Editing Suez Crisis (section)

===== Nasser and the Soviet Union =====
Instead of siding with either superpower, Nasser took the role of the spoiler, and tried to play them off, to have them compete in attempts to buy his friendship.<ref>{{Harvnb|Gaddis|1998|pp=170–172}}</ref>

Under the new leadership of [[Nikita Khrushchev]], the Soviet Union was making a major effort to win influence in the so-called [[Third World]].<ref name="Gaddis, John Lewis, p. 171">{{Harvnb|Gaddis|1998|p=171}}</ref> As part of the diplomatic offensive, Khrushchev had abandoned Moscow's traditional line of treating all non-communists as enemies and adopted a tactic of befriending so-called "non-aligned" nations, which often were led by leaders who were non-Communists, but were hostile towards the West.<ref name="Gaddis, John Lewis, p. 171"/> Khrushchev had realised that by treating non-communists as being the same thing as being anti-communist, Moscow had needlessly alienated many potential friends over the years in the Third World.<ref name="Gaddis, John Lewis, p. 171"/> Under the banner of anti-imperialism, Khrushchev made it clear that the Soviet Union would provide arms to any left-wing government in the Third World as a way of undercutting Western influence.<ref>{{Harvnb|Love|1969|pp=306–307}}</ref>

Chinese Premier [[Zhou Enlai]] met Nasser at the 1955 [[Bandung Conference]] and was impressed by him. Zhou recommended that Khrushchev treat Nasser as a potential ally.<ref name="Gaddis, John Lewis, p. 171"/> Zhou described Nasser to Khrushchev as a young nationalist who, though no Communist, could if used correctly do much damage to Western interests in the Middle East. Marshal [[Josip Broz Tito]] of [[Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia|Yugoslavia]], who also came to know Nasser at the [[Bandung Conference]] told Khrushchev in a 1955 meeting that "Nasser was a young man without much political experience, but if we give him the benefit of the doubt, we might be able to exert a beneficial influence on him, both for the sake of the Communist movement, and ... the Egyptian people".<ref name="Gaddis, John Lewis, p. 171"/> Traditionally, most of the equipment in the Egyptian military had come from Britain, but Nasser's desire to break British influence in Egypt meant that he was desperate to find a new source of weapons to replace Britain. Nasser had first broached the subject of buying weapons from the Soviet Union in 1954.<ref>{{Harvnb|Gaddis|1998|pp=170–171}}</ref>