Ridley, Norman When the World stood on the Brink of Nuclear War

Superpower Face-off. The Suez Crisis and the Hungarian Uprising

The post-war world was dominated by the US and the USSR, but the events of 1956 exposed their limitations. On 22 October 1956, after Egyptian leader Gamal Abdel Nasser nationalised the Suez Canal, British Prime Minister Anthony Eden secretly met with French and Israeli politicians in Sevres, France. They agreed that Israel would invade Egypt, while Britain and France would intervene under the guise of peacemaking to secure control of the canal and overthrow Nasser. On 23 October, far from the Middle East, hundreds of thousands of demonstrators in Budapest protested against Soviet occupation and tore down statues of Stalin. The uprising escalated when the Soviet Red Army intervened, leading to twelve days of violence, thousands of deaths and injuries, and 250,000 Hungarians fleeing their country. Britain and France withdrew from Suez after nine days of fighting, their ambitions thwarted by international pressure and the closure of the canal. The US and the USSR sought to influence these events. The US, preoccupied with domestic elections and the threat of Soviet nuclear retaliation, was unable to support the Eastern European movements. The Soviet Union's actions during the Hungarian uprising weakened its global standing. Norman Ridley's analysis shows how these crises highlighted the limits of the superpowers' influence. Despite their nuclear strength, the US and the USSR faced challenges they could not overcome, highlighting their mutual difficulties in shaping the post-war world order.