The Eisenhower By the early s, American oil consumption—in the form of gasoline and other products—was rising even as domestic oil production was declining, leading to an increasing dependence on oil imported from abroad.
Despite this, Americans worried little about a dwindling supply or a On October 6, , hoping to win back territory lost to Israel during the third Arab-Israeli war, in , Egyptian and Syrian forces launched a coordinated attack against Israel on Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar. Taking the Israeli Defense Forces by Its origins date back to ancient Egypt. The modern Suez Canal is only the most recent of several manmade waterways that once snaked their way across Egypt.
Following years of diplomatic friction and skirmishes between Israel and its neighbors, Israel Defense Forces launched preemptive air strikes that Live TV. This Day In History. History Vault. Where Is the Suez Canal?
Suez Crisis: The Israelis struck first on October 29, Recommended for you. How the Troubles Began in Northern Ireland. British Reaction to Suez Canal Crisis. Adlai Stevenson on Crisis in the Congo. What Was the Suez Crisis? Eisenhower Doctrine On January 5, , in response to the increasingly tense situation in the Middle East, President Dwight Eisenhower delivered a proposal to a joint session of the U. Energy Crisis s By the early s, American oil consumption—in the form of gasoline and other products—was rising even as domestic oil production was declining, leading to an increasing dependence on oil imported from abroad.
The passageway hosts nearly 19, vessels each year. The time saved by the passage is almost invaluable. Today, a ship traveling from a port in Italy to India, for instance, would cover around 4, nautical miles if it passed through the Suez Canal -- a journey that, at a speed of 20 knots, would take about nine days. But the second-quickest way to complete that same journey would be via the Cape of Good Hope and around Africa.
At the same speed, it would take three weeks to traverse the route, which is 10, nautical miles long. Adding to its importance is that there are no alternatives to the Suez; were it not for the Red Sea stretching up above the Horn of Africa and along Sudan and Egypt, no land masses would be narrow enough to support an artificial waterway that links Europe with the Asia-Pacific. The canal's strategically important position now means it hosts nearly 19, vessels each year, according to Lloyd's List, a shipping industry journal.
What is its history? A passageway connecting the Mediterranean and Red Seas had been longed for by nation states for centuries, and the canal's importance was clear long before construction began.
Instigated by French interests and exploration, the Suez was built over the course of 10 years by local peasants drafted and forced into labor, and European workers who later joined the effort. Suez Canal traffic jam blocks the world's jugular vein. Financial troubles forced the Ottoman governor of Egypt to sell a controlling stake in the waterway to Britain in ; 13 years later, a multinational summit resulted in an agreement that the canal would be free for all countries to use, both in peace and war.
While the significance of the crisis was once accepted as conventional wisdom, in recent years historians have promoted more sophisticated and nuanced perspectives. Both of these trends had actually started long before , and would likely have unfolded with or without the spark of Suez. Britain had been severely weakened economically by the Second World War, relying heavily on American loans in the decade that followed.
With domestic economic pressures mounting throughout the s, it was inevitable that both the size of the armed forces and the scale of overseas commitments would be drastically scaled down in the s. Decolonisation and the end of empire was also underway well before , given the high costs of maintaining colonial territories and the mounting political pressures and nationalist movements inside Africa.
Many officials thus came to favour a fast and orderly transfer of power to friendly post-colonial governments, before the Soviet Union penetrated the continent. Furthermore, the fallout from Suez did not mark an immediate collapse of British imperial power and prestige.
The UK gradually disengaged from the Middle East after handing over many commitments to the United States , but continued to staunchly defend her oil interests in the region. From these broader historical perspectives, the impact and significance of the Suez Crisis appears to have been overstated.
If the Suez Crisis was not the critical watershed moment it has often been depicted as, why does it continue to be so vividly remembered six decades later?
The episode was undoubtedly dramatic, with a story worthy of the most exciting political thriller. The attempt to seize back the canal was a failed attempt to reassert European strength and colonial power at a time when the world was undergoing fundamental change, shifting to a new world order constituted of independent post-imperial states and organised around the poles of the competing Cold War superpowers.
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