Some of the Truth

Ten years ago last week, Egypt's Gamal Abdel Nasser nationalized the Suez Canal and set the stage for the bloody Suez crisis that rocked the world in November 1956. Thereupon, Israel invaded the bleak, sand-blown Sinai Peninsula, ostensibly to destroy guerrilla bases operating against her borders. Then, speaking loftily of "separating the belligerents" and "protecting" the canal, Britain and France ordered Egypt to surrender its control to them; when Egypt refused, they began bombing Cairo and Port Said. In the end, amid the angry protests of the U.S.'s John Foster Dulles and a rattle of rockets from Moscow, the three countries finally withdrew in ignominy.

A question has lingered: Was there collusion among Britain, France and Israel? At the height of the crisis, Selwyn Lloyd, then British foreign secretary, denied any "prior agreement." Two months later, Prime Minister Anthony Eden denied any "dishonorable conspiracy," even claimed that Britain was unaware that Israel was planning an attack. Washington suspected otherwise, and so did just about everyone else, including British Opposition Leader Hugh Gaitskell. "We must wait," Gaitskell counseled. "If there was collusion, the motives of the men who practiced it were so various that they are bound to start giving one another away."

Sure enough. A few years later, stories spread of a secret meeting in Sevres, near Paris, a week before the invasion. Selwyn Lloyd was said to have met French Foreign Minister M. Christian Pineau and Israeli Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, and worked out the full invasion plan in advance. Ben-Gurion himself admitted the meeting, and claimed that the three nations discussed the need for British collaboration because Israel wanted to guarantee the destruction of Egypt's air force. Did the British actually agree?

Fortnight ago France's Pineau finally came forward and confirmed that "definite arrangements" were made at the meeting. "A treaty like the Anglo-French-Israeli treaty," he said on a BBC interview in London, "was necessarily secret, because the circumstances were very difficult." Pineau felt the time for secrecy was past. "I should think that after ten years," he noted, "it would be possible to say more. If my English friends after this period agree to voice all the truths about this question, I should agree." If any of Pineau's English friends were to speak up, it would have to be Eden--now the Earl of Avon--and Lloyd, and last week they both were keeping mum.

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