Summary
British journalist, son of Sir Winston Churchill, whose book The Rise and Fall of Sir Anthony Eden (London: MacGibbon & Kee, 1959) is the chief published source quoted in Chapter 7 of Peace, Peace, When There Is No Peace for the collusion behind the Suez war: the French Defence Ministry’s September 1956 approach to Israel, the joint staff work from 1 October, and the two French-manned squadrons at Lydda — Churchill himself uses the word “collusion” for the Israel–France connection, while praising Israel and blaming Anthony Eden’s hesitancy for the attack’s failure (Peace, Peace, When There Is No Peace, PDF p.324, p.327-330).
Details
- Churchill argues that when Britain and France received no satisfaction from the United Nations, “what conceivable pretext would be left to them to intervene in Egypt? What pretext could there be, save an attack by Israel upon Egypt?” (pp.256-258 of his book) (Peace, Peace, When There Is No Peace, PDF p.325).
- On the secret 16 October Paris meeting he records that France had already made its own arrangements with Israel: on 20 September two representatives of the French Defence Ministry went to Israel proposing French air and naval support for an Israeli attack on Egypt, accompanied by direct Anglo-French intervention, with a date early in November suggested (pp.263-264) (Peace, Peace, When There Is No Peace, PDF p.327).
- The military staffs of France and Israel “began work on their joint project on October 1”; representatives of Defence Minister Bourgès-Manoury visited Israel and General Dayan came to Paris twice during October (pp.264-265) (Peace, Peace, When There Is No Peace, PDF p.328).
- Churchill went to Israel on 7 November 1956 with Ed Murrow and relates that two squadrons of the Escadron Dijon — thirty-six aircraft manned by French pilots — had been flown to Lydda airport in the last week of October, supplying the air cover that freed the Israeli-manned Mystères for the front-line battle; on the evening of 5 November he found “an uproarious party proceeding in the Dan Hotel, at which some twenty French pilots were being fêted” (pp.272-273) (Peace, Peace, When There Is No Peace, PDF p.329-330).
- The translator’s footnotes record that passages attributed to Churchill’s book in the Hebrew version, via Yedioth Aharonoth (2/12/58) — including a French “now or never” ultimatum to Ben-Gurion and the claim that Israelis knew RAF bombers would “take care of” Egyptian airfields — could not be found in the original English editions of the book (Peace, Peace, When There Is No Peace, PDF p.327, p.330).
Related pages
Peace, Peace, When There Is No Peace, Anthony Eden, Operation Sinai, Robert Henriques, France