The real Suez crisis

Since this book is intended above all to put the 1956 crisis back within a framework that has existed since 1869, and since the influence of the crisis is still being felt, the account could be developed only in the following manner: What we call "The Clouds Gather" includes the story of Egypt's political evolution and its consequences for the Compagnie Universelle du Canal Maritime de Suez (later known as Compagnie Financière de Suez) in the ten years preceding the crisis. These first four chapters are followed by a summary of the company's attitudes toward the West and its own reputation on the eve of the crisis. The story of the "storm" itself, while it cannot ignore the attitudes of Egypt, Great Britain, and France, or of the United States and several other countries, will be told essentially from the point of view of the company. In the end, the consequences pose two main questions: Is the damage now repaired? and Won't the repercussions, by no means near an end, stay with us? - Introduction. It is just as well that Jacques Georges-Picot did not write what the promotion material claims he wrote: the history of the Suez Canal crisis of 1956, about which there are three dozen scholarly monographs. He wrote instead a personal account of the role of Compagnie Universelle du Canal Maritime de Suez in the 1956 affair. This he is qualified to do since he was a high official. His work is both a memoir of the company that ran the canal and a record of his activities on its behalf. He eulogizes the 87-year-old corporation, and condemns those countries which allowed or brought on its demise: the United States ("the Eisenhower-Dulles team") for indirectly encouraging Egypt (Gamal Abd-al Nasser) to nationalize the company, and Britain (Sir Anthony Eden) and France (Guy Mollet and Christian Pineau) for abandoning it. Georges-Picot seems to be more concerned about the rights of the company's shareholders and the canal's international navigators than about the national interests and politics of half a dozen involved countries. That is not unusual, however. Officials often view international events through the narrow prisms of their positions. Consequently, Georges-Picot's memoir tells us little about the Suez Canal crisis, but a lot of limited interest about his company's role in it. - Kirkus Review.

Beyond its central premise, the book can be read through the connected lenses of Nonfiction. Those themes offer useful points of attention as the characters, ideas, or world develop, especially where the book complicates the expectations of its primary category.