Peter, imagine a world in which a furious American president stages an intervention

connected to a crisis and conflict in the Middle East that has seismic implications for the

configuration of global power and triggers a massive economic crisis.

You're not going to tell me they're like London buses. You don't see them for decades and then suddenly everyone's talking about them all at the same time. Give me a few more clues, Alfred. Let me guess. Does it lead to economic meltdown, destruction of ideas about the role of the West, the idea that imperialism is alive and well? Is that all part of the same story or am I barking out

the wrong tree? It's almost like you know something about the Suez crisis of 1956 Peter,

or more specifically, the economic shock it triggered, because this is our series on economic

shocks and you cannot do a series on great economic shocks without looking at Suez.

And Peter, tell us why.

Well, we've talked about the rises and falls of empire many times. Also, where do you benchmark it?

Last time we did 1915 and the Dardanelles, the British Empire, she reached its highest, largest

point in September

1923. There's an excellent book by my friend Matthew Parker about this. The empires can keep

growing even after you think that they haven't. But I know that you think, Alfred, that Suez marks

the exact moment where the British Empire officially dies. Tell me why you think that.

It's not so much in literal terms, because you're quite right, Peter, that wasn't the end of

the British Empire and it didn't collapse overnight. But it was definitely the end of an idea of

what British imperial power represented, this kind of limitless capacity for Britain to rule the world.

This, for me, was certainly the moment that narrative lost credibility.

It was almost like the Emperor's new clothes where the rest of the world suddenly noticed

that the Emperor was actually naked.

And for Britain, it was a brutal reality check showing them and France as well that they could no longer act like the

19th century imperial superpowers they still thought they were. But that's the problem, but in the

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