British Diplomatic Oil Crisis: Contemporary Anglo-Saxon Geopolitical Rivalries in the Persian Gulf: Drawing a Lesson? Or Sir Anthony Eden‘s Delusion of Grandeur.

Britain
had tried to keep up with theme [the USA and the USSR], but
now, in the age of the hydrogen bomb, if we try to do so we shall
bankrupt ourselves.18

In view
of the weak British economic position, the British
Government wanted America to play a leading role for the defence of
the Persian Gulf, since the United States declined to join the
Baghdad Pact. As has already been said, containment of the Soviet
Union and preventing her from reaching to the oil-rich Persian Gulf,
was the concern of Britain as well as the United States. In the
British Government’s view, the United States should understand that
the British position in the Persian Gulf was for the defence of
Western interests, which included the United States’ oil interests.
According to the British Foreign Secretary, Selwyn- Lloyd:

We should
seek to obtain American understanding of our position in
the Gulf as the best guarantee of Western interest there including
that of the United States oil companies.19

Though
the United States did not join the Baghdad Pact, as has been
mentioned earlier, to reaffirm her willingness, however, to
intervene in the Persian Gulf zone if necessary, in January 1957,
President Eisenhower set forth the Eisenhower Doctrine. The
Eisenhower Doctrine was, sending the United States’ military forces
to any part of the Middle East to combat overt armed aggression from
any nation controlled by international communism.
20 Eisenhower put his proposal to the
Congress, and received their approval. Between $400 and $500 million
were to be disbursed in two years in the form of