ENGLAND AND THE SUEZ CANAL.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 5122, 23 August 1877, Page 3

ENGLAND AND THE SUEZ CANAL.

(From the Saturday Review.) Englishmen will naturally direct their chief attention to, and will speculate on, what rules ought to be laid down with regard to the Suez Canal. A question on this subject was asked in the House of Commons, and Sir Stafford Nortbcote answered that England could not possibly abandon in the time of war her right to send through it the troops she might want ; to place in India. No other answer could be given. If, when we are at war, we are not to send troops to India, we should debar ourselves from making the only use of the Suez Canal which is of real importance to us. But then, if our ships are to pass in time of war through the Suez Canal, we could not expect our enemies not to try to prevent them from passing. Let us suppose that we are at war with France, and that France held Egypt as France held it in the time of Napoleon. It cannot be imagined that a French army would line the banks e! the Canal, and remain calm and contented while they saw our ships go by under their noses. They would fire on the passing vessels, and it would be impossible to contend that they were trespassing beyond their belligerent rights in doing so. They would also try in every way to bar the passage. They would lay down torpedoes, or simply sink a ship at the entrance of the Canal. This sinking of a ship at the entrance of the Canal is really by far the greatest danger we have to fear. It it is not very likely that the French or any other Continental nation will get possession of Egypt; but if we were at war, a very inferior maritime Power might succeed in barring the Canal for a time by closing the entrance. We might perhaps try to induce all maritime Powers to agree to rule that the Canal should never be closed in this way, but we could hardly hope that they would really observe the rule in time’ of war. Nor is there any very obvious reason why other maritime Powers should accept such a rule. It would be a rule made exclusively for the benefit of England. As the Suez Canal is a highway of universal trade, the natural rule in the interest of Europe would be that .it should be preserved as a highway, whether in peace or war, and that no vessels of war belonging to a belligerent should pass through it. Even without any rule being laid down, it might seem as if any belligerent had a right to call upon Turkey to fulfil the duties of a neutral, and to close to the ships of all belligerents the passage through an artificial ditch made exclusively on Turkish territory. But England declines to permit anything of the sort ; necessity compels her. She must send her troops through the Canal without regard to the neutrality of Turkey or the commercial interests of other nations. She is strong enough to do it, and she frankly tells the world that she is going to do it. If she thus uses the right of the stronger—and there can be no doubt that she has no choice and must use it—there seems very slight hope of persuading other nations to agree that, if they are at war with her, they will put no obstacles in her way. She cannot have the bargain all on one side; and that the bargain would be all on one side if she might send troops through the canal in time of war, and her enemy was pledged not to stop her using this privilege, is sure° to ,be pointed out to her if she tries to negotiate with the object of procuring such an engagement. She must rely, not on negotiations” but on her navy. If she holds the entrance to the canal in force, she can permit, and of course would permit, the vessels of neutrals to use the canal although war might be going on. But it is the English navy which would make the arrangement possible, just as

it is the English navy which makes it possible to establish the claim that English troops'shall be sent to India in time of war through neutral territory, ’ ■ .- ,