ABSTRACT
THE LABOUR GOVERNMENT entered office with the declared intention of improving relations with the Nasser regime. In June 1964, the shadow Colonial Affairs spokesman, Arthur Bottomley, commented on the Anglo-Egyptian crisis and suggested that it was in reality a Conservative party-Nasser clash:
The fact is that the Tory Government has had no Middle Eastern policy since its disastrous Suez adventure. Whether we like it or not, Colonel Nasser is the dominating Arab leader and it is futile to ignore him ... We must recognise that the Arabs are not anti-British but anti Home, Lloyd, Butler and the other ‘guilty men of Suez’.1
