Oriental Crisis of 1840

Oriental Crisis of 1840
Date summer – November 1840 Location Nile Delta, Beirut, Acre Result Convention of London enforced by allied powers while Muhammad Ali Pasha secures his position in Egypt
Belligerents
United Kingdom  Austrian Empire  Prussia  Russian Empire  Ottoman Empire	Egypt

The Oriental Crisis of 1840 was an armed conflict in the eastern Mediterranean between Egypt and the Ottoman Empire. It was triggered by Wāli Muhammad Ali Pasha's aims to establish a personal empire in the Ottoman province of Egypt.

Origins of the conflict

After a series of political and military successes of Muhammad Ali's forces against the Ottoman Empire to secure his independent rule, an alliance of European powers comprising the United Kingdom, the Austrian Empire, the Kingdom of Prussia and the Russian Empire intervened on behalf of the young Sultan Abdülmecid I.

By the Convention of London these European powers offered Muhammad Ali and his heirs permanent control over Egypt and the Province of Acre (roughly what is now Israel), provided that these territories would remain part of the Ottoman Empire and that he withdrew his forces within ten days from the Syrian hinterland and the coastal regions of Mount Lebanon. The Convention was signed on 15 July 1840 between the United Kingdom, Austria, Prussia and Russia on the one hand, and the Ottoman Empire on the other. The European powers agreed to use all possible means of persuasion to effect the agreement, but Muhammad Ali hesitated, believing in support from France.

Military campaign

In September 1840, the European powers eventually moved from diplomatic means to military action. When French support for Muhammad Ali failed to materialize, British and Austrian naval forces in the eastern Mediterranean moved against Syria and Alexandria.^[1] Alexandria was the port where the Ottoman fleet, which had already defected to Muhammad Ali before, had withdrawn. After the Royal Navy and the Austrian Navy first blockaded the Nile delta coastline, they moved east to shell Sidon and Beirut on 11 September 1840. British and Austrian forces then attacked Acre. Following the bombardment of the city and the port on 3 November 1840 a small landing party of Austrian, British and Ottoman troops (which were led personally by the Austrian fleet commander, Archduke Friedrich) took the citadel after Muhammad Ali's Egyptian garrison in Acre had fled.

Long term results

After the surrender of Acre Muhammad Ali finally accepted the terms of the Convention on 27 November 1840. He renounced his claims over Crete and the Hijaz and agreed to downsize his naval forces and his standing army to 18,000 men, provided that he and his descendants would enjoy hereditary rule over Egypt and Sudan — an unheard-of status for an Ottoman viceroy.^[2] The firmans, subsequently issued by the sultan, indeed confirmed Muhammad Ali's rule over Egypt and the Sudan. He withdrew from Syria, Crete and handed back the Ottoman fleet.

See also

• History of Ottoman Egypt
• History of the Ottoman Empire
• History of Egypt under the Muhammad Ali dynasty

References

1. ^ H. Wood Jarvis, Pharaoh to Farouk, (London: John Murray, 1956), 134.
2. ^ Morroe Berger, Military Elite and Social Change: Egypt Since Napoleon, (Princeton, New Jersey: Center for International Studies, 1960), 11.