Complexity

I just found out a few /polsters have never heard of the Suez Crisis, an event which pretty well announced the death knell of European states in Africa/the middle East.

Thats not the failing of those people, but it is a scandal that their education never touched on such an epoch defining event.

After this the Euros scuttled from their former colonies under American pressure, the USSR was given a virtual free pass to interfere in the former colonies and Africa went from a potentially steady transition to working states to despotic shitholes.

Heres a potted history of the crisis, but seriously, if you want an idea of how complex geopolitics was in the 50s/60s the Suez is a great place to start.
America stabbed its WW2 allies in the back to appease the USSR, this showed the USSR it could use proxies to fuck over the "west", thus leading directly to Vietnam and the USAs humiliation there.

history.com/topics/cold-war/suez-crisis

>On October 29, 1956, Israeli armed forces pushed into Egypt toward the Suez Canal after Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser (1918-70) nationalized the canal in July of that same year, initiating the Suez Crisis. The Israelis soon were joined by French and British forces, which nearly brought the Soviet Union into the conflict, and damaged their relationships with the United States. In the end, the British, French and Israeli governments withdrew their troops in late 1956 and early 1957.

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onthisday.com/events/date/1956
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>The catalyst for the joint Israeli-British-French attack on Egypt was the nationalization of the Suez Canal by Egyptian leader 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 their 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 countries, 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.
Suez Crisis: 1956-57

>The Israelis struck first, on October 26, 1956. Two days later, British and French military forces joined them. Originally, forces from the three countries were set to strike at once, but the British and French troops were delayed.

>Behind schedule, but ultimately successful, the British and French troops took control of the area around the Suez Canal. However, their hesitation had given the Soviet Union–also confronted with a growing crisis in Hungary–time to respond. The Soviets, eager to exploit Arab nationalism and gain a foothold in the Middle East, supplied arms from Czechoslovakia to the Egyptian government beginning in 1955, and eventually helped Egypt construct the Aswan Dam on the Nile River after the United States refused to support the project. Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev (1894-1971) railed against the invasion and threatened to rain down nuclear missiles on Western Europe if the Israeli-French-British force did not withdraw.

>The response of President Dwight Eisenhower’s administration was measured. It warned the Soviets that reckless talk of nuclear conflict would only make matters worse, and cautioned Khrushchev to refrain from direct intervention in the conflict. However, Eisenhower (1890-1969) also issued stern warnings to the French, British and Israelis to give up their campaign and withdraw from Egyptian soil. Eisenhower was upset with the British, in particular, for not keeping the United States informed about their intentions. The United States threatened all three nations with economic sanctions if they persisted in their attack. The threats did their work. The British and French forces withdrew by December; Israel finally bowed to U.S. pressure in March 1957.

>In the aftermath of the Suez Crisis, Britain and France found their influence as world powers weakened.

And heres some of the things going on in the background.
onthisday.com/events/date/1956

Jan 1 Sudan (Anglo-Egyptian Sudan) declares independence from Egypt & UK
Jan 2 Poujadists/communists win French parliamentary elections
Jan 16 Egyptian pres Nasser pledges to reconquer Palestine
Jan 18 German Democratic Republic (East Germany) forms own army (National People's Army)
Feb 6 French premier Guy Mollet pelted with tomatoes in Algiers
Feb 11 British diplomats Guy Burgess and Donald Maclean deny working as spies for Soviet Russia after reappearing in the Soviet Union after going missing 5 years earlier
Feb 29 Islamic Republic forms in Pakistan
Mar 2 Morocco tears up the Treaty of Fez, declares independence from France
Mar 3 Morocco gains independence from France (Anniversary of throne)
Mar 20 Tunisia gains independence from France
Mar 20 USSR performs nuclear test
Mar 23 Sudan becomes independent
Mar 27 French commandos land in Algeria
Apr 7 Spain relinquishes her protectorate in Morocco
Apr 11 French government decides to send 200,000 reservists to Algeria
Apr 18 Egypt & Israel agree to a cease fire
Apr 28 Last French troop leave Vietnam
May 7 Battle at Oran, Algeria, kills 300

May 10 French government sends 50,000 reservists to Algeria
May 16 Egypt recognizes People's Republic of China
May 27 French raid in Algiers
Jun 13 After 72 years, Britain gives up Suez Canal to Egyptian control
Jun 18 Last of foreign troops leaves Egypt as British leave Suez Canal
Jul 5 France raises tobacco tax 20% due to war in Algeria
Jul 10 650,000 US steel workers go on strike
Jul 10 Solomon Kalushi Mahlangu, Mamelodi, east of Pretoria, South Africa, a soldier of Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK), the armed wing of the ANC
Jul 19 US refuse to lend Egypt money to build Aswan Dam
Jul 20 France recognizes Tunisian independence
Jul 20 Great Britain refuses to lend Egypt money to build Aswan Dam
Jul 25 Jordan attacks UN Palestine force
Jul 26 Egypt seizes the Suez Canal
Aug 4 Indonesia says it will not pay debts to the Netherlands
Aug 7 British government sends 3 aircraft carriers to Egypt
Aug 29 French government routes troops to Cyprus near Suez crisis

Sep 9 African Party for Liberation of Guinea-Bissau & Cape Verde forms
Oct 22 France intercept Moroccan plane, arrest Ben Bella
Oct 23 Thousands of Hungarians protest against the government and Soviet occupation. (The Hungarian Revolution is crushed on November 4).
Oct 24 Soviet troops invade Hungary, Imre Nagy becomes PM of Hungary
Oct 26 Vietnam promulgates its constitution
Oct 29 International zone of Tangier returns to Morocco
Oct 29 Israeli paratroopers drop into Sinai to open Straits of Tiran
Oct 30 Israel captures Egyptian military post at El-Thamad
Oct 31 Britain & France begin to bomb Egypt to reopen Suez Canal
Nov 2 Hungary appeals for UN assistance against Soviet invasion
Nov 4 200,000 Russian troops attack anti-Soviet movement in Budapest, Hungary
Nov 4 Israel captures Straits of Tiran & reach Suez Canal Egypt
Nov 5 Britain & France land forces in Egypt in reaction to seizure of Suez Canal
Nov 5 Israel liberates Sharm-el-Sheikh, reopening Gulf of Aqaba
Nov 18 Morocco gains independence
Nov 27 F Goodrich and A Hackett's "Diary of Anne Frank" premieres in Netherlands
Dec 3 Bitain and France pull troops out of Egypt
Dec 6 Nelson Mandela & 156 others arrested for political activities in S Africa
Dec 12 Commencement of the Irish Republican Army's Border Campaign.
Dec 15 Emergency crisis in North Ireland proclaimed after IRA strikes
Dec 18 Israeli flag hoisted on Mount Sinai
Dec 22 Last British & French troops leave Egypt
Dec 24 Ferdinand de Lesseps statue blown up in Port Said Egypt

Thats it, ok nobody's interested.
Hope someone liked it.

I wrote about it for an assignment last year, got highest grades. It really was the final nail in the coffin for the old colonial empires.

thanks for the history
also points out the Israel has always been the first to attack and interfere.

And the role the UN played was basically to slurp Nassers ballsack and support every separatist movement going around.

We did sort of mention it as a footnote since we focused on Romania. But what was worse here is the lack of mention of Romanian relations outside of Europe do to the Crissis.

I can understand Romanian education not mentioning it a lot, that whole period would be a nightmare to teach without getting someones nose out of joint.

The thing is following our support in ruining the Hungarian revolution and do to still good ties with most of the Western world. We used the situation to build a merchentile fleet that required no escort and got into Africa the same way China is now. We bought tons of crude oil for cheep and refined it back home as well as selling tools and food stuff to nations that couldn't make them, as well as small and medium arms.

That was the Arabs big win, because the west sat back as their oil supplies were stolen by sand niggers who then nearly choked the west to death with restricted supplies.

The early cold war was a lot closer to a USSR victory than is taught today.

After that, France decided to step up their nuclear program to have an independent nuclear deterrent in order to not depend upon the whims of Washington DC.

Huge repercussions, I also believe there was an attempted military coup over the handling of the Algerian crisis. Small and crushed but a pretty big deal in France.

Because early USSR was led by pragmatists that wanted to win. To the point that colectivization in EE was made to give USSR more food as to prevent starvation.

They were so incredibly good at fucking over the "west" for relatively small outlays of resources. IRA, PLO, Red Brigades etc all caused massive grief, yet they couldnt provide their population with enough food/consumer goods to stop collapse.

You could spend your life trying to work out why and get nowhere i think.

>IRA

Did USSR pay paddy?

There were 2 attempted coups in fact.
One in 1958 which ultimately wasnt fully carried out because the government accepted to call De Gaulle to power before the paratroopers which had already seized Corsica could come, and it was successful.
Second one in 1962, where basically the same was attempted but De Gaulle wouldnt budge this time.
But Suez crisis was basically the seminal act of French nuclear deterrence. It showed that the US nuclear umbrella wasnt compatible with independent foreign policy.

Wouldnt be surprising, they had their hands everywhere.

More reason to hate the Irish.

Why are the British Isles full of shitheads?

Only OK people are the Welsh and Cornish.

I think it was the second on I heard of, cant recall reading about the first.
France was damn near openly Communist at one stage wasnt it?

Yes, most of the explosives and much of the weaponry was supplied from Eastern Europe USSR satellites. Just enough deniability for the USSR.
Lot of the funding was US based though, with the fucking Kennedys involved neck deep.

>US and USSR banding up to prevent any other power to raise to their level

It makes a lot of sense.

>France was damn near openly Communist at one stage wasnt it?
Commie support was at its highest in the immediate afgermath of WWII, though they never managed to seize power.

Weren't some 40%of French mayors openly commies?

Was De Gaulle as much a POS as the Socialists say he was?