While Second World communism was suffering from fissures, the Third World was further united by a bit of First World bumbling. After Nasser nationalized the Suez Canal, France and Britain invaded—against Washington’s wishes—to reassert control of the waterway and oust the Egyptian leader. They were joined by the young state of Israel, whose creation had been supported by both Washington and Moscow, but eventually had to back down because of US pressure. Despite Eisenhower’s anger with the new Jewish state, Washington steadily increased support for Israel from the middle of the 1950s for Cold War reasons. It was the nascent alliances between the USSR and radical Arab nationalist regimes, we know now, that formed the basis for a growing US-Israel alliance.6
Is this true? It seems very detached from reality and no sources are given aside from a note that is kinda irrelevant to the question. Since when was the US "angry" about the foundation of Isntreal and since when was the USSR a supporter of it or even neutral to it at all? This feels like bullshit
This is a pretty standard summary of the Suez crisis tbh. Geopolitics is weird, and sometimes leftists make major L's, like the USSR supporting the creation of Isreal, based on a misapplication of the national question. The world isn't a simple "good guy/bad guy" Marvel movie-ass binary.
If you want a really fucked up example, look at the Biafra War
Given that this is just general background on the Suez crisis, that kind of "general knowledge" typically don't require citations, but making the claim "The suez crisis formed the basis for a growing US-Isreal Alliance" is a claim that needs backed up. Hence why that's the sentence that gets a footnote.
So, if I'm writing a book about the world system of the late 18th century, and I say "In 1776, The American colonists declared independence" give some background information, and then proceed to make a claim about the impact that independence had on, global trade. Then I need to back up the claim about global trade.
The background on The american war of independence is just that, background, and doesn't require citations. Because there's a presumed general knowledge that if you're reading this book, you won't need that explained to you.
Out of curiosity, what's the footnote in question? What does it say?
Yeah it sucks that the USSR supported something that has turned out so ridiculously bad but I can understand that this wasn't obvious at the time and geopolitics can be very hard especially when you're up against imperialist powers who hate your existence.
This is the footnote:
Ok, yeah this makes sense. This footnote is backing up the "suez crisis formed the basis for a growing US-Israel Alliance" claim, by pointing to a separate historian who's making the same claim (Since of multiple people came to the same conclusion then you can argue that the evidence points to that interpretation of the facts of the case).
And the explanation given by the other author gives two reasons:
Ihe US didn't want to invade, in order to paint itself as more restrained than the Soviets, re: the Invasion of Hungary.
Israel could serve as an imperial outpost, and thus a check on Arab leftists, like Nasser, in lieu of an invasion.