Conclusions: British Strategy and Intelligence at Suez, a Special but Fragile Relationship

Abstract

The Suez Crisis has entered the vault of British strategic and political history as one of the most notorious episodes of the twentieth century. Its controversy has only since been matched by the venture of Tony Blair’s government into Iraq in 2003, and its parallels to Iraq have been noted in terms of political leadership,¹ as well as in the use of Suez analogies to warn against the Iraq venture.² And while Michael Oren was correct to label Suez as a ‘crisis for all seasons’,³ the broad direction of Suez historiography has largely been conditioned towards considering only those aspects that proved most controversial—the decision to use force, and the collusion conspiracy to provide a pretext for that use of force.