The Canal - Nationalization - Anniversary.

[Hafiz]

Its odd that the Egyptian media doesn't mention the 60th anniversary of one of the most important events in modern Egyptian History - the nationalization of the canal. The fact that the canal has not been going well of late, after its 10's of billions of development, might be a reason to be quiet.

I can't think of any asset that has caused so much conflict or misery. First time round the kdeive couldn't pay for its debts and had to hand over the government (at the point of a gun) of Egypt from 1882 to the French and English to pay for it. The economic pillage of Egypt followed.

Everyone knows that the nationalization in 1956 was done to fund the dam and that it led, in a much more direct way than any chaos Tony Blair did in Iraq, to the Franco-English-Israeli invasion.

The UN had provided for nationalization and the dreadful Nassr agreed to pay full compensation. So what was the problem either legal or financial?

This was not enough and the former imperial powers wanted control again. Indeed the English army had never left.

As the war turned out the US required that they should all go home and this is one of the high points of US diplomacy and the cause of French, English and Israeli shame. It was a good time.

The BBC version - entirely sanitized - is at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/date ... 701603.stm.

What it chooses to omit, but a recent BBC drama pointed out, was that the Israeli (pre-planned with the others) invasion was to be 'defeated' by the French and English. They had all worked it out before. The Israeli's would attack and France and England would save Egypt by occupying the canal. The major effect would be that the former imperial powers would be back in control in Egypt with a couple of hundred thousand troops on the canal and east of Alex. With such military power in Egypt and controlling their major economic asset a government in Cairo by Egyptians would be a (French) farce.

The French and English lied to their own people about all of it. They said they had been inspired on the spur of the moment to save Egypt from Israel.

Thank god their silly game was exposed and thank god both French and English governments fell because of their lies.

Australia has a particularly shameful role in this whole fiasco but we comfort ourselves that our current historical consensus, unlike others, is that our imperialist Prime Minister, who was sent to negotiate, was one of our worst and little more than an English lickspittle. He was. His reputation on this and other matters is irremediable. Unlike the hapless English PM who organized all this (and who was rewarded for his disgrace with an hereditary earldom) not even his current political supporters will talk aloud about him. His whole approach to empire, in this matter and others, is a national shame and embarrassment. Only the US came out of this with any integrity.

Others have yet to make a full confession. Maybe 60 years on should give the English and French the clean air to unburden themselves. I doubt it.

[newcastle]

Not the finest hour in the history of Great Britain.....




......but at least WE have a history to look back on

[Hafiz]

Newcastle - not sure of the connection. Barry and Suez. Could this be, not that you would ever do it, muck throwing of anything remotely relevant from some obscure cupboard to attack an unwanted argument. If you have an objection to my (admittedly simplistic and extreme) view on Suez then I'm all ears. What could this all mean.

'But at least we have a history to look back on' - what could this mean. For example does this mean that all Greeks and Egyptians will always glow, to the end of time, with the (unearned) benefit of past achievements. On this basis Kenya, the cradle of human development, should have your undivided worship. Lots of freeloaders in this argument of yours.

Barry is not popular in this country and one of the reasons for this is that he left, prostrate alcoholic, almost 50 years ago to make his fortune in the UK deriding his country of birth to the amusement of London metropoles who needed reassurance of their cultural superiority. The whole point of his comedy is that we are vulgar and coarse. He has succeeded in his objectives - particularly the denigration of the left, Catholics, Irish, the working class etc. - anything other than the ruling classes he aspired to but was excluded from. All to be expected from someone who as a boy and young man had a slim hold on the establishment respectability he craved. He went to the poshest school but was never of that class he aspired to and was told that in no uncertain terms.

A particularly gross moment in his later public life was a TV interview where he extolled, at length, the virtues of Prince Charles (a loudly announced close personal friend) and the prince's 'lady' wife. It was cringe-worthy, lick spittle. Exactly what you would expect from an old drunk who has spent his life crawling up a London greasy pole to compensate for a youth where he never fitted in.

Its a lesson to us all. Sucking up to our 'betters' is always unhealthy. Its also unhygienic.

For my part, and based on a personal experience, I remember a room named after him being opened by him at my University. He was prepared for the honor of opening a room in his name. He fell over, vomited and had to be removed but not before he derided the university from which he had flunked decades before. Anger and self loathing, but very popular in some elevated circles.

[newcastle]

" I remember a room named after him being opened by him at my University. He was prepared for the honor of opening a room in his name. He fell over, vomited and had to be removed but not before he derided the university from which he had flunked decades before."

Very much the archetypal Aussie then

We all have our crosses to bear.

We have a sordid history of colonising the world (although I bet some of our African former subjects wish we hadn't set them free!)....you have Dame Edna ( or Sir Les Patterson if you prefer!)

But the thing about history, as you'll have noticed, is that it's in the past. We learn from it (hopefully), get over it and move on.

Far better to judge a person, or a nation, by it's current activities. I mean, we don't go around stuffing kids up chimneys any more...... nor tear-gas them in our police stations

[Hafiz]

Sorry Newcastle - I misquoted you.

You said 'but at least WE have a history to look back on.'

Maybe you make the point better, and more economically, than I ever could.

Don't look back too far for too long - you might fall over trying to walk forward. Not that this would ever happen to you in the 'forward' moving regions of coastal Egypt.

[Hafiz]

"tear gas them in police stations" thank you Newcastle for giving me an 'in'. I read your posts to their very last phrase/thorn.

A point about your accuracy - they weren't police stations - they were 'youth detention facilities' - kids prisons. Appalling. but they were convicted criminals not detainees. Many of them with appalling long term criminal histories. None of which justifies abu graib type treatment. Unlike the UK we do not have detention without charge, trial and conviction. Thank God we have stuck to Magna Carta. Others have not.

As you well know - the issue is not the ill you do - its all about how you deal with it. The Minister has been fired (he is awaiting an ennoblement - apparently Prince Charles is considering a grant of the Duke of Darwin as an exit strategy) . A Royal Commission has been called - all papers and all persons and all in public- no protection against self incrimination - a full criminal investigation (not a Chilcot). A proper judge, not a semi-retired bureaucrat, to investigate

Its dreadful - the only moral question is what happens next. An election in the Territory is immanent and all responsible for current problems will lose their jobs. A good thing. There will be no subsequent jobs in the City for them.

You have Wales - an acute embarrassment - we have the Northern Territory - six times the size of the UK with a red-necked population smaller, but less liberal, than Brighton. We give them self government and they behave as themselves. Awful.

'Nice' debating point - but a bit cheap.

[Who2]

Whatever the outcome, the Egyptian Government still have 'unpaid annual bills to pay us.
We still bill them annually and they must pay Mr's Queens' government.
I mean my landlord soon gets on my case if I owe them monies..
Ps: "Everyone must pay the piper!

[newcastle]

What's with this "my country is better than yours" dialogue we seems to be having Hafiz?

Personally.....I don't give a sh*t about the cruelties of earlier generations of Brits...any more than I care about the transgressions of earlier generations of Aussies.

It's getting boring.

Let's find something more relevant (preferably about Egypt) to bicker & score points over

[Horus]

When people spout all this oppression crap they usually forget one vital point and that is, the very people who oppressed your ancestors and any other nationalities all over the world were doing exactly the same to my ancestors and all mine are English. As Newcastle says, it was so far back in history so as not be be related to us today, in the same way you cannot hold every German responsible for what Hitler did back then, so I absolutely refuse to apologise to anyone or any country for the land I live in today, it is no better and certainly no worse than many I could name.

[Hafiz]

Well - I couldn't agree more with you about future posts. It should not be about us. Except when it is made so. You opened the door.

Odd you should say this given the post was about Suez - which is at the very center of modern Egyptian history. What could be more Egyptian. The post was not about house prices in Ramla or the coast. If it had been then your argument about self reference would have been well made.

But what did I say which was about - 'mine was better than yours'. I never said that, nor could any reasonable person imply, that I thought that we had not done well. A confession rather than a celebration. Not better than yours - in fact no comparisons at all. Our role in Suez was awful as I said. Your interpretation is unexpected and unusual.

In the most recent post did I mention or imply 'the cruelties of earlier generations of Brits'. Really. I say lots of things but not that. Well I do, but not on this particular occasion with anything like those words.

You opened the door - a door you now want closed. Fine by me. Close the door. I am all for sticking to Egyptian themes - like Suez.

[newcastle]

.....no, I'm not taking the bait. Enough already.

[Hafiz]

Good - all friends - all agreed (maybe? - up to you) we have said too much and at too much length (me).