What can rivers bring? Delicious fish and shrimp, fertile soil, endless fertile fields, merchant ships full of goods … most rivers are rich. As early as thousands of years ago, mankind had the ambition of digging rivers, hoping to use the Tangtang River to visit Wan Li every day and take shortcuts, so that troops or trade materials in battle can reach their destinations as soon as possible and bring wealth. Among the canals all over the world, the Panama Canal connecting the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean and the Suez Canal connecting the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea are the most famous.
In the 19th century BC, Senuslert III, the 12th dynasty of Egypt, wanted to build a canal connecting the Red Sea and the Nile. This huge project lasted on and off for many years, and it was not completed until the Persian Empire came to Egypt. Subsequently, due to the retreat of the Red Sea and the diversion of the Nile, the Pharaoh Canal gradually disappeared from the ground. The Venetians and Napoleon of France tried to repair the canal, but failed. It was not until 1858 that the French emperor Charles Louis Napolé on Bonaparte put this plan into practice. Thousands of Egyptians have been walking along the Asian-African border with sediment for ten years. In 1869, the 163-kilometer Suez Canal was finally opened.
The opening of the direct canal between Europe and Asia has indeed brought immeasurable wealth, but it has also accelerated the looting between regions. From the end of 19th century to the beginning of 20th century, most of the income of Suez Canal was collected by Britain and France, and all kinds of raw materials from Asia were transported to Europe at an accelerated pace. After the opening of oil trade, the Suez Canal has become an important gateway to the global economy, continuously transporting oil to Europe and America (and later East Asia). With less human intervention, rivers bring prosperity and corresponding disasters to the places they pass. However, when human influence is too great, the gift and tyranny of rivers no longer follow this logic. The unequal international political and economic order and the expanding consumer society will transfer the interests of rivers to the leading countries of this order, and the local canals will suffer disasters.
Yesterday, the cargo ship “Ever Given” stranded in the Suez Canal for nearly a week finally righted its hull and resumed its normal course, which means that the traffic in the Suez Canal is expected to restore order. In the past week, this usually silent canal suddenly became the global focus, and freight and oil prices followed suit. Humans naturally enjoy the convenience brought by the canal. Only when the canal is blocked will they think of the appearance of the earth and the overlapping and intertwined networks. The traffic jam was near misses, and people may soon forget it, but the daily life on the Suez Canal is far more thrilling than we thought, because it is a gathering place of many forces and affects the economy and people’s livelihood all over the world. In 1950s, Egyptian revolutionary leader gamal abdel nasser advocated the nationalization of Suez Canal under the wave of nationalism. Britain and France invaded Egypt for the canal. During the war, about 49 large obstacles fell off the canal and blocked the river, which seriously threatened the British national economy. The United States and the Soviet Union also participated in this competition with different intentions. The following excerpts review the history of the Suez Canal crisis, and we hope to think with readers about what continues to happen in the canal after this storm.
On March 29th, 2021, local time, in Suez, Egypt, the cargo ship Changci, which ran aground in the Suez Canal a few days ago, began to move with the efforts of the rescue team. Sputnik News Agency & Radio quoted a source as saying on the 29th that the Suez Canal is expected to resume navigation within a few hours after the cargo ship “Changci” became shallow. Source: vision china.
This book is excerpted from the book The Silk Road: A Brand-new World History written by British historian Peter Franco Pan, and published with the authorization of Zhejiang University Press.
American ambitions for the Arab world (excerpt)
Text | [English] Translated by Peter Frank Pan | Shao Xudong and Sun Fang
At the end of 1954, Afghan leaders cautiously asked the United States for assistance and equipment, but they were rejected by the State Council. Prince Naeem, the brother of the Afghan Prime Minister, was told that Afghanistan should focus on its own doorstep, such as resolving its border dispute with Pakistan, instead of seeking arms assistance. This clumsy answer is to show support for the Karachi regime in Pakistan, which a defense official recently called “of global strategic significance”.
Shortly after the news came back to Kabul, the Soviets stepped in to provide military equipment and development funds. This proposal was quickly accepted by Afghanistan. The Soviets allocated up to $10 million for the first time, and then provided other support to help Afghanistan build bridges, upgrade communication facilities and expand the road system, including the road between Kandahar and Herat. Money and experts from Moscow were also used to build the 1.7-mile Salang Tunnel, which was located on the road leading to Central Asia under Soviet rule. This road, which symbolizes the friendship between the Soviet Union and Afghanistan, became the most important supply line of the Soviet Union when it invaded Afghanistan in the 1980s. Ironically, it is also a key transportation route to bring the motorcade of the United States and its allies into Afghanistan in the early 21st century. This road was originally built to strengthen Afghanistan’s strength against the West, but later it became the core artery to help the West rebuild Afghanistan according to its own interests.
This is undoubtedly a cold lesson. However, a few months later, a similar incident happened again, and it was more dramatic. At the end of 1955, gamal abdel nasser, a revolutionary who overthrew the rule of King Farouk with the help of the CIA, also wanted to seek military assistance from Moscow. This surprised the Americans and immediately expressed their willingness to cooperate with Britain and the World Bank to provide funds for the construction of the Aswan Dam. Washington held several high-level consultations with London to discuss how to continue to appease Nasser. The result of the discussion was a promise to provide weapons to Egypt and pressure Israel to agree to sign a treaty with Egypt, hoping to improve the increasingly tense relations between the two countries.
In fact, it was the Baghdad treaty that annoyed Nasser. He believes that the treaty hinders the unity of the Arab world and provides a tool for westerners to maintain their position in the region. If western funds and aid can be put in place immediately, he may not be so grumpy, at least not in the short term. However, because US lawmakers are worried that the construction of the dam will lead to a substantial increase in Egypt’s cotton production, which will lead to a drop in prices and affect the interests of American farmers, the investment commitment was finally cancelled. This selfishness is fatal and has become the last straw to crush the relationship between the United States and Egypt.
Nasser is a master of political adventure. British Prime Minister Anthony Eden once said that he was bent on “becoming Napoleon of Arabia”. Now, he decided to escalate the situation. In the spring of 1956, the British Foreign Secretary arrogantly commented that the Suez Canal is an inseparable part of the Middle East oil system and is of vital importance to Britain’s interests. In this regard, Nasser sharply retorted: If so, Egypt should share the profits of the canal, just as oil exporting countries share the income from oil. He knows very well that westerners will protect their assets at all costs, but in the long run, the nationalization of the canal will definitely bring great benefits to Egypt.
When Americans began to calculate what impact the canal closure would have on oil prices, the British leadership was already in an atmosphere of pessimism and disappointment. “The fact is that we are in a dilemma. Harold Macmillan, the well-received and popular British Chancellor of the Exchequer, wrote, “If we take tough measures against Egypt, the canal will be closed, the oil pipeline to the Levant will be cut off, there will be rebellion in the Persian Gulf, and oil production will stagnate, so Britain and Western Europe will have no hope. On the other hand, if westerners do nothing, Nasser will win easily, which will have disastrous consequences elsewhere: all countries in the Middle East will follow suit and nationalize the oil industry.
Nasser inherited Mossad’s mantle and started again where he fell. Western diplomats, politicians and intelligence personnel began to consider taking joint action against these leaders who violated western interests. Not long after, Britain began to look for “ways and means to overthrow the regime”: a senior diplomat in London pointed out that “we must get rid of Nasser”; Prime Minister Anthony Eden believes that Nasser should not only be overthrown, but also be killed. After several rounds of diplomatic discussions failed, Britain and France thought it necessary to show the strength of the West, so as to impress the leaders in the Middle East. Anyone who dares to resist the will of the West will be directly hit.
At the end of October 1956, military operations against Egypt began. British and French troops went to protect the canal area, while their Israeli allies launched a deep attack on the Sinai Peninsula to help protect the Suez Canal and put maximum pressure on Nasser. However, the invasion soon failed completely. The Suez Canal was completely blocked after Egyptian ships, barges and maintenance ships sank into the waterway and blew up the movable railway bridge in Herverie Dan, north of Ismaila. There are about 49 similar obstacles, and their impact is much more serious than closing the canal. At that time, it was reported: “This caused a serious fault in the normal circulation of commodities. “the amount of oil shipped to western Europe has fallen sharply.
The consequences are far more than that. According to the judgment of the CIA, the price of “many basic commodities in world trade” is bound to rise, and the free world that relies on the Suez Canal economically is likely to “have a fairly high unemployment rate” and the Soviets will also feel the pressure. Due to the closure of the Suez Canal, their ships trading with the Far East had to sail 7000 miles around Africa to return to their home port in the Black Sea. Americans noticed that Moscow began to transport basic necessities through railway lines across Asia, which made the importance of these railways increase rapidly.
Nasser (middle) and Khrushchev (right)
Although they realized that the situation in Egypt was getting increasingly tense, the outbreak of military action surprised the Eisenhower administration because the United States was not consulted about this invasion plan. The president was very angry about this and criticized the British Prime Minister mercilessly in private. The use of force in the Canal Zone is undoubtedly a public opinion disaster for a country that claims to be a defender of the “free world”, which is no different from the Soviet Union’s action of tanks passing through the streets of Budapest to suppress a large-scale uprising in Hungary. However, the Suez action finally brought a different result: the United States inherited the status of a western power in the 20th century, and now it has to choose between the oil countries in the West and the Middle East-the American answer is the latter.
President Eisenhower explained, “We can’t make Arabs angry with us. If they get angry, the oil supply in the Middle East will decline as a whole, because the canal will be closed and oil production may stop, and other countries in the region with natural sympathy for Egypt’s unbridled intimidation will also impose an oil embargo. “As long as the Middle East refuses to provide oil to Britain for one or two years, our gold reserves will no longer exist. Without gold reserves, the pound area will fall apart. Once the pound area collapses, we don’t have any reserves … I doubt whether we can afford the minimum defense expenditure. And if a country has no national defense, it will go to extinction. “This is bound to be a bad ending. “Even so,” Eisenhower himself admitted privately, “we can’t stand by and watch the fuel and financial difficulties facing Western Europe.” However, as he said in a letter to Lord Ismay, the first NATO Secretary-General, everything should be done “without angering the Arab world”.
Britain and France are in trouble. Although Washington designed a plan to transport oil from the United States to Western Europe, in order to solve the Egyptian problem, the plan was deliberately shelved. Predicted that Britain’s economy would collapse in 1939, the currency group centered on the pound formed by Britain and some countries would depreciate sharply, and London was forced to seek financial assistance from the International Monetary Fund (IMF)-only 40 years later, Britain was reduced from a world hegemon to a beggar. The International Monetary Fund flatly rejected Britain’s request. What is even more shameful is that the troops sent to Egypt to compete for the Suez Canal, the most precious gem in western Europe, have now withdrawn before completing their tasks. The global media are paying attention to the withdrawal of British troops, which indicates that the world has changed: India was abandoned, Iranian oil fields were out of British control, and now it is the Suez Canal. The resignation of Prime Minister Anthony Eden in 1957 was just another episode at the end of imperial decline.
On the other hand, when the United States entered the roof of Asia, it was deeply aware of its new responsibilities. It must be careful. The Suez Canal crisis is a warning. Britain’s prestige and influence have collapsed, which shows that the plan to prevent the Soviet Union from expanding southward is likely to “completely fail because of the penetration and success of communism in the Middle East”, President Eisenhower wrote at the end of 1956.
In addition, the abortion of military operations has rekindled anti-western sentiment throughout the Middle East. The news that Nasser summoned up his courage and finally defeated the western military pressure greatly encouraged the nationalist agitators in the region. With the vigorous promotion of the Egyptian leadership, Arab nationalism began to sprout, and the idea of unifying all Arabs into one country also spread. This voice of unity will enable them to strike a balance between the western group and the Soviet camp.
In fact, before Nasser’s adventure policy was successful, some shrewd observers had foreseen such an outcome. Roy Henderson, the American ambassador to Tehran, knows this region better than any other American. He believes that the voice of nationalism will become clearer and stronger. In 1953, he wrote: “In the future, countries in the Middle East … will get together to discuss policies. Nasser is the leader of this trend.