(narrator) October 29th, 1956.

The Israeli Army invades Egypt.

Tanks and armored vehicles roll over the dunes and rocky gullies of the Sinai Desert.

Mustang fighters fly overhead.

(announcer) Within days, Egyptian forces were completely routed.

(narrator) The world watches, shocked, when a few days later Britain and France join the military strike against Egypt.

(announcer) The stage was set for the next move in the complex Suez situation.

The Soviet Union threatens to bomb London and Paris.

With the Middle East as a source of oil and economic activity which was crucial to the world economy, was seen by both the Soviets and the United States as one of the central battlegrounds of the Cold War.

(President Eisenhower) This country will not go to war.

(narrator) The US refuses to support its traditional allies and urges Britain and France to withdraw.

What had started with the US reneging on a loan agreement with Egypt, seems to be careening into World War III.

We have to defend our territory against aggression, and we insist.

(narrator) At issue is a narrow stretch of water barely 200 kilometers long and just 42 meters wide: The Suez Canal.

The Suez Crisis is a geopolitical thriller.

It's a moment where Britain, France, Israel decide to attack a newly nationalistic and powerful Egypt, all during the midst of a superpower rivalry.

This canal should not remain and the unrestricted control of one government or of one man.

(narrator) By the end of the 100 days of the Suez Crisis, the geopolitical world order will be dramatically changed.

(plane whirring) (MLK Jr.) No man is free... (Churchill) We shall fight on the beaches.

...if he fears death.

(narrator) 100 days can change everything, from major military upsets... Iraq's army is defeated.

(narrator) ...and global crisis... (Churchill) We shall never surrender.

(narrator) ...to moments of hope.

(Reagan) Tear down this wall.

(narrator) These 100 days provide a window into the events that defined modern history.

♪ (suspenseful music) ♪ July 30th, 1956.

Anthony Eden, British Prime Minister, tells Parliament, "No arrangements for the future of this great international waterway could be acceptable to Her Majesty's Government, which would leave it to the unfettered control of a single power, which could exploit it purely for purposes of national policy."

♪ The great international waterway he's talking about is the Suez Canal.

(water sloshing) Constructed in the 19th century, it is an engineering marvel, connecting the Mediterranean with the Red Sea.

The Suez Canal was a vital waterway for Britain.

It was important for trade.

♪ It stopped trade having to go all the way down round the Horn of Africa.

(narrator) Despite running through Egypt, the canal was operated by a corporation, the Suez Canal Company, dominated by Britain and France.

More than 12,000 vessels from over 40 countries passed through each year.

Over half of which are oil shipments.

This is one of the reasons Britain and France have the highest stakes in maintaining control of the vital international waterway.

To be without oil is to see our industries grind to standstill.

(narrator) More than 60 percent of Britain's and 45 percent of France's oil, sourced from the Middle East, are shipped via the canal.

In addition to that, there was concern about access to the British interests in the Far East.

The British wanted to be able to respond quickly to circumstances that could arise.

(crowd clamoring) (narrator) Just four days before Eden's speech, Egypt's President, Gamal Nasser, told cheering crowds, "Some of your fellow citizens have just taken over the canal.

The Suez Canal shall be nationalized.

All company assets shall be transferred to Egypt.

Within Egypt it was wildly popular.

The way in which he was seen to be standing up to the British over the canal, it touched upon the deepest sensitivities of the Egyptian population about a history of being exploited and taken for granted by the British over many, many generations.

(narrator) Nasser offers financial compensation to those with shares in the Suez Canal Company based on the closing share price at the time of nationalization.

For Britain and France, this is not an option.

They want nothing short of the reinstatement of their control.

Public opinion at home is on their side.

In private, Prime Minister Eden is livid.

He dislikes Nasser and the feeling is mutual.

(Dr. Kettle) The relationship with Nasser started cordially.

I think Eden was quite hopeful that they would have a good relationship.

He'd studied Persian and Arabic at Oxford, and so saw himself as an Arabist, and thought that they could be quite a good working relationship.

However, that very quickly turned.

(narrator) For Eden, it's more than just a matter of which country controls the canal.

Historians sometimes debate whether Eden's policy from the outset of the crisis was to unseat or to remove Nasser from power.

It's evident really from the Cabinet Papers themselves that this was a key element of Britain's policy towards Egypt after the nationalization of the canal in July 1956.

Eden, during the course of the Suez Crisis, frequently conjured up this image of Nasser as a kind of Arab Mussolini with his hands around the windpipe of the British Empire, attempting to throttle Britain economically.

So it was a powerful image and it was an image which I think Eden himself took personally very seriously.

(narrator) Eden demands military options: "How soon can the Mediterranean Fleet land commandos at Port Said?"

(bell tolling) (unsettling music) French Prime Minister Guy Mollet is equally outraged by the nationalization of the canal.

Mollet and his cabinet fear that Nasser is building an empire, and by the international community allowing it, are drawing parallels to the appeasement of Hitler in 1938.

In reality, they seek to maintain their own interests in the region, interests that Nasser threatens.

Well, for the British, the primary concern was that this was a step with uncertain consequences for the future of Britain as an imperial power.

(applauding) The French saw it in very similar ways.

They had already suffered through the loss of Indochina.

They had had to withdraw from Tunisia and Morocco, and they were facing an uprising in Algeria.

♪ (narrator) France has occupied Algeria since it invaded Algiers in 1830, and receives agricultural products from the colony.

♪ In 1954, a new nationalist opposition movement emerged in Algeria, which was called the National Liberation Front, the FLN.

Nasser was a supporter of Arab liberation across the whole of the Middle East, and he emerged as one of the key supporters of this movement.

(clamoring) (narrator) One of the rebel leaders, Ahmed Ben Bella, has even been living in Cairo as Nasser's guest, coordinating Egyptian assistance to the resistance.

(Professor Vinen) The French are obviously looking to stop armaments being shipped to the FLN, but they're also, to some extent, looking for a conventional military victory.

(suspenseful music) (narrator) Eden has already been on the telephone to France's Foreign Minister, discussing the need for swift and decisive military action.

(tense music) July 31st.

Hearing of the British enthusiasm for using force, United States President Dwight Eisenhower writes a letter to Eden, trying to dissuade his ally from what he calls, "The unwisdom even of contemplating the use of military force at this moment."

Eisenhower was very keen to pursue a diplomatic route.

This was for a number of reasons.

Firstly, he was on the campaign trail for re-election.

He was also campaigning on a pledge of peace, prosperity, and progress, and that he was going to get US troops out of Korea.

He couldn't do that whilst also at the same time supporting war against Egypt.

(narrator) Eisenhower's letter to Eden glosses over an uncomfortable fact.

The US itself precipitated Nasser's actions.

♪ Nasser has big ambitions for his own country and his region, but the US has recently thwarted those ambitions.

By 1956, Nasser had emerged as the most significant leader in the Arab world.

(clamoring) His reputation really developed after 1952 in the Free Officers Revolution, which was a military coup which removed the King of Egypt and instituted a new republic in Egypt.

But by 1954, Nasser had emerged as the key figure within that group of military officers, and in the next two years, between 1954 and 1956, he achieved a series of diplomatic successes.

(narrator) Nasser's successful regional diplomacy is part of his ambition to unite the Arab world in a pan-Arab coalition, independent of colonial control.

(Professor Saikal) Nasser's brand of nationalism was radical nationalism, and it rested very much on three pillars: Anti-imperialism, anti-colonialism, and anti-Zionism.

(narrator) Key to his ambitions for Egypt, Nasser has been negotiating with the US, the UK, and the World Bank to borrow money for a new dam at Aswan on the Nile River.

Nasser regarded the construction of the dam and the provision of electricity and a modernized agricultural sector as the core development that would enable Egypt to be transformed socially and economically into a modern nation.

The United States initially offered to finance the project as a way to help support Nasser, to make sure that Nasser was a strong leader that was aligned with the United States in the Cold War.

But ultimately, they withdrew that offer, and when they withdrew that offer, Nasser responded by ultimately nationalizing the Suez Canal.

(dramatic music) (narrator) The canal earns $30 million in profit every year.

It can fund building Nasser's Aswan Dam.

Eisenhower suggests Britain holds a conference of nations involved in Suez shipping to come to an agreement.

♪ Eisenhower also knows that if the West doesn't help Egypt, the Soviet Union may be willing to.

Eisenhower's main concern, in terms of his overall global strategy for the Cold War, was: What would happen when the states of Africa and Asia became independent?

Would they align themselves with the Western Bloc, or would they align themselves with the Eastern Bloc?

And one of the main reasons why states such as Egypt were inclined to tilt towards the Eastern Bloc and the Soviet Union was because the Soviet Union was a consistently anti-colonial power.

So to some degree, Eisenhower needed to offer his own brand of anti-colonialism.

(narrator) If Britain made a military response, Eisenhower warns, "I personally feel sure that the American reaction would be severe, and that the great areas of the world would share that reaction."

(applauding) (pensive music) August 2nd.

The British take no notice of Eisenhower's warning.

Following the nationalization of the canal, there was immediate international flurry to sort out the situation diplomatically.

In public, Eden supported this.

In private, however, very quickly military plans were being put in place.

♪ (narrator) Britain's chiefs of staff estimate six weeks to prepare for a military strike.

20,000 reservists are called to duty to be dispatched to the British base in Cyprus.

(whirring) (intense music) ♪ British naval forces move into the Eastern Mediterranean.

(tense music) Israel, too, is strongly against Egypt.

This dislike dates back to 1948, when David Ben-Gurion declared the establishment of the Jewish State.

(announcer) There is cheering and Hebrew dances of joy for a Jewish homeland that has been reborn.

(narrator) Egypt immediately declared war.

(Dr. Mawby) That fighting had come to an end in 1950, but no peace treaty had ever been signed between any Arab state and Israel.

So as far as the State of Israel was concerned, it was still at war with Egypt.

And Egypt, as the largest and most significant military power in the Middle East, was clearly the key challenge to Israeli security and to Israeli sovereignty.

(narrator) Throughout the 1950s, tension between Egypt and Israel remained high.

(representative) Israel should not have any military forces in this area.

(narrator) Palestinian guerrilla fighters, Fedayeen, supported by Egypt, made attacks from Gaza into Israel.

Israel responded with reprisals.

Egypt blockaded shipping to and from Israel by the Straits of Tiran.

(Professor Saikal) Nasser viewed Israel as an outpost for colonial and imperialist powers, and of course he had fought in the 1948 war in support of the Palestinian cause, and he was very familiar with what had precisely happened, and therefore he was a very strong supporter of the Palestinian cause.

(ominous music) ♪ (narrator) France sees an advantage in alliance with Israel.

France secretly approaches Israel.

Would they join in a military attack on Egypt?

♪ Israel says yes.

♪ August 8th.

In Britain, military advisors have been working on strategies to return the canal to British control and remove Nasser from power.

♪ In Egypt, Nasser is aware of the growing threat.

Egypt has substantial forces in the Sinai Peninsula, the desert and mountain region east of the canal bordering Israel.

(planes whirring) Nasser orders his military to draw back from the Sinai and concentrate on the heartland of Cairo, Alexandria, and the Suez Canal.

This leaves the Sinai with only half its previous defenses.

In Britain, the opposition Labor Party are now becoming worried about Eden's militaristic approach.

As the shock wore off and a more careful consideration of what exactly had transpired was undertaken, the political temperature on the Labor Party's side cooled considerably, and there was a strong push toward having the issue handled within the United Nations' context, rather than being subject to military action on Eden's part.

(narrator) Parliament is no longer united behind Eden.

This is a matter of life and death to us all.

(regal music) ♪ (announcer) Lancaster House, London, naturally attracted quite a crowd on the opening day of the Suez Conference.

(narrator) August 16th.

In public, Britain and France take Eisenhower's suggestion of a conference.

24 countries using the Suez Canal for shipping are invited to London to discuss its operation.

(Eden) The occasion for calling it must rank among the greatest that any of us have had to face since the Second World War.

(narrator) Egypt refuses to attend.

(tense music) "Why should any foreign nation have a say in operating its national asset?"

♪ Despite the Soviet Union and India opposing, the US convinces 18 countries to support international operation of the canal.

(Lloyd) We believe that the plan which 18 countries endorsed is a good plan, it's fair to Egypt, and will provide the security of the future free navigation of the canal.

Australian Prime Minister Robert Menzies, a senior figure in the Commonwealth, is given the job of selling the plan to Nasser.

Menzies headed a delegation including an American representative, Loy Henderson, and several others who, indeed, met Nasser and presented these ideas from the conference.

(narrator) September 7th.

Under the proposed international plan, Egypt will receive all the profit from the canal, so Nasser will have money to build the Aswan Dam, but an international consortium will operate it.

Menzies says, "It is a fair and, indeed, generous settlement."

-Uh, Japan.

-Nasser responded by saying he rejected their proposals as another form of imperialism, and there the matter effectively ended.

(grim music) (narrator) September 8th.

While the conference ticks away, Britain and France work on secret military plans.

France is also separately making plans with Israel.

♪ And Israel is making its own plan: Operation Kadesh.

In the Hebrew Bible, Kadesh is the place in the Sinai where the Israelites stayed with Moses following the Exodus from Egypt.

(engine whirring) The Israelis see an omen in the fact that the man who will lead them to Egypt, General Dayan, has the same first name.

The Hebrew for Moses is Moshe.

(dramatic music) ♪ September 20th.

French representatives travel secretly to Tel Aviv.

♪ Impressed with the well-trained Israeli military, they formally propose a joint Anglo-French-Israeli military operation.

(Dr. Bowker) It was initially conceived as a means of regaining control of the canal, but more importantly, to inflict upon Nasser such a humiliating military defeat as to cause the collapse of his regime.

♪ (narrator) September 26th.

A few days after the French visit, the UK, France, and Egypt take the Suez matter to the UN Security Council, which meets on the day that British Chancellor Harold Macmillan visits President Eisenhower in Washington.

♪ They have a long chat, but don't discuss Suez directly.

Macmillan interprets this to mean the US won't stand in Britain's way if they use force against Egypt.

(contemplative music) October 5th.

The strain is starting to take a toll on Prime Minister Eden.

(cameras snapping) Having been in poor health since a botched gall bladder operation in 1953, Eden spends this weekend resting in hospital.

♪ (engines whirring) ♪ October 12th.

The UN's Secretary General Dag Hammarskjöld has come up with a list of six principles that he thinks are the basis for a peaceful resolution.

♪ The essential elements of the six principles were quite acceptable to the Egyptians.

They referred to free transit through the canal, which the Egyptians had already undertaken to provide.

It spoke of Egyptian sovereignty, rather than the London Conference's suggestions about restoring international control over the canal.

It talked about setting tolls by agreement between Egypt and the user countries.

(Hammarskjöld) The door that has been opened can be kept open given restraint on all sides.

(narrator) October 13th.

The UN Security Council adopts Dag Hammarskjöld's six principles.

So there was an opportunity, it seemed, in the middle of October 1956 to resolve the conflict, and certainly the British Foreign Secretary at the time, a man called Selwyn Lloyd, believed that some progress had been achieved at the UN.

(Lloyd) The acceptance of the six principles means that Egypt has nearly accepted part of the basis upon which the (inaudible) proposal put forward.

(Dr. Mawby) The French were much more skeptical about this idea, and they were particularly hostile to Nasser and particularly skeptical about the possibility of the six principles negotiations actually resolving the conflict.

(narrator) October 14th.

3:00 PM.

Afternoon tea time at Chequers, the British Prime Minister's country retreat.

Anthony Eden has two visitors: French Minister of Labor, Albert Gazier, and General Maurice Challe.

The French have a plot in mind to legally justify military action against Egypt.

The plot had to begin with Israel's attack upon Egypt.

(suspenseful music) What it allowed for was for Britain and France to call upon the 1954 Suez Base Canal Zone Treaty, and state that the Suez Canal was under potential attack from a foreign invader.

(narrator) Eden can see how an Israeli attack could legitimize the planned Anglo-French invasion.

By drawing upon this, they could use it as a pretext to send troops back in and regain control of the canal to protect it against the Israelis.

(narrator) He says he will consult with his ministers.

(energetic music) October 16th.

Eden comes back with some conditions.

He wants Israel to invade Egypt by November 1st.

Leaving it later risks bad weather in the Mediterranean.

The invasion force will need to use British bases in Malta and Cyprus.

The US is holding its presidential election on November 6th.

Britain wants the war to happen while Dwight Eisenhower is still in office.

Israel and France agree to Eden's conditions: War before November.

(pensive music) October 20th.

It's meant to be a quiet day for the British Foreign Office.

Foreign Secretary Selwyn Lloyd has told his staff he's at home with a cold.

But he's not.

He's secretly sneaking into a private villa in Sèvres.

♪ And so from the 22nd to the 24th of October, a secret conference was held at Sèvres in which the Israelis, under Ben-Gurion, the French, and the British hammered out a very detailed plan for military operations.

(narrator) The three-nation plan is called Operation Musketeer, after Dumas's novel The Three Musketeers.

The agreement is typed up in triplicate in the villa's kitchen.

Within a week they hope to have deposed Nasser and seized the canal.

The men celebrate by popping champagne.

This had to remain a secret.

Britain wanted plausible deniability.

♪ (narrator) October 23rd.

The world's attention is diverted from the Suez Crisis when students and protestors take over the Hungarian Parliament in Budapest.

(bell tolling) The protestors use the radio station to broadcast demands.

(intense music) They want Hungary free from Soviet control and to have a democratic political system.

The key thing to remember about Soviet policy is that the Suez Crisis took place at exactly the same time as a reform movement emerged in Hungary to challenge the Communist government.

♪ (narrator) October 24th.

♪ The Red Army enters and occupies Budapest, clashing with protestors, as the Soviets seek to forcefully quell the revolutionaries.

(gunshots firing) Protestors are hopeful that the US will intervene.

But while the US issues statements condemning the violence, no action is forthcoming.

(announcer) We can certainly set down today that the use of armed might by the Soviet Union to repress legitimate demands of the people of Hungary is something which is shocking to the whole world.

(engine whirring) (unsettling music) (narrator) October 25th.

Britain's negotiators return to London with their copy of the Sèvres Agreement.

Prime Minister Eden is incensed and burns the British copy in the fireplace at Number 10.

(Dr. Bowker) Eden was deeply distressed to learn that the Sèvres Protocol had been committed to paper, asking the French and the Israelis to destroy or hand over their copies of the document.

The French refused and the Israelis had already left with the document carefully in Ben-Gurion's pocket.

(narrator) Israel secretly mobilizes its forces and prepares to move to the Egyptian border.

(engines whirring) (ominous music) October 28th.

The US is spying on Britain.

♪ They suspect the UK, France, and Israel are planning to act against Egypt.

And sure enough, the US had the U-2 spy plane and it was taking photographs of the region.

♪ Eisenhower ordered more flights as they realized there was an Israeli military build-up on the border with Egypt.

So U-2 planes are telling Eisenhower, "Something's going on.

There's an attack coming."

(narrator) President Eisenhower, again, cautions Britain and France and writes to Israel Prime Minister Ben-Gurion to refrain to any action which could lead to hostilities.

By so asserting this belief, we are taking a step to preserve the peace.

(narrator) The French and British ambassadors say they know nothing about any proposed military action.

(dramatic music) October 29th.

2:00 PM.

Israel launches raids of F-51 Mustang fighters over the Sinai Peninsula, cutting off communications amongst Egypt's military bases on the peninsula.

(whirring) 3:00 PM.

The 202nd Paratroop Brigade crosses over the Israeli border and enters the Sinai Peninsula.

♪ They're led by a young lieutenant colonel, who will later become Israel's Prime Minister: Ariel Sharon.

Sharon's battalions drive across the rocky desert towards the Mitla Pass, a high, narrow gap in the mountain ranges of the Sinai.

♪ It's just 65 kilometers from the Suez Canal.

♪ One of the important things to remember is that the British themselves had helped shape Israeli military planning by shifting their attention from the southward push towards the Straits of Tiran, and insist that there should be a move westwards, which would menace the Suez Canal.

♪ (narrator) The Israelis clash several times with Egyptian units.

(whirring) The vehicles struggle in the sand and rocky defiles.

(suspenseful music) Paratroopers land close to the Mitla Pass and establish a forward location.

Egypt has no armored units on the peninsula that can counter Sharon's advance.

Nasser learns of the attack that evening.

♪ He and his military advisors can't work out what Israel's intentions are.

Is this a pretext for Israel to invade Jordan?

Or are they trying to draw Egyptian forces south to then invade in the north?

♪ Nasser sends infantry units to block the strategic Mitla Pass.

He also sends armored divisions back across the Suez and more infantry to protect the southern oil fields.

(contemplative music) ♪ October 30th.

The world is in outcry over the Israeli invasion.

♪ The UN calls for an immediate cease-fire and for Israel to withdraw to its own territory.

At 6:00 PM that evening, the British and French ambassadors in Cairo and Jerusalem deliver their own ultimatum: An immediate cease-fire, and Egypt and Israel to keep their troops at least 16 kilometers back from the canal.

Egypt must also allow Anglo-French forces into the country to ensure the safety of shipping.

Israel and Egypt are given 12 hours to respond.

As agreed at the secret Sèvres meeting, Israel accepts the ultimatum.

They're still further away from the canal than 16 kilometers anyway.

Israel can accept the ultimatum and still keep advancing through the Sinai.

(suspenseful music) As predicted, Nasser rejects it.

The fighting continues.

In a rare example of Cold War agreement, both the US and the Soviet Union submit resolutions to the UN calling for an end to fighting in the Sinai.

(representative) Failure, it is all too transparent.

The UK and France vetoed both resolutions.

-Peaceful outcome.

-Eden denies Britain had any advance knowledge of Israel's actions.

♪ The Tripartite Pact is, officially at least, still secret.

♪ 10:30 PM.

Ariel Sharon's ground forces have driven all night and all day across the desert.

They've lost many vehicles and field guns to dunes or Egyptian attacks en route.

10:30 PM, they rendezvous with the advance paratroopers at Mitla Pass.

(dramatic music) ♪ October 31st.

British Parliament is starkly divided on Eden's response to the Suez situation.

The opposition, led by Hugh Gaitskell, condemns the proposed military action as, "An act of disastrous folly whose tragic consequences we shall regret for years."

The press and public are also much less keen.

(woman) I think there should be a way to calm out out without all this fighting.

(narrator) Eden's own conservative party, however, still presents a unanimous front, supporting military action.

(engine puttering) Israeli troops venture into the Mitla Pass and are ambushed by Egyptian troops.

The resulting battle is very bloody, but heavily favors Israel.

(intense music) Israel now controls this strategic point and can spread across the entire Sinai Peninsula.

(Dr. Bowker) The Israeli action encountered rather less opposition than they had been expecting because Nasser, anticipating the attack, had withdrawn most of his forces from the Sinai itself.

As a result of that, the Israelis arrived at the designated point before the canal a day early.

(narrator) The Anglo-French ultimatum to Israel and Egypt expires.

Egypt has not accepted the cease-fire.

As planned at Sèvres, Israel has provided a reason for Britain and France to attack.

Now, they do it.

In the Mediterranean Sea, a French vessel fires on an Egyptian destroyer.

(blasting) (suspenseful music) At 7:00 PM, French and British bombers attack Egyptian airfields, destroying planes on the tarmac.

(exploding) They ran out of useful targets fairly quickly, and then proceeded to try to silence the Egyptian radio stations, which were broadcasting Egyptian propaganda in response to the attack.

(narrator) Nasser calls an emergency meeting with his advisors.

He orders his military to withdraw from the Sinai back to the west bank of the canal.

(tense music) Nasser wants his forces close by in case he needs to defend the Egyptian heartland.

♪ In the US, Eisenhower is angry that Britain has not heeded his warnings.

(Eisenhower) Our policy will envision all peaceful methods and devices.

So what is clear is that Eisenhower decided very shortly after the British and French attacked that he wasn't going to allow them to triumph, he wasn't going to allow them to simply take out Nasser, which would enrage countries around the world, not just in the Middle East.

(narrator) In retaliation for the British and French bombings, Nasser orders all 40 ships that are currently in the canal sunk.

Nasser's response, by blocking the canal, placed enormous leverage at his disposal in pressuring the British and the French to withdraw their forces once it became apparent that the Americans were not going to support the attack.

The precious waterway is now impassable.

(ominous music) ♪ (announcer) London's Trafalgar Square, traditional place for political rallies in Britain.

(narrator) Public support for the attack on Egypt has turned.

It started to show on British television.

(broadcaster) Britain and France in a joint sea-and-air invasion attack.

(Dr. Kettle) They saw ports and towns being destroyed and that impacted the public support.

This was a time of national service, so people at home didn't really understand why Britain was at war with Egypt, and why their brothers, their sons, their friends, their husbands were in a country far away fighting a war that they did not understand.

(man) Well, I think probably we should've moved some troops in there, but we haven't actually made a declaration of war.

First Sea Lord, Admiral Mountbatten, tries to get Eden to stop the planned British landings and bombings.

"We'll be plastered around the world as assassins and baby killers."

Eden refuses.

(dramatic music) The Northern Sinai Peninsula is now in Israeli hands.

Israeli Army units halt their advance 16 kilometers east of the Suez Canal.

They turn their attention to the Gaza Strip, hoping to clear the area of Palestinian and Egyptian forces.

♪ Canada suggests that the UN will need to be more hands-on.

They need a peacekeeping force of their own.

This has never happened before.

♪ Dag Hammarskjöld asks Canada to make a plan for UN armed peacekeepers.

♪ November 4th.

Canada's ambassador to the UN, Lester Pearson, and Dag Hammarskjöld submit their plan for an inaugural UN peacekeeping force.

♪ The Soviet Union votes against UN peacekeepers who might well be sent to other hotspots.

For example, in Eastern Europe, where Soviet tanks are rolling into Budapest.

(clamoring) In less than a week, Hungary will be back under Soviet control and the leaders of the uprising captured and eventually executed.

♪ At noon, Gaza formerly surrenders to Israeli forces.

♪ (tense music) November 5th.

Britain and France commence their land invasion.

♪ British parachute regiments land at El Gamil Airfield just after dawn.

They secure the airfield in just 45 minutes, and then move east towards Port Said.

♪ (Dr. Kettle) It took a lot of fighting.

♪ The Egyptians had put on plain clothes and handed out weaponry to all of its citizens, claiming it to be a people's war.

♪ (narrator) Strategic targets fall quickly.

French forces take Port Fuad.

♪ Sharm El Sheikh surrenders to Israeli troops.

(clattering) (somber music) Around the world the response was one of consternation.

♪ Not a single NATO-member country supported the British and the French in the actions that they took.

(engine whirring) The reaction among the Arab world at this revisitation of colonial behavior on the part of the British, the reaction of the Non-Aligned countries, who had been supportive of Nasser, from China to Tito's Yugoslavia, to Sukarno's Indonesia, was that this shouldn't have been allowed to happen.

The Soviet people believe discussions should be started between the belligerents.

(narrator) Up until now, the Soviet Union has been taking action via the UN, but now Premier Nikolai Bulganin gets involved.

(intense music) He writes to his British and French counterparts that, "The Soviet Government is fully committed to resorting to the use of force to restore peace in the Middle East.

If Britain and France do not cease hostilities, the Soviet Union will fire rockets on London and Paris.

♪ The Suez Crisis is bringing the world to the brink of nuclear war."

♪ The UN General Assembly agrees to form their own army of peacekeepers.

Major General E.L.M.

Tommy Burns of Canada will be the Chief of Command, heading a multinational force of 6,000 troops.

This is not, however, an invasion force, so Egypt must invite the UN troops in.

♪ Burns travels to Cairo to negotiate with Nasser.

♪ (plane whirring) (pensive music) November 6th.

Election day in the US.

(clamoring) ♪ President Eisenhower is running for a second term with Richard Nixon as Vice President.

And one of the reasons why he'd been so hostile and so shocked by the British action was that it undermined his campaign as a peace candidate against the Democratic candidate, Adlai Stevenson.

(Eisenhower) I will continue to work for peace in the world.

That's for sure.

But the election itself turned out to be the triumph.

Was one of the great landslides of presidential history.

Eisenhower secured a second term in office.

(Eisenhower) Let us unite for the better future for America, for our children and our grandchildren.

(applauding) (narrator) As America welcomes another term of President Eisenhower, Britain and France continue their amphibious and air assault, landing marines at Port Said.

(dramatic music) The strategic town is taken by late afternoon.

♪ The intention is to continue south and secure the entire canal.

(engine whirring) But back in London, stomach for the fight is wavering.

♪ So briefly what happens during the crisis is a run on the pound sterling.

♪ Speculators selling sterling in the belief that the British economy is going to come under pressure if the Suez Canal is blocked, the balance of payments is going to be damaged.

And normally in that circumstance, the United States would step in to help Britain.

(narrator) But the US Federal Reserve has, in fact, been selling off pounds, increasing the financial pressure to force Britain to pull out of Egypt.

The Bank of England lost a significant amount of money, we're talking millions of pounds, in those first few days of the military operations.

As a result, the British Government applied to the International Monetary Fund for assistance, and the US blocked any actions to support the UK in getting the requirements that they needed.

(narrator) Under such sustained and universal pressure, Prime Minister Eden agrees to a cease-fire and to the prompt withdrawal of British and French troops.

This will be overseen by the First United Nations Emergency Force, who maintain a presence on the Sinai Peninsula until 1967.

(Eden) All my life I've been a man of peace, working for peace, striving for peace, negotiating for peace.

There are times for courage, times for action, and this is one of them in the interest of peace.

(narrator) The US releases its hold on the International Monetary Fund.

Britain will get its loan to short up the pound.

(Dr. Mawby) The British and French military forces managed to get two thirds of the way down the canal by the time of the cease-fire on the night of 6th of November.

From their point of view, that was regarded as a substantial military success.

But any sense of military victory was completely undermined by the diplomatic failure of the crisis.

(narrator) Around 200 Israelis, 26 British and French, and 3,000 Egyptians have been killed.

♪ The Suez Crisis is over.

Egypt retains control of the canal, but it will takes months to clear the scuttled ships.

♪ Canal operations will only resume in March 1957.

I do hope we've learned from all this.

(narrator) The Suez Crisis profoundly changed the world order.

It was the end of empire as far as the British were concerned.

(Dr. Kettle) No longer was it this great power who was infallible.

(Dr. Bowker) So far as the French were concerned, it marked another step toward the end of their imperial role in North Africa.

(narrator) With colonial influence severely eroded, countries that Britain and France had once controlled asserted their independence.

For Nasser, the Suez Crisis was a triumph.

(Professor Ashton) The Egyptians hadn't performed particularly well militarily and Suez had been routed by the Israelis, but that didn't really matter in terms of perception on the Arab street.

It was Nasser who had stood up to the might of the British Empire.

Let us believe that any small country can raise war.

(narrator) For Anthony Eden, the crisis was crushing, both to his reputation for foreign policy savvy and to his health.

(Dr. Mawby) He went to Jamaica in order to attempt to recover, but on his return it was evident that his doctor believed he couldn't continue with the job of prime minister, and so he opted in January 1957 to resign.

(narrator) France's Guy Mollet followed him out of office in June.

Algeria secured its independence in 1962.

(cheering and applauding) Nasser's friend, rebel leader Ben Bella, became Algeria's first president.

(cheering) Israel's attack on Egypt further enflamed the country's Arab neighbors, intensifying tensions.

Conflict would break out again in 1967 with the Six-Day War.

(Nixon) There is a desperate need and a great yearning for peace.

(narrator) The crisis prompted the US to become far more engaged in the Middle East.

On January 5th, 1957, the President announced what would be called the Eisenhower Doctrine: Economic and military support for the Middle East.

(Eisenhower) We are ready to end the present hostilities in the area.

Vital to the security of the United States and to the free world.

(narrator) Nasser got his Aswan Dam.

Using money from the Suez Canal and loans from the Soviet Union, construction started in 1960.

It produced its first hydroelectricity seven years later, around the same time that the UN peacekeepers finally left Egypt.

(uplifting music) The vast lake that the dam created is called Lake Nasser.

(birds chirping) ♪ (dramatic music) ♪ (bright music)