Egypt in World War II

Common card · No. 433185

Egypt was a major battlefield in the North African campaign during the Second World War, being the location of the First and Second Battles of El Alamein. Legally an independent kingdom since 1922, and an equal sovereign power in the condominium of Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, in reality Egypt was under the heavy coercive influence of the United Kingdom, a state of affairs that had persisted since the UK had intervened militarily in the Orabi Revolt in favour of Egypt's Khedive, Tawfik Pasha in 1882, subsequently occupying the country. The continuing British dominance of Egyptian affairs, including British efforts to exclude Egypt from the governance of Sudan, provoked fierce Egyptian nationalist opposition to the United Kingdom. Consequently, despite playing host to thousands of British troops following the outbreak of the conflict, as it was treaty-bound to do, Egypt remained formally neutral during the war, only declaring war on the Axis powers in the spring of 1945. Though escaping the fate...

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