ABSTRACT
EGYPT WAS the ‘swing door’ of the British Empire.1 Lying on the Isthmus of Suez, Egypt controlled the shortest overland route from Britain to British India, the Far Eastern possessions and the Australian continent. Command of the isthmus by a hostile power would have endangered Britain’s control of these imperial possessions. With the loss of the American colonies in 1783, Britain’s eastern Empire, centred on India, greatly increased in importance to it. Napoleon illustrated the centrality of Egypt to British power with his ambitious attempt to capture it and the overland route to India in 1798. While the bid to seize control of the overland route floundered due to Nelson’s victory at the Battle of the Nile, it caused near panic in ministerial circles in London.2
