The Conservatives in power: Egypt and the Sudan 1951–53

Abstract

The relatively short, but very heated party batde over the Anglo-Egyptian agreement on the Sudan proved a watershed in backbench opinion. It provided the catalyst for the ‘Sudan Group’,¹ from which grew the active and extremely vocal faction, the Suez Group. The furore over the proposed agreement was the most serious revolt Churchill’s government had yet faced, coming on top of internal wrangling over transport policy, commercial television and government expenditure. The party was already excited by Egyptian truculence over Britain’s future in the Suez Canal base, die strategic importance of which was believed to have increased with the tension of the Cold War, and it was well known on the backbenches that Churchill was at loggerheads with his Foreign Secretary in Cabinet on Eden’s Egyptian policy.