Andrew McCarthy
Sarah Paradoski
Lupe Ramsey
Global Energy Crises—Summer 2007
Yergin, Chapter 24: The Suez Crisis
1869
 Suez Canal completed by Ferdinand de Lesseps’ Suez Canal Company
 What was once an 11,000 mile journey for ships is now 6,500 mile trip
1875
 Egypt’s 44 percent ownership of the Canal came up for purchase and with the
assistance of the Rothschild family was immediately bought by the British
government under the direction of Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli
1947
 Most of the United Kingdom’s territories such as India gain independence by this
time effectively shifting the canal’s original purpose of defending India to one
centered on the transportation of petroleum
1952
 A group of military officers successfully ousted the Egyptian King
1954
 Col. Gamal Abdel Nasser topples the original military government led by General
Mohammed Naguib and begins his ultra-nationalist, pan-Arabist diatribes against
the West and particularly the British for their continued control of Egypt’s canal,
not due to expire until 1968
 British Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden negotiates a deal with Nasser whereby
Britain agreed to withdraw its troops from the canal zone within 20 months
1955
 Later that year, the Americans, British, and the World Bank consider a massive
loan to Egypt to build a dam on the Nile
 The West learns that Nasser solicited weapons from the USSR in addition to
Nasser’s friendly relations with “Red China.” American Senators and Israeli
leaders alike begin to pull support for the dam for their own reasons
 Washington instead decides to support Tito of Yugoslavia over Nasser
1956
 20th anniversary of Hitler’s remilitarization of the Rhineland
 Eisenhower is up for reelection this year—was running on a ticket of peace so any
hope of the Americans engaging Nasser militarily should have been dispensed
with by the British and French—Unfortunately they did not factor this into their
plans
 June: the last British troops leave canal zone
 Early July: Dulles officially pulls the funding of the Aswan Dam loan surprising
Nasser
 July 26: Nasser nationalizes the Suez Canal
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September: Eisenhower sends a wealthy Texas oil man, Robert Anderson, to
Saudi Arabia to push the Saudis into pressuring Nasser to compromise—his
warning: the US will move away from oil toward nuclear energy—King Saud
dismissed the warning
October: French and British pilots responsible for guiding ships through the canal
zone are withdrawn which they thought would leave the “ill-trained” Egyptians
unable to run the canal—they were wrong
October 24: British, French, and Israeli officials secretly meet in France to discuss
a military plan: Israel occupies the Sinai while Britain and France issue an
ultimatum to Nasser—if Nasser refused, the British and French would invade the
canal zone
October 29: Israel launches its attack on the Sinai
October 31: after refusing Britain and France’s ultimatum, British and French
forces bomb Egyptian positions and invade—infuriates Eisenhower
November 6: Eisenhower wins a landslide victory over Adlai Stevenson—
demands the British, French, and Israelis withdraw threatening a US oil embargo
of Europe
Saudi Arabia institutes an oil embargo against Britain and France
November 7: Britain announces that domestic oil consumption to be cut by 10
percent
Early December: Oil Lift bailout program commences
Organization for European Economic Cooperation (OECD) creates the Petroleum
Emergency Group to equitably allocate American and European oil supplies
among European nations—but the Texas Railroad Commission decides not to
allow higher production because price worries thereby exacerbating Europe’s
situation
1957
 Spring: by this time companies cede to political pressure and increase oil
production making the Oil Lift successful—helped by the fact that Europe was
still largely a coal-based economy (oil accounted for only 20 percent of energy
consumption on the continent)
 March: Bermuda Conference—to ameliorate the strained relationship between the
US and Britain
 April: the US suspends the emergency Oil Lift program
 mid-May: British government abolishes gasoline rationing and then reluctantly
directs British ships to use the Suez Canal
 January: Prime Minister Anthony Eden resigns—his reputation forever marred by
Nasser’s victory
British Prime Minister Anthony Eden is remembered as “the last prime minister to
believe Britain was a great power and the first to confront a crisis which proved she was
not” (Yergin, 496).