SIR ANTHONY EDEN AND DELUSION OF GRANDEUR: IRANIAN OIL CRISIS EXPOSED BRITISH WEAKNESS: SUEZ WAS ONLY AN UNDERLINE THAT BRITAIN COULD NOT ACT MILITARILY WITHOUT AMERICAN CONCURRENCE.
The British side had in effect to buy American agreement to come to the rescue of British Petroleum (then the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company) in its struggle with the Musaddiq government.¹ According to Sir Anthony Eden, it was not until he:
Proposed American participation in a new oil consortium that the State Department agreed to abandon its tactics of preserving neutrality between Musaddiq and London. ²
Eden was of the opinion that the United State’s co-operation during the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company’s crisis led to the United Kingdom having to offer the United States a share in the new oil consortium. He did not want another American involvement in the Suez crisis which may lead to further United State’s influence in the Middle East, as was the case in the aftermath of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company. As has been mentioned, Eden, during the Suez crisis, was of the opinion that the United Kingdom’s interests in the Middle East were greater than the United States, and that Britain should not be restricted to act by the United States’ reluctance, and should act without their concurrence if necessary.
Following the nationalisation of the Suez Canal by the Egyptian Government in 1956, without consulting the United States, independently Britain proceeded. The United Kingdom, in an Anglo-Franco-Israeli plan launched an attack on Egypt. Thus the conspiracy with Israel and France was the cloak for military action which in the case of Iran was not present.
The Suez military operation by Britain, France and Israel did not succeed.
After the Anglo-Franco-Israeli attack was launched on Egypt the Americans played a leading role in the United Nations in condemning Britain’s role and the Americans demanded British withdrawal from Egyptian soil.
Eden should have learnt from the nationalization of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company and the crisis that followed: i.e. that Great Britain could not act militarily without the United States’ concurrence. The Suez crisis only underlined that Britain could not act without the assistance of the United States. Whereas the Anglo-Iranian Oil Cpmpany’s crisis showed the limited range of action Britain could take. It indicated that the United Kingdom could not act militarily in the Middle East without consultation with the United States
The Suez crisis has been described (by Anthony Nutting amongst others) as having taught Britain “no end of a lesson”. Certainly it demonstrated the limitations of British power in the Middle East. But it is arguable that the Iranian crisis – or crises – of 1950-54 had already laid bare the shaky foundations on which British diplomacy, and her capacity for military intervention in support of her diplomatic aims, rested. The British were, at the bottom, confronted with three choices: to acquiesce in the Iranian Government’ policy; intervene militarily; or to use subterfuge to topple Musaddiq’s government. In the end she pursued, and succeeded in achieving, the third option, but only when the United States of America decided, for her own reasons, to intervene in internal Iranian politics. Moreover, as Eden acknowledged (rather resentfully), America demanded her price for undertaking her new responsibilities in the Middle East. It seems safe to conjecture that this resentment was at least partly responsible for Eden’s decision to by-pass the Americans in 1956. But the Suez crisis only revealed what had been implicit in the Iranian crisis that preceded it: that Britain could not act effectively without American assistance and support; and that she would only get that assistance and support if America identified her own selfinterest as involved, and only on America’s own terms – thus not necessarily to the liking of the British Government.
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- A. EDEN, Full Circle, (London: Cassell, 1960), p. 198.
- Ibid, p. 202.
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