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THanks Howard.
Alexander, I flaming well know where Egypt is. But, in an effort to help you be better informed I will expand the historical panorama for you further. As I said to Andy, none of this is made up, none of this is spin, it is ALL verifiable historical fact, if you care to research for yourself.
When the Ottoman Empire began to collapse the European vultures circled overhead. That'll be Russia, France, Austria, Germany and Britiain to you. In order to protect the communication route to India we grabbed Egypt on the basis of a. keeping the French out, and b. a promise to sort out the collapsing Egyptian adminstration. We also grabbed Cyprus. Both were taken as we had given up on our alliance with Turkey and no longer saw the loss of Constantinople as a threat to India.
Taking Cyprus was to enable our fleet to be nearer the Suez Canal as the nearest station at that time was Malta.
Britain had embarked on 'passive' African expansion at that time and it was deemed important to hold the lands through which the Nile flowed. Ergo, we needed to position ourselves in Egypt in order to take Sudan (and get revenge for the death of General Gordon), Uganda and Kenya in addition to some states in West Africa, notably Nigeria. A far greater landmass was conceded to the French but it was considered mainly desert and therefore worthless.
Germany had a foothold in East Africa, but they were more interested in places like Heligoland which we ceded to them in exchange for for a large part of German East Africa.
This type of stuff was going on throughout the period after Waterloo and prior to the Great War, and places like Bosnia-Herzogovina, Bulgaria and Romania were treated as mere chattels by the stronger European nations. For a good deal of the time between Waterloo and the Great War, Britain sat aloof to the shenanigans and kept itself ready only to intervene if war looked likely or needed someone to help negotiate the peace.
The point I am making is this. Only by being at the top table and having a big say in affairs of Europe are we ever likely to make it work for us, as historical evidence shows staying away tends to lead to the continentals arguing and our troops being killed while trying to sort out the mess, or, at best, Britain missing out on something critical for the nation.
I don't understand or appreciate your accusation of being a New Labourite. I don't tell lies or spin the truth, which, if you or Andy or anyone else for that matter checks, all that I've posted on this subject is easy to verify. I do however admit to being a European of British decent and I therefore wnat the best for my country. I passionately believe that to be acheivable IN Europe as opposed to OUT of Europe.