The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money, and Power

by Daniel Yergin

Nasser was angry, humiliated, and eager for revenge. The tolls from the canal, he thought, could be used to finance the Aswan Dam; the hated symbol of colonialism in his midst would be exorcised. On July 26, he gave a speech in the same square in Alexandria where he had, as a boy, for the first time joined a demonstration against the British. Now, as leader of Egypt, he repeatedly heaped calumny on the name of de Lesseps, the builder of the canal. It was no mere history lesson. “De Lesseps” was the code word to the Egyptian military to move; by the time the speech was completed, the army had seized control of the Canal Zone. The Suez Canal had been expropriated. It was a resounding and daring act. Tension rose swiftly and dramatically in the immediate aftermath of the seizure. In England, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Harold Macmillan, echoing the foreshadowing of his beloved Victorian novels, wrote apprehensively in his diary, “There was last night and through today, the most violent gale I ever remember.” In Cairo, Nasser, deciding that he needed to escape from the mounting tension, slipped off to the Metro movie theater to see Cyd Charisse in Meet Me in Las Vegas. Now followed three months of diplomatic circus and futile efforts to work out a compromise. In mid-September, the British and French pilots who had continued to guide ships through the canal were withdrawn on the instructions of the Suez Canal Company. The job was considered to be at the pinnacle of the mer...