a Canadian suggestion to assemble an international emergency force to go to the canal and monitor the ceasefire. These were to be the first “blue hat” UN peacekeepers. The organisation was one of the clear winners of the crisis, gaining an enhanced role in the world. For the other participants in the drama, the consequences were more mixed.The French drew the clearest lessons. Suez showed that they could never rely on perfide Albion. Britain, then Europe's strongest power, would, it seemed, always put its “special” relationship with America above its European interests. And the Americans, to the French, were both unreliable and annoyingly superior.So the French would have to look elsewhere for more durable allies—a search that was, by one account, short. The story goes that on the evening of November 6th, when Mollet got the call from Eden that he was aborting the invasion, he happened to be with the German chancellor, Konrad Adenauer. The French foreign minister, Christian Pineau, records Adenauer as saying that“France and England will never be powers comparable to the United States...Not Germany either. There remains to them only one way of playing a decisive role in the world: that is to unite Europe...We have no time to waste; Europe will be your revenge.”Thus was born the six-country European common market, which has now become the 25-country European Union. The founding Treaty of Rome was signed the very next year, in 1957. And the French, particularly Charles de Gaulle in the 1960s, kept the British, America's Trojan horse, out of it for as long as they could, until 1973. France had by then made itself truly independent of American military power (unlike the British) by building its own nuclear deterrent from scratch and, in 1966, leaving NATO's integrated command structure.It should have been no surprise, then, that in the months before the invasion of Iraq in 2003, it was the French who played the American role of 1956, though Jacques Chirac could hardly deliver the coup de grâce, as Eisenhower had done in 1956. In reaction to Suez, France had constructed a new identity as the ostensible leader of Europe, upholding a set of universal values in competition with the Americans.The British were hurt most by Suez. Eden resigned soon afterwards, his health wrecked, his reputation in tatters, his lies and evasions damaging the country's always tendentious reputation for fair play. The crisis exploded Britain's lingering imperial pretensions, and hastened the independence of its colonies.Some talked of a “Suez syndrome”, where, in Margaret Thatcher's words, Britain's rulers “went from believing that Britain could do anything to an almost neurotic belief that Britain could do nothing”. Certainly, much of Mrs Thatcher's prime ministership, particularly the retaking of the Falklands in 1982, was an essay in exorcising the demons of Suez. Tony Blair has not been afraid to take advantage of her success, by deploying British power in Sierra Leone, the Balkans and Iraq.But never without the Americans' support. The major lesson of Suez for the British was that the country would never be able to act independently of America again. Unlike the French, who have sought to lead Europe, most British politicians have been content to play second fiddle to America.Eden recuperated from the crisis in Ian Fleming's house, Goldeneye, in Jamaica. It was an appropriate choice, as it was Fleming who was to mythologise the new relationship in his James Bond novels. The first, “Casino Royale”, was published to little attention in 1953, but the series took off in the years after the Suez crisis, offering some sort of literary consolation to a country coming to terms with its new, humbler status. The partnership between Bond and Felix Leiter, a CIA agent, reflected the way the British now liked to see things, the one suave, smart and endlessly resourceful, the other with a lot of money and a slightly plodding manner.Eisenhower won his election in America. The crisis affirmed the country's new status as the global superpower, challenged only by the Soviet Union. Suez was also to be the last incident in which America was to take strong action against Israel. As Eisenhower had feared, the Russians moved into the Middle East to fill the gap left by the disorderly retreat of the British, so the Americans felt compelled to get in as well. Thus the cold war spread to north Africa and Egypt (the Russians duly stepped in to finance the Aswan dam, and much else), and Israel became ever more closely tied to the United States.Before 1956, Israel had been militarily vulnerable, but, beyond the Arab world, morally and politically unassailable. The Israeli occupation of Sinai (and Gaza) in 1956 began the gradual inversion of this state of affairs, as it marked the first expansion of Israel beyond its original borders, with all the subsequent criticisms of its occupation of Arab or Palestinian land. In 1956 the Israelis were quickly forced to withdraw from Sinai by American (and Russian) pressure. Never again, however, would an American president face down Israel as Eisenhower had done at Suez.The rise of NasserismThe chief victor of Suez, in the short term, was Nasser. Before the crisis he had faced lingering opposition in Egypt, not only from the former ruling class but also from communists and the radical Islamists of the Muslim Brotherhood. “Pulling the Lion's tail”, and getting away with it, proved wildly popular. As dissidents fled, fell silent or filled its jails, Nasser's Egypt projected itself as the vanguard of Arab nationalism and a beacon to liberation movements across the third world.Puffed up by his own success, Nasser launched misguided adventures such as a short-lived political union with Syria and disastrous nationalisations of Egyptian industry. And the Nasserist dream inspired a wave of pan-Arab nationalism that helped install lookalike leaderships, with similar flags, propaganda and secret police, across much of the Arab world. Saddam Hussein was one who drew inspiration. Nasser himself was largely discredited by Israel's crushing victory in the 1967 war, but the institutions of Nasserism still lived on, in Egypt and elsewhere, as effective systems of political control.No end of lessons AFPNasser's 1956 triumph endured in Arab memory as a moment of cathartic liberation. It inspired, to some extent, Saddam's dramatic moves, such as invading Iran and later Kuwait. A famous Egyptian film, “Nasser 56”, lingers nostalgically over the Egyptian leader. Amid rousing music, he is portrayed in black and white, shrouded in pensive solitude by a swirl of cigarette smoke, reaching his momentous decision to nationalise the canal. But the film jumps to the happy outcome, ignoring the fact that Nasser's victory was not won by this new Arab superman, but delivered by superpower intervention.A wider lesson lies in the interpretation of history. Eden, who had honourably resigned as foreign secretary in 1938 in disapproval of the appeasement of Hitler and, especially, Mussolini, was nonetheless haunted by Neville Chamberlain's readiness to yield to tyrants. His impulses at Suez were surely complex. Eden was far from anti-American or indifferent to American concerns. He had resigned in 1938 partly because he thought his prime minister, Chamberlain, had treated Roosevelt shabbily. Yet he saw Nasser as a “Mussolini” and was plainly determined to avoid any charge of appeasement, even though the essential features of Munich and Suez were wholly different. Instead of saying that those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it, George Santayana might have better said that those who misinterpret the past are condemned to bungle the present.This day in History: Oct 29, 1956: Israel invades Egypt; Suez Crisis begins (coldwarproject2015.weebly.com)Israeli armed forces push into Egypt toward the Suez Canal, initiating the Suez Crisis. They would soon be joined by French and British forces, creating a serious Cold War problem in the Middle East.The catalyst for the joint Israeli-British-French attack on Egypt was the nationalization of the Suez Canal by Egyptian leader General Gamal Abdel Nasser in July 1956. The situation had been brewing for some time. Two years earlier, the Egyptian military had begun pressuring the British to end its military presence (which had been granted in the 1936 Anglo-Egyptian Treaty) in the canal zone. Nasser's armed forces also engaged in sporadic battles with Israeli soldiers along the border between the two nations, and the Egyptian leader did nothing to conceal his antipathy toward the Zionist nation. Supported by Soviet arms and money, and furious with the United States for reneging on a promise to provide funds for construction of the Aswan Dam on the Nile River, Nasser ordered the Suez Canal seized and nationalized.The British were angry with the move and sought the support of France (which believed that Nasser was supporting rebels in the French colony of Algeria), and Israel (which needed little provocation to strike at the enemy on its border), in an armed assault to retake the canal. The Israelis struck first, but were shocked to find that British and French forces did not immediately follow behind them. Instead of a lightening strike by overwhelming force, the attack bogged down. The United Nations quickly passed a resolution calling for a cease-fire.Israeli paratroopers dig in near the Mitla Pass, 31 October 1956Smoke rises from oil tanks beside the Suez Canal hit during the initial Anglo-French assault on Port Said, 5 November 1956.The Soviet Union began to issue ominous threats about coming to Egypt's aid. A dangerous situation developed quickly, one that the Eisenhower administration hoped to defuse before it turned into a Soviet-U.S. confrontation. Though the United States sternly warned the Soviet Union to stay out of the situation, Eisenhower also pressured the British, French, and Israeli governments to withdraw their troops2ème RPC paratroopers patrol in Port Said, October 1956.A British link up between the 3rd Battalion, The Parachute Regiment, and the Commandos at the Coast Guard barracks in Port Said. The paratroopers have with them a captured SU-100 tank destroyer, and the Commandos a Buffalo amphibious assault vehicle.They eventually did so in late 1956 and early 1957.Ibrahim el Awal after its capture by the Israeli NavyStatue of Ferdinand de Lesseps (a Frenchman who built the Suez Canal) was removed following the nationalisation of the Suez Canal in 1956.Israel invades Egypt; Suez Crisis begins - Oct 29, 1956 - HISTORY.comSuez Crisis (military.wikia.com)When Gamal Abdel Nasser was announced new leader of Egypt one of his first action plans is to create the Aswan Dam. Needing help to pay for the creating of the new dam America gave a loan, hoping to spread government support and gain an ally. All seemed smoothed until until the U.S. withdrew their loan due to conflicts with the soviets. Nasser and Egypt were furious and betrayed.Damaged Egyptian equipmentNeeding quick and easy money, Nasser took control of the Suez Canal. A man made passageway from Europe to the middle east or India, 120 miles long and 670 feet wide. Egypt collected money for envisioned Aswan Dam. In their tripartite collusion, Israel attacked first, followed by Britain and France purportedly to separate the combatants. Egypt did not give up without a fight. France and Britain resorted to strategic bombing. The UN halted further advance on the 8th day.THE SUEZ CRISIS (OPERATION MUSKETEER) 1956This event during the cold war was important due to the fact that the U.S. and the Soviet Union for the first time where on equal terms. Both wanted the canal open. 59 years later the canal is open today.The Suez Crisis of 1956 and its aftermath: A Comparative Study of Constitutions, Use of Force, Diplomacy and International Relations (bu.edu)Michael Olsen Historia (eiu.edu)Suez Crisis - Wikipedia

I think you need to step away from the news a bit because, while there still is war in the world, it is being dramatically reduced. We are living in one of the most peaceful times in human history.Seriously. Think about that for a second.Just 30yrs ago, we had wars in Iran/Iraq, Lebanon, southern Africa, Central America and Asia.Now? Not so much. There are no “classic” nation vs nation wars.The following article is from 2011 but is still very much relevant.Think AgainThink Again: WarWorld peace could be closer than you think.By Joshua S. GoldsteinAugust 15, 2011facebooktwittergoogle-plusredditLinkedInemailThink Again: War“The World Is a More Violent Place Than It Used to Be.”No way. The early 21st century seems awash in wars: the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, street battles in Somalia, Islamist insurgencies in Pakistan, massacres in the Congo, genocidal campaigns in Sudan. All in all, regular fighting is taking place in 18 wars around the globe today. Public opinion reflects this sense of an ever more dangerous world: One survey a few years ago found that 60 percent of Americans considered a third world war likely. Expectations for the new century were bleak even before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and their bloody aftermath: Political scientist James G. Blight and former U.S. Defense Secretary Robert McNamara suggested earlier that year that we could look forward to an average of 3 million war deaths per year worldwide in the 21st century.So far they haven’t even been close. In fact, the last decade has seen fewer war deaths than any decade in the past 100 years, based on data compiled by researchers Bethany Lacina and Nils Petter Gleditsch of the Peace Research Institute Oslo. Worldwide, deaths caused directly by war-related violence in the new century have averaged about 55,000 per year, just over half of what they were in the 1990s (100,000 a year), a third of what they were during the Cold War (180,000 a year from 1950 to 1989), and a hundredth of what they were in World War II. If you factor in the growing global population, which has nearly quadrupled in the last century, the decrease is even sharper. Far from being an age of killer anarchy, the 20 years since the Cold War ended have been an era of rapid progress toward peace.Armed conflict has declined in large part because armed conflict has fundamentally changed. Wars between big national armies all but disappeared along with the Cold War, taking with them the most horrific kinds of mass destruction. Today’s asymmetrical guerrilla wars may be intractable and nasty, but they will never produce anything like the siege of Leningrad. The last conflict between two great powers, the Korean War, effectively ended nearly 60 years ago. The last sustained territorial war between two regular armies, Ethiopia and Eritrea, ended a decade ago. Even civil wars, though a persistent evil, are less common than in the past; there were about a quarter fewer in 2007 than in 1990.If the world feels like a more violent place than it actually is, that’s because there’s more information about wars — not more wars themselves. Once-remote battles and war crimes now regularly make it onto our TV and computer screens, and in more or less real time. Cell-phone cameras have turned citizens into reporters in many war zones. Societal norms about what to make of this information have also changed. As Harvard University psychologist Steven Pinker has noted, “The decline of violent behavior has been paralleled by a decline in attitudes that tolerate or glorify violence,” so that we see today’s atrocities — though mild by historical standards — as “signs of how low our behavior can sink, not of how high our standards have risen.”Getty Images“America Is Fighting More Wars Than Ever.”Yes and no. Clearly, the United States has been on a war footing ever since 9/11, with a still-ongoing war in Afghanistan that has surpassed the Vietnam War as the longest conflict in American history and a pre-emptive war in Iraq that proved to be longer, bloodier, and more expensive than anyone expected. Add the current NATO intervention in Libya and drone campaigns in Pakistan, Somalia, and Yemen, and it’s no wonder that U.S. military spending has grown more than 80 percent in real terms over the last decade. At $675 billion this year, it’s now 30 percent higher than what it was at the end of the Cold War.But though the conflicts of the post-9/11 era may be longer than those of past generations, they are also far smaller and less lethal. America’s decade of war since 2001 has killed about 6,000 U.S. service members, compared with 58,000 in Vietnam and 300,000 in World War II. Every life lost to war is one too many, but these deaths have to be seen in context: Last year more Americans died from falling out of bed than in all U.S. wars combined.And the fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan has taken place against a backdrop of base closures and personnel drawdowns elsewhere in the world. The temporary rise in U.S. troop numbers in South Asia and the Middle East, from 18,000 to 212,000 since 2000, contrasts with the permanent withdrawal of almost 40,000 troops from Europe, 34,000 from Japan and South Korea, and 10,000 from Latin America in that period. When U.S. forces come home from the current wars — and they will in large numbers in the near future, starting with 40,000 troops from Iraq and 33,000 from Afghanistan by 2012 — there will be fewer U.S. troops deployed around the world than at any time since the 1930s. President BarackObama was telling the truth in June when he said, “The tide of war is receding.”Getty Images“War Has Gotten More Brutal for Civilians.”Hardly. In February 2010, a NATO airstrike hit a house in Afghanistan’s Marja district, killing at least nine civilians inside. The tragedy drew condemnation and made the news, leading the top NATO commander in the country to apologize to Afghan President Hamid Karzai. The response underscored just how much has changed in war. During World War II, Allied bombers killed hundreds of thousands of civilians in Dresden and Tokyo not by accident, but as a matter of tactics; Germany, of course, murdered civilians by the millions. And when today’s civilians do end up in harm’s way, more people are looking out for them. The humanitarian dollars spent per displaced person rose in real terms from $150 in the early 1990s to $300 in 2006. Total international humanitarian assistance has grown from $2 billion in 1990 to $6 billion in 2000 and (according to donor countries’ claims) $18 billion in 2008. For those caught in the crossfire, war has actually gotten more humane.Yet many people insist that the situation is otherwise. For example, authoritative works on peacekeeping in civil wars (Roland Paris’s award-winning At War’s End and Michael Doyle and Nicholas Sambanis’s Making War and Building Peace), as well as gold-standard reports on conflict from the World Bank and the Carnegie Commission on Preventing Deadly Conflict, tell us that 90 percent of today’s war deaths are civilian while just 10 percent are military — the reverse of a century ago and “a grim indicator of the transformation of armed conflict” in the late 20th century, as political scientist Kalevi Holsti put it.Grim indeed — but, fortunately, untrue. The myth originates with the 1994 U.N. Human Development Report, which misread work that Swedish researcher Christer Ahlström had done in 1991 and accidentally conflated war fatalities in the early 20th century with the much larger number of dead, wounded, and displaced people in the late 20th century. A more careful analysis done in 1989 by peace researcher William Eckhardt shows that the ratio of military to civilian war deaths remains about 50-50, as it has for centuries (though it varies considerably from one war to the next). If you are unlucky enough to be a civilian in a war zone, of course, these statistics are little comfort. But on a worldwide scale, we are making progress in helping civilians afflicted by war.ROBERTO SCHMIDT/AFP/Getty Images“Wars Will Get Worse in the Future.”Probably not. Anything is possible, of course: A full-blown war between India and Pakistan, for instance, could potentially kill millions of people. But so could an asteroid or — perhaps the safest bet — massive storms triggered by climate change. The big forces that push civilization in the direction of cataclysmic conflict, however, are mostly ebbing.Recent technological changes are making war less brutal, not more so. Armed drones now attack targets that in the past would have required an invasion with thousands of heavily armed troops, displacing huge numbers of civilians and destroying valuable property along the way. And improvements in battlefield medicine have made combat less lethal for participants. In the U.S. Army, the chances of dying from a combat injury fell from 30 percent in World War II to 10 percent in Iraq and Afghanistan — though this also means the United States is now seeing a higher proportion of injured veterans who need continuing support and care.Nor do shifts in the global balance of power doom us to a future of perpetual war. While some political scientists argue that an increasingly multipolar world is an increasingly volatile one — that peace is best assured by the predominance of a single hegemonic power, namely the United States — recent geopolitical history suggests otherwise. Relative U.S. power and worldwide conflict have waned in tandem over the past decade. The exceptions to the trend, Iraq and Afghanistan, have been lopsided wars waged by the hegemon, not challenges by up-and-coming new powers. The best precedent for today’s emerging world order may be the 19th-century Concert of Europe, a collaboration of great powers that largely maintained the peace for a century until its breakdown and the bloodbath of World War I.What about China, the most ballyhooed rising military threat of the current era? Beijing is indeed modernizing its armed forces, racking up double-digit rates of growth in military spending, now about $100 billion a year. That is second only to the United States, but it is a distant second: The Pentagon spends nearly $700 billion. Not only is China a very long way from being able to go toe-to-toe with the United States; it’s not clear why it would want to. A military conflict (particularly with its biggest customer and debtor) would impede China’s global trading posture and endanger its prosperity. Since Chairman Mao’s death, China has been hands down the most peaceful great power of its time. For all the recent concern about a newly assertive Chinese navy in disputed international waters, China’s military hasn’t fired a single shot in battle in 25 years.Getty Images“A More Democratic World Will Be a More Peaceful One.”Not necessarily. The well-worn observation that real democracies almost never fight each other is historically correct, but it’s also true that democracies have always been perfectly willing to fight non-democracies. In fact, democracy can heighten conflict by amplifying ethnic and nationalist forces, pushing leaders to appease belligerent sentiment in order to stay in power. Thomas Paine and Immanuel Kant both believed that selfish autocrats caused wars, whereas the common people, who bear the costs, would be loath to fight. But try telling that to the leaders of authoritarian China, who are struggling to hold in check, not inflame, a popular undercurrent of nationalism against Japanese and American historical enemies. Public opinion in tentatively democratic Egypt is far more hostile toward Israel than the authoritarian government of Hosni Mubarak ever was (though being hostile and actually going to war are quite different things).Why then do democracies limit their wars to non-democracies rather than fight each other? Nobody really knows. As the University of Chicago’s Charles Lipson once quipped about the notion of a democratic peace, “We know it works in practice. Now we have to see if it works in theory!” The best explanation is that of political scientists Bruce Russett and John Oneal, who argue that three elements — democracy, economic interdependence (especially trade), and the growth of international organizations — are mutually supportive of each other and of peace within the community of democratic countries. Democratic leaders, then, see themselves as having less to lose in going to war with autocracies.Getty Images“Peacekeeping Doesn’t Work.”It does now. The early 1990s were boom years for the blue helmets, with 15 new U.N. peacekeeping missions launched from 1991 to 1993 — as many as in the U.N.’s entire history up to that point. The period was also host to peacekeeping’s most spectacular failures. In Somalia, the U.N. arrived on a mission to alleviate starvation only to become embroiled in a civil war, and it quickly pulled out after 18 American soldiers died in a 1993 raid. In Rwanda in 1994, a weak U.N. force with no support from the Security Council completely failed to stop a genocide that killed more than half a million people. In Bosnia, the U.N. declared “safe areas” for civilians, but then stood by when Serbian forces overran one such area, Srebrenica, and executed more than 7,000 men and boys. (There were peacekeeping successes, too, such as in Namibia and Mozambique, but people tend to forget about them.)In response, the United Nations commissioned a report in 2000, overseen by veteran diplomat Lakhdar Brahimi, examining how the organization’s efforts had gone wrong. By then the U.N. had scaled back peacekeeping personnel by 80 percent worldwide, but as it expanded again the U.N. adapted to lessons learned. It strengthened planning and logistics capabilities and began deploying more heavily armed forces able to wade into battle if necessary. As a result, the 15 missions and 100,000 U.N. peacekeepers deployed worldwide today are meeting with far greater success than their predecessors.Overall, the presence of peacekeepers has been shown to significantly reduce the likelihood of a war’s reigniting after a cease-fire agreement. In the 1990s, about half of all cease-fires broke down, but in the past decade the figure has dropped to 12 percent. And though the U.N.’s status as a perennial punching bag in American politics suggests otherwise, these efforts are quite popular: In a 2007 survey, 79 percent of Americans favored strengthening the U.N. That’s not to say there isn’t room for improvement — there’s plenty. But the U.N. has done a lot of good around the world in containing war.Getty Images“Some Conflicts Will Never End.”Never say never. In 2005, researchers at the U.S. Institute of Peace characterized 14 wars, from Northern Ireland to Kashmir, as “intractable,” in that they “resist any kind of settlement or resolution.” Six years later, however, a funny thing has happened: All but a few of these wars (Israel-Palestine, Somalia, and Sudan) have either ended or made substantial progress toward doing so. In Sri Lanka, military victory ended the war, though only after a brutal endgame in which both sides are widely believed to have committed war crimes. Kashmir has a fairly stable cease-fire. In Colombia, the war sputters on, financed by drug revenue, but with little fighting left. In the Balkans and Northern Ireland, shaky peace arrangements have become less shaky; it’s hard to imagine either sliding back into full-scale hostilities. In most of the African cases — Burundi, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Uganda, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Ivory Coast (notwithstanding the violent flare-up after elections there in late 2010, now resolved) — U.N. missions have brought stability and made a return to war less likely (or, in the case of Congo and Uganda, have at least limited the area of fighting).Could we do even better? The late peace researcher Randall Forsberg in 1997 foresaw “a world largely without war,” one in which “the vanishing risk of great-power war has opened the door to a previously unimaginable future — a future in which war is no longer socially-sanctioned and is rare, brief, and small in scale.” Clearly, we are not there yet. But over the decades — and indeed, even since Forsberg wrote those words — norms about wars, and especially about the protection of civilians caught up in them, have evolved rapidly, far more so than anyone would have guessed even half a century ago. Similarly rapid shifts in norms preceded the ends of slavery and colonialism, two other scourges that were once also considered permanent features of civilization. So don’t be surprised if the end of war, too, becomes downright thinkable.http://foreignpolicy.com/2011/08/15/think-again-war/