The geopolitics of the first British expedition to Egypt – II

Abstract

The departure from Malta on 20 December 1800 of the British commanderin-chief in the Mediterranean, Sir Ralph Abercromby, at the head of 15,000 troops sent to challenge the French army of occupation in Egypt, was the outcome of a cabinet crisis lasting six weeks between supporters and opponents of the British alliance with Austria. Its supporters saw the alliance as the only way to reduce the power of France on the Continent; its critics as a snare, likely to divert money and troops from Great Britain's top priority, the defence of her overseas empire. By 3 October, when a majority of the cabinet decided that Austria was unlikely to prolong the war against France, they also decided that the French must be challenged in Egypt before peace could be made. Otherwise, the stability of the British territories in India might have to be sacrificed during peace negotiations to the weakening of France on the Continent.' One of the differences between the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century states systems was the relationship between Europe and the wider world. Paul W. Schroeder suggests that although the 'prevailing system' allowed and indeed encouraged European expansion in Asia as a legitimate expected activity, wars between European states in the process were forbidden. 'The nineteenth-century international system . . . did stop them.'2 The eighteenth-century international system did not. The European states not only fought one another overseas, across the Atlantic as well as in Asia, they also fought in Europe to win prizes overseas as well as overseas to win prizes in Europe. The role of colonial warfare was to change, rather than to sustain, the relationships between the European states. Although the British cabinet took a calculated risk, therefore, in deciding to send their only strategically mobile force to Egypt, the risk turned out to be greater than they had expected. Great Britain seemed likely by January 1801 soon to be at war with two first-class naval powers at the same time. The British had learned during the war of American Independence how costly this might be and spent the nineteenth century trying to make sure that it should never happen again. Their troops in the