Hi John,

I was looking at all the signs in the Heavens at the moment, 3 comets and
the upcoming transit of Venus. The last time the transit of venus occurred
was 1882 which was the year Britain took control of Egypt for a very similar
basis of logic as the US may yet use this year to take ongoing control of
Iraq.
__
Thanks for the info, Chris.
John

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http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1908cromer.html
Modern History Sourcebook:
The Earl of Cromer:
Why Britain Acquired Egypt in 1882, (1908)

This is the Earl of Cromer's (first British Viceroy of Egypt) account of why
the British took over Egypt. It is also a  good example of Political
Imperialism - i.e., we don't really want the damned place but if we don't
someone else will grab it and the whole balance of power will be mucked
up....
Egypt may now almost be said to form part of Europe. It is on the high road
to the Far East. It can never cease to be an object of interest to all the
powers of Europe, and especially to England. A numerous and intelligent body
of Europeans and of non-Egyptian orientals have made Egypt their home.
European capital to a large extent has been sunk in the country. The rights
and privileges of Europeans are jealously guarded, and, moreover, give rise
to complicated questions, which it requires no small amount of ingenuity and
technical knowledge to solve. Exotic institutions have sprung up and have
taken root in the country. The capitulations impair those rights of internal
sovereignty which are enjoyed by the rulers or legislatures of most states.
The population is heterogeneous and cosmopolitan to a degree almost unknown
elsewhere. Although the prevailing faith is that of Islam, in no country in
the world is a greater variety of religious creeds to be found amongst
important sections of the community.
In addition too these peculiarities, which are of a normal character, it has
to be borne in mind that in 1882 the [Egyptian] army was in a state of
mutiny; the treasury was bankrupt; every branch of the administration had
been dislocated; the ancient and arbitrary method, under which the country
had for centuries been governed, had received a severe blow, whilst, at the
same time, no more orderly and law-abiding form of government had been
inaugurated to take its place. Is it probable that a government composed of
the rude elements described above, and led by men of such poor ability as
Arabi and his coadjutators, would have been able to control a complicated
machine of this nature? Were the sheikhs of the El-Azhar mosque likely to
succeed where Tewfik Pasha and his ministers, who were men of comparative
education and enlightenment, acting under the guidance and inspiration of a
first-class European power, only met with a modified success after years of
patient labor? There can be but one answer to these questions. Nor is it in
the nature of things that any similar movement should, under the present
conditions of Egyptian society, meet with any better success. The full and
immediate execution of a policy of "Egypt for the Egyptians," as it was
conceived by the Arabists in 1882, was, and still is, impossible.
History, indeed, records some very radical changes in the forms of
government to which a state has been subjected without its interests being
absolutely and permanently shipwrecked. But it may be doubted whether any
instance can be quoted of a sudden transfer of power in any civilized or
semi-civilized community to a class so ignorant as the pure Egyptians, such
as they were in the year 1882. These latter have, for centuries past, been a
subject race. Persians, Greeks, Romans, Arabs from Arabia and Baghdad,
Circassians, and finally, Ottoman Turks, have successively ruled over Egypt,
but we have to go back to the doubtful and obscure precedents of Pharaonic
times to find an epoch when, possibly, Egypt was ruled by Egyptians.
Neither, for the present, do they appear to possess the qualities which
would render it desirable, either in their own interests, or in those of the
civilized world in general, to raise them at a bound to the category of
autonomous rulers with full rights of internal sovereignty.
If, however, a foreign occupation was inevitable or nearly inevitable, it
remains to be considered whether a British occupation was preferable to any
other. From the purely Egyptian point of view, the answer to this question
cannot be doubtful. The intervention of any European power was preferable to
that of Turkey. The intervention of one European power was preferable to
international intervention. The special aptitude shown by Englishmen in the
government of Oriental races pointed to England as the most effective and
beneficent instrument for the gradual introduction of European civilization
into Egypt. An Anglo-French, or an Anglo-Italian occupation, from both of
which we narrowly and also accidentally escaped, would have been detrimental
to Egyptian interests and would ultimately have caused friction, if not
serious dissension, between England on the one side and France or Italy on
the other. The only thing to be said in favor of Turkish intervention is
that it would have relieved England from the responsibility of intervening.
By the process of exhausting all other expedients, we arrive at the
conclusion that armed British intervention was, under the special
circumstances of the case, the only possible solution of the difficulties
which existed in 1882. Probably also it was the best solution. The arguments
against British intervention, indeed, were sufficiently obvious. It was easy
to foresee that, with a British garrison in Egypt, it would be difficult
that the relations of England either with France or Turkey should be
cordial. With France, especially, there would be a danger that our relations
might become seriously strained. Moreover, we lost the advantages of our
insular position. The occupation of Egypt necessarily dragged England to a
certain extent within the arena of Continental politics. In the event of
war, the presence of a British garrison in Egypt would possibly be a source
of weakness rather than of strength. Our position in Egypt placed us in a
disadvantageous diplomatic position, for any power, with whom we had a
difference of opinion about some non-Egyptian question, was at one time able
to retaliate by opposing our Egyptian policy. The complicated rights and
privileges possessed by the various powers of Europe in Egypt facilitated
action of this nature.
There can be no doubt of the force of these arguments. The answer to them is
that it was impossible for Great Britain to allow the troops of any other
power to occupy Egypt. When it became apparent that some foreign occupation
was necessary, that the Sultan would not act save under conditions which
were impossible of acceptance, and that neither French nor Italian
cooperation could be secured, the British government acted with promptitude
and vigor. A great nation cannot throw off the responsibilities which its
past history and its position in the world have imposed upon it. English
history affords other examples of the government and people of England
drifting by accident into doing what was not only right, but was also most
in accordance with British interests.