France, Suez, and Israel

John Heelan posted the Encyclopedia Britannica account of the Suez 1956 crisis. 

Istvan Simon comments:  It is mostly accurate except where it says that Britain and France intervened to stop Israel. The Israeli action and France's were coordinated and not an accident. France and Israel were allies then.  It was the United States under President Eisenhower that forced the cease-fire, mostly because he  was then more preoccupied with the Hungarian crisis,  which happened at the same time (the Hungarian revolution was on October 23), and the danger of war with the Soviet Union there.  So the loss of influence that the Encyclopedia refers to is due more  to the United States' actions rather than Israel's, and perhaps the French and British  would be rightly justified in resenting it.

However, it is too bad that France tried to regain their influence by shady deals with Saddam Hussein, and rather  irresponsibly at that. The nuclear reactor in Iraq  was dubbed "OsChirac" for good  reason.  Not that the United States dud not also sin in this respect. The United States is equally guilty of cuddling Saddam when he was at war with Iran.

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